I'm planning to buy a new videocard, but the problem is: which one?
I'm searching for the best videocard to use on my system. How do I know if my computer can handle a very good videocard?
You will probably need some data of my computer, but where can I find that?
Thanks already.

I know dxdiag will give you some basic specs for your PC.

Click the Start Menu, then click on "Run"

in the Run window, type in:




Then click OK.

Then tell us what info it gives you on the first page.


Anyone know of a program that'll tell us about whether he has PCI, PCIe, or AGP slots?

I think evest will tell you what kind of expansion slots you have. but most everybody has a PCI slot.

If everst doesnt say what style exp slots you have it will give you your mobo model # and brand and you can google the # and brandto find your mobo specs

Alright there's 2 things I need to know:

What kind of motherboard do you have (and how many PCI/PCI-E x# slots do you have)?

How much are you willing to spend?

I got a nVidia 8800 GTX 768 mb in this one and it's REALLY high performance and I love it, only problem is it takes up a lot of space and it costs ~650 dollars.

Grr..8800 GTXs.
They also have a smaller version of it with a water cooling thing on it, but it costs 150$ more.
The also have a 8800GTS for ~460

On your request Amazing Andrew (I couldn't copy or translate it properly so I took a screenshot):



And about the motherboard, it may be included in my picture, but if it isn't where can I find that, same for the PCI slots? (not good with the inside of the computer )
And about the money to spend... well... not sure about that, I just want a perfect videocard for my computer, but I don't want to pay €200+ (1 Euro = 1.3192 U.S. dollar) on that and not going lower than 256Mb.

Looks like you have a fairly dated computer with an AGP slot.
With a system that old I wouldn't put anything more than a 6600GT. That will let you play games from about a year ago somewhat comfortably, but if you want to play the newer stuff you'd be much better served saving your money for a new system, or saving for a system overhaul instead of buying older parts.

Just from looking at the conversation here, you can get an Nvidia 6800GS in either AGP or PCI-E....it's a 256mb card, and is quite fast...try to by an "OC'd" (overclocked) version, as it's memory speed is 1000mhz...a little faster than the standard, or "not overclocked" version.

I also think that you'd be happy with a 6600GT as arcman has suggested. It's only a 128mb card, but it too comes in an "OC'd" version, and has nice clock sppeds (overclocked core at 400mhz and memroy at 1000mhz if I remember right), so it'll run a lot of games in default (normal) settings easily.

You could also get the ATI equivelant if you're an ATI fan. Not sure what it would be though

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the help everyone, I'll try to get my hands on a good videocard with your advise.

I've seen 256MB 6600GT's. I'd highly suggest getting one of these 3 cards. A X800 ( Get a XL or XT ) 6600GT, ( My friend has had one, served him well) or a 6800. But you'd have to have the required power supply.

For that you'd have to open you case and check the model and power rating, you'd probably want at least 350 watts and maybe 20 Amps on the 12V rail.

Get the X800 GTO
Bestest AGP card on newegg for the price.
It used to be the 6800GS but they discontinued it!

Thanks for the info about the videocard, it looks good to me. The replys seem good too .
It saids $134.99 , thats about €102, how about the shippingcosts to other countries? Is it the same for all countries ($6.13 --> €5.6)? And what does the "HI, AK and PR" mean (sorry if its very obvious). As I live in Belgium, it might be included with one of those three...

Newegg doesn't ship internationally, so you'll want to find a different reseller, preferably one local to EU. that would be a decent card for you, though.

Thanks anyway, but no problem, I found a new site which the owner is very close to me. They seem to have a videocard I'm looking for. If you want to see it, here's the link:
http://www.compu-star.be/index.php?page=2&Id=327

Yeah, I think that would be a very good card with a big performance boost to your system. That card also has some eye candy like SM3 (i think)

I'm usually a nvidia fan, but for your system, i would recommend the ati radeon x800\x850. It doesn't have SM3 (which is required to play some of the newest games) and some of that stuff, but it has more raw power and will squeeze more framrates out of your slightly older system.

Remember that if you get something too good, it will only run as fast as the other parts of your system will let it (bottleneck). Such as you would not be able to tell that much of a difference between the 6800 and 7600.

You might be better of with this one: http://www.compu-star.be/index.php?page=2&Id=329 The 6600GT core is noticeably better than the normal 6600.

I'll think about it mr Alpha but I'd prefer a 256Mb, thanks for the help though, I might change my mind.

I agree with Mr Alpha. A quick comparison of the 6600 (256mb ram) and the 6600GT (128mb ram) shows the following speeds:

6600 256mb: Core speed = 300mhz
memory speed = 500mhz

6600GT 128mb: Core speed =500mhz
memory speed =1,000mhz




In a nutshell, while the 6600 might have more memory, the 6600GT is (as Mr Alpha stated) considerably faster. It's no big deal how much ram you have if your card isn't fast enough to handle (run) a game. It's like a cadalac racing a porsche.....just because the cadalac is bigger and has more room, it doesn't mean it's faster!

Just some food for thought!

So if I understand it well, you mean the 128Mb will have better preformance on my computer than the 256Mb videocard?

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm going to say yes Although the 256 one has more memory, it's slower memory. The 128 one has less memory (nothing like pointing out the obvious! ), it's faster memory, so it'll "process' everything quicker.

In reality 256MB would be better. But if you compare the speed of the memory and Core on 6600GT to the normal one, the 6600GT will be much better.

The amount of video ram his new card has isn't going to be the bottleneck on his system by a long shot. Just stick with the faster GPU/VRAM.

With slightly older cards like this, there really wouldn't be too much of a difference between 128mb and 256mb and like mentioned before, it wouldn't be able to even really use all 256mb anyway. I saw a test similar to this comparing a radeon 9600xt 128mb and 9600xt 256mb. No performance difference at all. Definately go for higher core\mem speeds (6600gt)

Thanks for the help everyone, I'll buy that videocard this week. I really appreciate the help.
(This topic can close since I have dicided.)