Wonder if I could get some advice? Someone has given me a Dell Dimension 5100 system (running XP) with a Pentium 4 3.2Ghz. Don't laugh as its a big step up from my Athlon xp1900 (no it isn't on loan from a museum honest!).
I need to get more memory (currently only has 512mb), but I was originally thinking of spending about £100 on a graphics card with the silly idea I could run Arma2 on minimum settings. I think this is very wishful thinking so I've decided to cut my budget back to £40 to £50 max (until the win lottery/ marry rich woman plans come to fruition). I have no illusions about playing Crysis etc, but would like to play some last gen games (COD4, Left 4 Dead, Far Cry 2 etc) as well as the likes of Serious Sam SE online, Half-Life 2 (which my trusty old 9800 AGP card does fine), and playing HD video on a 22inch monitor.. So looking for suggestions for a PCI-E card. Don't have any preference for Nvidia or AMD. Current card seems very basic (Radeon X300 SE I think).
One thing is I think the Dell has the original 300W power supply so need to take that into account juice wise. I was looking at this:
Gigabyte GV-R465OC-1GI Radeon HD 4650 Graphics Card (1GB, ATX, DVI-I): Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories
its a Radeon 4650 1 GB card for £40, which doesn't seem to need an extra power connector (I think).
So any suggestions? Also, is it worth getting more than 2GB memory on an XP home system?
Thanks all. Have a great New Year
I need to get more memory (currently only has 512mb), but I was originally thinking of spending about £100 on a graphics card with the silly idea I could run Arma2 on minimum settings. I think this is very wishful thinking so I've decided to cut my budget back to £40 to £50 max (until the win lottery/ marry rich woman plans come to fruition). I have no illusions about playing Crysis etc, but would like to play some last gen games (COD4, Left 4 Dead, Far Cry 2 etc) as well as the likes of Serious Sam SE online, Half-Life 2 (which my trusty old 9800 AGP card does fine), and playing HD video on a 22inch monitor.. So looking for suggestions for a PCI-E card. Don't have any preference for Nvidia or AMD. Current card seems very basic (Radeon X300 SE I think).
One thing is I think the Dell has the original 300W power supply so need to take that into account juice wise. I was looking at this:
Gigabyte GV-R465OC-1GI Radeon HD 4650 Graphics Card (1GB, ATX, DVI-I): Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories
its a Radeon 4650 1 GB card for £40, which doesn't seem to need an extra power connector (I think).
So any suggestions? Also, is it worth getting more than 2GB memory on an XP home system?
Thanks all. Have a great New Year
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