Video card help

[ghost_warlock]

Recently I picked up Champions Online and have been enjoying my (limited) play time on the game immensely. The problem is, my video card is old and unsupported (came factory-installed on my 5+ year-old refurbished desktop). As a result, when I try to load the game it gives me an 'unsupported video card' warning and gives me the option of running with reduced or defaut settings, with the caveat that the game may have trouble running.

For the most part the game runs fine. As I'm really not too concerned about graphics, I don't mind that the game isn't as beautifully rendered as some screenshots I see. Still, every once in a while, my video card fails and the game freezes, forcing me to hard-restart the computer to exit. :smallfrown:

So, I'd like to replace my video card to something that is actually supported by the game so I don't have this problem any more but I know next to nothing about video cards. I've browsed on newegg and tigerdirect but, like I said, I'm really lost when it comes to finding what I'm looking for.

Because Champions is really the only game I'm playing I'd prefer not to spend a lot of money, maybe setting a soft cap of ~$50. I'd like to replace my whole system sometime in the next year or two, but that'll have to wait until my finances are a bit better.

So, any suggestions?

P.S. posted in Games (Other) rather than FB because I figured this would the place to ask for advice on what is, primarily, a computer-gaming issue.

[OracleofWuffing]

Can you give me a bit more information about your computer? Maybe there's a service tag code on the back or something, if it's a Gateway or Dell (and I believe HP), that might give us all the specifications we need. At the very least, you might be able to go into your Device Manager (Right click on My Computer, Properties, and on the hardware tab), and see what you're using for a display adapter. You might actually be using integrated graphics, which means you may have a slot open for a video card that you're not using.

Generally speaking, you're looking for a PCI video card, that's the simplest (and usually cheapest) route to take. Be careful not to look for a PCI-Express card, as that's quite different. At your computer's age, it is possible that you're using an AGP-based card, though what AGP speed your computer can handle will be a problem. Since you'll have PCI slots as well as one AGP or PCI-Ex slot, getting a PCI card will go around the which-slot-you-have issue, without opening your computer. However, which form factor of PCI card you're looking for is also going to be an issue, whether you want a full-size or mid-size depending on your computer's chassis.

[ghost_warlock]

My system is a Gateway 700GR (http://support.gateway.com/s/PC/R/3726/3726nv.shtml). Specifications (http://support.gateway.com/s/PC/R/3726/3726sp27.shtml).

Card is ATI Radeon X300 SE (128 MB PCI-Express).

[Willis888]

This site (http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=85&card2=548) is great for comparing video cards.

This one for $87 is about eight times faster than your current card:
GeForce 8800 GTS 512mb (http://cgi.ebay.com/MSI-NVIDIA-GeForce-8800-GTS-512-MB-PCIe-2-0-x16_W0QQitemZ150377889050QQcmdZViewItemQQptZPCC_Vi deo_TV_Cards?hash=item2303387d1a&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14)
It is above the Recommended stats for Champions.

This one for $60 is almost as good:
RADEON HD 3850 (http://cgi.ebay.com/Diamond-ATI-RADEON-HD-3850-PCI-E-512MB-OC-Video-Card_W0QQitemZ120475112083QQcmdZViewItemQQptZPCC_V ideo_TV_Cards?hash=item1c0ce05293&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14)
It is the Recommended card.


Also, you could pick up a second gig of RAM for $20 (http://www.1stchoicememory.com/catalog/products.asp?id=2225&r=p). Windows wants about 1/2 a gig, and Champions wants one full gig to be available. Right now you only have one to share between windows and Champions.


The 8800 vid card would fit right into a new gaming rig, but the kind of RAM you need for your current machine is less than ideal and will likely not be compatible with a newer/faster rig.

[ghost_warlock]

I already upgraded to the max of 2gigs of RAM a while ago. I got the memory free by harvesting parts out of my cousin's old computer. :smallwink:

Honestly, I want to avoid spending $60-90 on a video card. My cousin suggested I get this card (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3515269&CatId=1826). Within my price range and apparently somewhere between the minimum and recommended cards. All I'm really looking for is for the game to run without crashing, so the minimum requirements would be good enough for my purposes.

[factotum]

You could get a 9400GT from the same site for about $3 more, and I think that would be a fair bit faster. Still not a barn burner by any means.

Thing is, buying a substandard graphics card is fine if you never intend to play anything other than Champions Online, but if you get the urge to play something else, you'll rapidly run into the limitations of the cards you're talking about.

[ghost_warlock]

You could get a 9400GT from the same site for about $3 more, and I think that would be a fair bit faster. Still not a barn burner by any means.
From what I understand of my system, it doesn't support PCI Express 2.0 so I'm stuck with the 1.0 x16 cards.


Thing is, buying a substandard graphics card is fine if you never intend to play anything other than Champions Online, but if you get the urge to play something else, you'll rapidly run into the limitations of the cards you're talking about.
Substandard is fine as I'm something of a specialist - I haven't been much of a gamer for years and when I do buy into a game I tend to stick with it for a long time. I still play Final Fantasy Tactis on my PS1, after all. :smallwink: (Incidentally, the PS1 was the most recent console system I've purchased.)

Hopefully, by the time a new game comes along that I'm actually interested in, I'll have upgraded my whole system...which will probably be in a couple years.

My cousin and another friend are excited about the Star Trek MMO, but I'm not at all interested in ship customization so I'll pass on that one. I also hate PvP so I'm completely uninterested in Aion. My gf has Sims 3 on her laptop so if I ever feel the urge to 'upgrade' from Sims 2 on my computer, I'll just play on her laptop. That pretty much runs the gamut of games I'm interested in right now. Well, I was intrigued by Diablo III, but I'll just stick with Champions for now as I never really progressed very far in the previous Diablo games anyway.

[Erloas]

I would go with a ATI 4650 such as this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150393

Sits right at your limit and it is a lot better then the 8400/9400 Nvidia cards. It is listed as PCI-E 2.0 but they are backwards compatible, so that isn't an issue.