Looking to upgrade my system. Your thoughts?

[Jonathan Berry]

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005 12:03:21 -0500, Robert Spangler
<bms at zoominternet.net> wrote:
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> On Friday 11 March 2005 23:44, Jonathan Berry wrote:
> 
> >  > I'm looking to upgrade my system with the following;
> >
> >  Looks like a nice system.  I would advise against the ATi graphics
> >  card, but I'm a little partial to nVidia, they seem to be doing a
> >  better job at supporting Linux than ATi at the moment.  I can tell you
> >  that my nVidia card (GeForce 440 Go) works just fine with the binary
> >  drivers.  I've also seen an FX5200 work with the binary drivers
> >  (though I don't recommend the card, your better off with a MX 440 (or
> >  4000) or with around an FX 5700).  This is with 64-bit Linux of
> >  course.  You won't get 3D accelleration from the open source drivers
> >  for nVidia or ATi (on their newer cards).  ATi might work, especially
> >  if you don't care about 3D, but I'd expect you to have more problems.
> >  Other specs look fine.  You might look at an nForce chipset (3 for
> >  AGP, 4 if you want to look at PCI-Express graphics) for comparison.
> >  The K8T800 should work fine, though.
> 
> I have a nVidia card now, TNT2, that is giving me all kinds of troubles.  The
> nVidia drivers just don't work anymore since the moved to the 2.6 and that is
> one reason why I was thinking of moving to ATI.  That and the fact that I
> have that ATI card laying here not being used at the moment.

Yeah, that is an old card.  It isn't supported by nVidia's driver anymore:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/IO_18897.html
Since you already have the ATi card, you won't loose anything to try it.

> OK, so if I wee to stay with nVidia what card would you say would be the best
> with 256MB and not break the bank?  I don't game much but when I do I would
> like to have the 3D working.  Heck I haven't play Tux Racer in a while now
> because the 3D isn't working. :(

Well, if you want a 256 MB card, then your options are a rather
limited.  As far as AGP cards go, it looks like you can get an FX 5200
or FX 5500 with 256 MB RAM for < $100 from www.newegg.com.  For < $150
you could also get an AGP 6200 or 6600.
The FX 5500 would probably be a pretty good card for your needs.  From
the reviews I have read before, it sounds like the FX 5700 is where
the 3D performance really starts to be impressive in the FX series. 
But the consumer reviews on newegg make this sound like a pretty good
card.  The FX 5200 might also meet your needs, but I have not been
impressed with it.  Also, the 5200 cards are about the same price as
the 5500 cards.
I don't know much about the 6000 series cards.  I know the 6800 is
about twice as fast as the previous generation cards that were out
when it first hit reviews.  So I'd guess that the 6200 and 6600 would
probably be very solid cards.  But in your case, unless you would want
to do some serious gaming, I'd say the extra cost would not be worth
it.
What you might do is try things with the ATi card that you have (no
money spent doing this) and see what you can get to work.  If you
aren't satisfied with that, then I'd suggest looking at an nVidia FX
5500 with 256 MB.

Jonathan