Upgrading from Ti 4200 (to FX 5700 LE?)

I currently have a 2.53ghz Dell 4550 and a GeForce Ti 4200 video card
with 64MB RAM. I play lots of HL and Counterstrike and it runs great.

I recently bought Far Cry and it runs great at 800x600 with medium
settings (I am running the latest nvidia drivers and DirectX 9.0b, or
whatever came with the game). I'd like to be able to crank up the
graphics a bit, which I know will require a new video card.

Unfortunately, my Dell has a rather small case and the power supply is
only 250w. This probably eliminates any of the fancy new 6800 cards.
I've been looking at the FX 5700 LE cards, though - would this be a
reasonable upgrade? Would I notice a difference? Will this card run
HL and Counterstrike well (I use the OpenGL option now and get
excellent frame rates).

Any advice appreciated.

Michael W.
Chicago, IL, USA

It really would not be that much better then what you are using now. You would
need to go to a higher FX to see more of an improvement. Your 4200 is not much
slower then a 5700 LE running DirectX8. The 5700 would be more faster at
DirectX9, but not by that much either.

The 4200 cannot run Directx9 in hardware full-stop. But yeah you are right.
The 5700LE wouldn't be much faster lol

Dan

"PRIVATE1964" wrote in message
...
It really would not be that much better then what you are using now. You
would
need to go to a higher FX to see more of an improvement. Your 4200 is not
much
slower then a 5700 LE running DirectX8. The 5700 would be more faster at
DirectX9, but not by that much either.

That's not an upgrade. It's a downgrade. Anything below a 5700 Ultra is
not as fast as a TI4200.

Mr. Brian Allen" wrote:

That's not an upgrade. It's a downgrade. Anything below a 5700 Ultra is
not as fast as a TI4200.

Thanks.

Any suggestions, then, as to video cards that would be an upgrade from my Ti
4200? Once again, I've got a Dell 4550 with only a 250 watt power supply.
Thanks.

Michael W.
Chicago, IL, USA

The 4200 cannot run Directx9 in hardware full-stop. But yeah you are right.
The 5700LE wouldn't be much faster lol

Yeah I should have posted the 4200 is missing the DirectX 9 features that the
5700 has. I meant it like if you were to benchmark both cards using 3Dmark 2003
the 5700 would get a a lot higher score because it has the DirectX 9 features.
If you were to benchmark both cards running 3Dmark2001 the 4200 would not be
much slower because both cards have DirectX 8 features.

Any suggestions, then, as to video cards that would be an upgrade from my Ti
4200? Once again, I've got a Dell 4550 with only a 250 watt power supply.
Thanks.

Your stuck because of your power supply. You would need to go higher then the
5700 Ultra to see a difference and even then its not gonna be earth shattering
unless you get close to a 5900 or a 9800 Pro IMO.

If you're into gaming you should have your own large computer case
and your own "stuffings" in it so you can upgrade as needed. At least
a 2.5 ghz P4 cpu, 1gb of fast RAM and the top 5900FX video card
you can find, and you should be up to date enough.
As far as 'Far Cry', I am running it just a shot slow, 1024x768, on
an nVidia Ti 4600, which I don't know if it uses DX 9 but I have DX
9.0c installed, the game runs well, technicaly. But for gaming these
days I'd say you are behind with your hardware. My machine:

Abit IS7 mainboard 800mhz bus
P4 2.6ghz C type, hyperthreading
Kingston dual channel RAM 1gb
Chaintech Ti 4600/128

Alex

"AArDvarK" said:

At least a 2.5 ghz P4 cpu ... I'd say you are behind with your hardware.

He has a 2.53Ghz P4, it was in his post.
--
McQualude

He has a 2.53Ghz P4, it was in his post.


aaahh... my mistake, I confused two posts!
Alex