My Win XP gamer ( built mainly for OG Doom 3 ) has a 256mb 8600 GT which I bought for $13. It works well enough but Doom 3 actually has framerate drops to 30 FPS when monsters are around. Holds 60 fps with nothing going on, and a swinging/ flickering light will render about 45 fps. I have resolution set custom at 1366x768. I bought it thinking it would be enough for Doom 3. Also apparently it draws nearly 50 watts? Really Doom 3 remains buttery smooth through everything and without Fraps, I wouldn't know any different.. But it does get toasty
Would a GT 730 be a better card? As I understand it, it's the last gen with XP support. I dual booted it though, so it actually has Win 7 as main OS and I use it as an internet browser/ youtube watcher. I'm thinking I could re play the Bioshocks and Singularity, ect on the Win 7 side and use less power than my main rig ( which is a power hog ) while holding good visual settings.. As far as the computer. It's just a leftover Optiplex 755 with a E6750 and 4gb of ram. It's not Windows XP era hardware, it's just supported hardware.
Would a GT 730 be a better card? As I understand it, it's the last gen with XP support. I dual booted it though, so it actually has Win 7 as main OS and I use it as an internet browser/ youtube watcher. I'm thinking I could re play the Bioshocks and Singularity, ect on the Win 7 side and use less power than my main rig ( which is a power hog ) while holding good visual settings.. As far as the computer. It's just a leftover Optiplex 755 with a E6750 and 4gb of ram. It's not Windows XP era hardware, it's just supported hardware.