Bald said:
Strikes me that the implied "dump your crap and buy a new computer"
approach is the insensitive one, not mine.
My HP came with a 250 watt psu.
Ok.
I put a 420 watt in
it.
Why?
Before that,
So it solved the problem without buying another whole computer?
my 256mb ATI did nothing but slow things down.
They make more than one, you know, and there are manufacturers other than
ATI. Point being, just because you had a problem with whatever the heck it
is you bought doesn't mean every kind of card in every kind of computer
will have the same problem.
The
performance became so slow that the icons on the screen would take forever
to replace the default icons. Instead of their appearing instantly, I could
watch them appear one by one.
That's certainly a problem. Got any idea what caused it and why? Because
there's nothing about using a PCI card, in general, or it having 256Meg of
memory that would just naturally lead to that.
And I could go on with other examples, but I
won't.
So far all I know is you had a problem but plenty of people use PCI video
cards, including me, with no trouble at all.
The OP is going backwards,
Your assessment of what constitutes forward and backward appears to be
based on a false conclusion derived from an unidentified problem you had
with unspecified equipment.
so you don't need to try to get him to go forward
by using the same computer with a video card that cannot even be used to it
fullest potential on that old computer.
A PCI card can be used to the fullest potential of a PCI card. That's what
they are and why they're made.
The OP was talking about chaning out
motherboards,
He talked about multiple solutions of which changing motherboards was one
but, clearly, his primary goal was to put in a PCI video card and his
modest expectations seem reasonable.
but some of the questions he asked strongly suggests that he
should not be fiddling inside his computer.
Lack of knowledge does not necessarily mean incompetence and everyone
started out ignorant.
Buying a newer system might be the best way to go for the OP.
It's certainly the easiest solution for those with money to burn.
The risk to a PCI upgrade is whether the improvement would be enough to
justify it and, personally, I wouldn't look at $200 cards.