Graphics card advice

[Dino M]

I am buying a new PC system and the graphics card that is installed is a
nVidia 8500GT 256MB PCI-E Graphics Card.

I currently have a Radeon 9600 in the system I have at the moment and I
would like to know which is the better card, as the Radeon is about 2 years
old.

I was not sure to leave the graphics card that comes with the system or take
it out and install the Radeon 9600, but I do not know anything about them,
as I had the Radeon 9600 installed as a couple of games I wanted to play
(Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 and FIFA) required a 3D card.

Any advice would be helpful and thanks to anyone that can help.

 

[kony]

I am buying a new PC system and the graphics card that is installed is a
nVidia 8500GT 256MB PCI-E Graphics Card.

I currently have a Radeon 9600 in the system I have at the moment and I
would like to know which is the better card, as the Radeon is about 2 years
old.

I was not sure to leave the graphics card that comes with the system or take
it out and install the Radeon 9600, but I do not know anything about them,
as I had the Radeon 9600 installed as a couple of games I wanted to play
(Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 and FIFA) required a 3D card.

Any advice would be helpful and thanks to anyone that can help.

First, is the Radeon 9600 an AGP or PCI Express card? I
would suspect it is AGP so it will not be compatible with
the new motherboard.

Second, if gaming is important then return the 8500GT for a
refund (or sell or reuse it for another system if necessary)
and buy a faster video card. 8500GT and 9600 are both slow
cards by today's gaming standards and will seem even slower
in the next year or two. However your games are not
terribly demanding of the video card, so all that really
matters for these two is whether your cards have acceptible
framerates. Since you already had the 9600 and now have
the 8500GT, you can directly compare them to see if the
framerate is high enough.

Which is the faster card doesn't necessarily matter, if both
play the games you want to play but neither is fast enough
for more demanding games. However, 8500GT is significantly
higher performing than Radeon 9600.

 

[Dino M]

First, is the Radeon 9600 an AGP or PCI Express card? I
would suspect it is AGP so it will not be compatible with
the new motherboard.

Second, if gaming is important then return the 8500GT for a
refund (or sell or reuse it for another system if necessary)
and buy a faster video card. 8500GT and 9600 are both slow
cards by today's gaming standards and will seem even slower
in the next year or two. However your games are not
terribly demanding of the video card, so all that really
matters for these two is whether your cards have acceptible
framerates. Since you already had the 9600 and now have
the 8500GT, you can directly compare them to see if the
framerate is high enough.

Which is the faster card doesn't necessarily matter, if both
play the games you want to play but neither is fast enough
for more demanding games. However, 8500GT is significantly
higher performing than Radeon 9600.

Kony, I would just like to say thanks for your advice. I just wanted to know
if the 8500GT would be OK to play the games I play. I do have a couple of
other games (Call of Duty and The Godfather) and if it will play these games
OK then it is fine, as the Radeon has been fine, so if the 8500GT is a
slightly better card then the system will be fine.

I am not that technically minded so I thought I would ask on here, as it was
just that if the Radeon that I already have was a significantly better card
and it was compatible, then I would have used that instead.

Thanks again Kony

 

[kony]

Kony, I would just like to say thanks for your advice. I just wanted to know
if the 8500GT would be OK to play the games I play. I do have a couple of
other games (Call of Duty and The Godfather) and if it will play these games
OK then it is fine, as the Radeon has been fine, so if the 8500GT is a
slightly better card then the system will be fine.

I don't know it's performance on these games, but you might
seek online benchmarks of those titles. As you wrote, since
the 9600 performance was acceptible, so should the 8500GT be
acceptible, even better.

 

[Dino M]

if your budget allows then you need to step up to at least the 8600 gts
the 8800 gts card is a much better choice but the 8500 gt cards are very
low performance. at least the 8600 gts has more piplelines and other
specs that are better suited for fps and decent framerates. the 8800
series even if its the 320 mb cards are a few steps up from the 8600.
hope this helps

The card I stated (the 8500) comes fitted as standard with the pc system
that I have bought. I have been told that the 8500 will run as well, if not
slightly better than the graphics card I have at the moment, as that has
been more than adequate for me then the 8500 should be fine for me.

Thanks for the advice though.