[r2zoo]

Well, were building a PC as part as my senior electronics class, and its nothing special so far, heres the specs I remember:
AMD Atholn 3200(i believe)
256MB RAM(planning on upgrading to 512MB or 768)
80 gig IDE hardrive
CD/DVD drive
350W Power Supply
Asus motherboard(a lower end one)
PCI and PCI-EX16 slots only

Its not very good, but it was $350, what do you expect? Any ways, I want to get a video card for it in order to play actual games. In particular, Id like to play Battlefield 2 on it. Now, Im on a insanely tight budget, looking for a card around $50, preferablly less, or a little over. Now, the card I was looking at my self is this one.

Im not sure if its a good card or not, most people either ignore the fact im asking about a card, and just say "buy more RAM" or "wait for the Direct X 10 cards". I know almost nothing of other brands then Nvidia, so any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Honestly, im not looking for 80FPS or something, I just want a card that will be able to beat my current(non-classes) machines Geforce 5200FX which is an AGP(otherwise I would have swapped them). If you need more info or can point me in the correct direction, Id appreciate it more then you know, its hard to find people who will take me seriously.

Edited by r2zoo, 03 October 2006 - 05:54 PM.

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Well, I'm assuming you have an AGP interface. If you can afford to go a little over $50 (and wait for the rebate), then I would look at something like this:

http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814102043
or
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814131262

Otherwise your best bet is a nvidia FX 5500. Good luck.

Edited by kidnova, 03 October 2006 - 09:39 PM.

[kidnova]

Well, I'm assuming you have an AGP interface. If you can afford to go a little over $50 (and wait for the rebate), then I would look at something like this:

http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814102043
or
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814131262

Otherwise your best bet is a nvidia FX 5500. Good luck.

Edited by kidnova, 03 October 2006 - 09:39 PM.

[r2zoo]

PCI and PCI-Express only(thought i said that) otherwise I would just use my trusty 5200 off my current pc. What im really intrested in is if the 7300GT would be a good investment, as $75 is alot for me

[kidnova]

Sorry, I somehow overlooked that part of your original post.

In that price range, the 7300 GT is probably your best option. The only other card I would suggest looking at would be this:
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814241024

Same number of pipelines and similar clock speeds, but it has a 128 bit interface as opposed to 64 bits for the 7300 GT. Do some google searches for reviews and you should get a better idea of which card is the better buy.

EDIT: It appears that the eVGA versions of the 7300 GT are the only ones with a 64bit interface. So avoid the eVGA cards. The other ones come with a 128 bit interface like the X700. So, I think it's really going to come down to your preference between nvidia and ATI. I think you will probably see similar performance from both cards.

Edited by kidnova, 04 October 2006 - 03:30 PM.

[r2zoo]

Thanks, Ill take both into consideration, and the the 7300GT from PNY is, for now, my choice, as I do prefer Nvidia, and dont know much about ATI. Thanks again for the help.

On a side note you scared me a bit by telling me the 7300GT were 64-bit(heard horror stories of 64bit), at least till I read on. I should have included the manufacturer I was thinking about before hand.

Edited by r2zoo, 04 October 2006 - 06:03 PM.

[racinmason001]

if you ever need graphics card reviews go to www.gpureview.com it is very helpful.