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video card, is it good

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 12:27 pm
by Hippo
I currently have a 32mb tnt2 nvida riva video card with tv out, it sux! I bought GTA3 and it plays like crap because of my crappy video card. the game works well on my friends 16mb something or other but not mine so im getting a new video card but this time I'd like to find out if its any good before i buy it. I'm thinkin of a Kyro 3D 64MB 2x/4x AGP Video Card with TV Out so please send me what u think of it.

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 2:05 pm
by sbp
I would advise on getting a faster, more feature rich videocard. A GeForce 4 Ti4200 or Radeon8500 fit the bill and doesn't break the wallet.

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 2:49 pm
by Hippo
i went on newegg and those were 100+ the kyro one is 36$ i just want it to be able to run GTA3 smoothly

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 5:11 pm
by FlyingPenguin
If money's that tight I'd recommend buying a Geforce2 MX 400 than a Kyro and they should be going for around $50 at Newegg.com

ALSO you didn't list your system specs. What processor are you running? If your processor is the bottleneck, buying a new vid card isn't going to help.

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 5:24 pm
by Hippo
i have an AMD AthlonXP 1800+

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 5:36 pm
by Hippo
o yea i didn't post who made my card before and i have its full name its a:
Number Nine NVIDIA RIVA 32MB TNT2 M64 AGP Video Card. Anyway does it matter who makes the Geforce2 or are they all the same?

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 5:38 pm
by Hippo
are NVIDIA and nVIDIA different companies?

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 5:55 pm
by Hipnotic_Tranz
no, they aren't different companies. Good luck getting GTA3 to run smoothly, there are peeps here on the board that have awsome machines and can't even run the game smoothly. If you ask me, they did a horrible conversion from the PS2.

I have a 1.4GHz machine w/256mb DDR and a 64meg Radeon 8500 and it still runs a little slow when it rains (I have it on 1024x768@32-bit color, draw distance at it's lowest) I would run it on a lower resolution but when I do everything just looks blurry for some reason. So my advice is to not buy a card solely on the thought of playing this game at it's max resolution because chances are you still won't be able to :)

http://www.pcabusers.net/forums/showthr ... adid=19103

Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2002 6:05 pm
by Hippo
i run it at a crappy resolution i dont care about how it looks i just want to play!!!!

Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 7:06 pm
by dadx2mj
I hate to say it but you get what you pay for. You buy a $36 card you will get $36 worth of performance. Save some money and get something better at least a GF 2 Pro or better

Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 10:17 pm
by FlyingPenguin
REALLY. With a nice CPU like that I'd save up for a better vid card - that's your only bottleneck right now. With that TNT2 holding you back you might as well have a Pentium2 400 in that computer for 3D video gaming. The CPU is contantly waiting on the card.

I understand money might be tight, but a Geforce2 GTS can be found for $60 (you might find one cheaper used on the trader forum here). But even that card would be holding you back.

I'd consider AT LEAST a Geforce3 Ti-200. Newegg.com has the Chaintech for $102 shipped. That would be a lot of performance for very reasonable money.

Better would be a Geforce4 4200 for around $150.

Some of the ATI users here can recommend Radeon cards in the same performance/price ranges if you feel like giving one of them a try.

Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 10:38 pm
by Hippo
thanks for the help everyone...what company should make this gforce card because i see that multiple companies put them out and i deff dont want to get stuck with another pos

Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 11:10 pm
by nexus_7
Visiontek is usually pritty good.

Greg

Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2002 12:45 pm
by FlyingPenguin
Geforce is made by many companies. Visiontek has always been good by me, and they're reasonably priced. Chaintech tend to be least expensive and they're okay from what I've heard but I've never owned one.

Asus makes very good ones but they're pricy.

Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2002 10:14 pm
by Hippo
are there other good companies....is PNY good?