Newbie Advice

[Scottler]

Hey everyone.

I'm a retard when it comes to the technical aspect of computers, so I'm asking for some help here.

I am considering upgrading my video card, but because I am going to be working on my PPL in real life, I don't want to spend 3.7 million dollars doing so.

What's the best card you would buy, yet spend as  little money as possible doing so,  to put in a PC with the following specs:

P4 2.0Ghz
640MB RAM
20GB hard drive (I know, it's not huge.  I don't need it to be.)

Thanks!

[ATI_7500]

ATI 9500pro. good performance ,low price. and forget the Gf FX 5200,it's much too slow.

[Scottler]

Cool, I'll look into it thanks!

[ozzy72]

Well its a question of budget Scott. The Ti4600s have taken a price drop recently, and I've got one and swear by it.
In both FS2k2 and CFS3 the performance is awesome! CFS3 is smoother than a cashmere codpiece, and FS2k2 is simply fantastic, all the sliders maxed, resolution at the limit! Wow

Mark

[Scottler]

I'll look into that one as well, Mark.

[Scottler]

Crap, I looked at two tonight and I can't remember which they were.

One was the ATI 9000, and the other was.....hmm  It came in an X shaped box too. lol

Either of those any good?  (for the price.)

[Tchkinjiu]

  If you change your mind...  ::)  If you have an AGP slot you could get the most powerful one out there. Oh...around... $500?  ;D

The GeForce 5900 Ultra 256MB.

Ultimate. Don't have one though. Heres hoping.  ;D

[Scottler]

$500?  I don't mind spending $500 on something if it's worth it, but that's nearly 5 hours of instruction!  lol  I don't need THAT much for a game.  (Though it's tempting.  haha)

[Tchkinjiu]

Very tempting!

Oh and if you want a before and after thing, check out this from Alienware.

http://www.alienware.com/Video/g4_M.wmv

[ATI_7500]

the 9000 is quite slow. if you really want to spend just little money,go for ozzys Ti 4600. the 9500pro costs about 230 US $,maybe even less.

[Scottler]

Only at SimV would someone be able to say "I'm trying to not spend tons of money" and have responses that range from $250 to $500.  lol

Actually, I'm not looking to spend that much money on simulated flight, because I've got the real thing to pay for.  I guess I'll just stick with my regular ol' card.

Thanks!  

[Tchkinjiu]

P.S.
   What vid card do you have right now?
I got a GeForce 64MB and have been getting better framerates then most people with a 128MB vid card. HA!

[Scottler]

The card that's in there at present is the one that came with the PC from Dell.  lol

It's not bad, but it's hardly great, either.

[Daz]

erm me personaly would choose the nvidia fx5200 which is sensibly  priced and offers great performace.....you might wanna go a bit higher to the nvidia fx5600 which i currently have and i swear by this card..

the only other alternative i can suggest is the geforce 4 ti4200 64MB version quite simply a card that can hold its own even in todays market even though its aging quite a bit now.....i used to have one of these babies and if you tweak it right you can still get very good performance out of it and its v v cheap

hope this helps and sorry for not mentioning any ATI cards i personally do not like them - sorry ati fans nvidia rules  

[swanny338]

sorry ati fans nvidia rules

my thoughts exactly