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so... i moved to japan, and stopped buying hardware for a while. my box runs everything i throw at it, except that i need to slim down the graphics settings on a few of the newer games.
i basically have a mentality with PC games that "if it looks at least as good as Half-Life 1 etc, then whatever...". if i want to see a real time reflection of the entire world renedered on a glass bottle, with specular highlights and full antialiased shadows, i can turn my head and look at the bottle of beer on my desk. big deal.
recently, though, i've had to turn so much extra crap off, that games are starting to look really bad. black and white 2 is the most recent glaring example.. i had to turn everything to low,a nd further edit a text file in order to butcher the graphics down so far that the entire island is just a big green and brown texture... the houses and people look fine, but my animal is bald (no fur etc)... it's just too much.
SO! i went shopping yesterday for a new video card. i read up a bit, and decided to get a 6800GT or an x800 based card... but there are no AGP cards anymore! i missed the revolution! i did find one or two, but the exact same card cost 100$ more for the AGP version! i figured at that point, i might as well upgrade my mobo too, and just suck it up...
BUT! my socket 478 cpu won't fit on any PCI-e boards! now it ends up being that i have to buy a mobo, CPU, and video card altogether. my 300 dollars that i decided to spend for a vid card suddenly is one third of the total cost.
i'm completely fine with my CPU. i have 1 gig of good RAM. i have a good PSU. i basically want a socket 478 board that i can slap a new card in, and migrate the rest of everything over to. so far i've found two candidates, but i can't find them here in japan;
:
the asus P4GD1 and the Albatron PX915P4C Pro...
does anyone have one of these, and can make a recommendation, or does anyone know of another that i"ve missed?
while i'm at it, do those cards sound like a good combo with my current (or soon to be current) rig? like i said, i was ready and willing to walk into the puter shop over here and plunk down 3-man ($300) for a good card, but thos new 500 or 600$ cards are just too much right now.
sorry for the ramble, thanks for reading.
i basically have a mentality with PC games that "if it looks at least as good as Half-Life 1 etc, then whatever...". if i want to see a real time reflection of the entire world renedered on a glass bottle, with specular highlights and full antialiased shadows, i can turn my head and look at the bottle of beer on my desk. big deal.
recently, though, i've had to turn so much extra crap off, that games are starting to look really bad. black and white 2 is the most recent glaring example.. i had to turn everything to low,a nd further edit a text file in order to butcher the graphics down so far that the entire island is just a big green and brown texture... the houses and people look fine, but my animal is bald (no fur etc)... it's just too much.
SO! i went shopping yesterday for a new video card. i read up a bit, and decided to get a 6800GT or an x800 based card... but there are no AGP cards anymore! i missed the revolution! i did find one or two, but the exact same card cost 100$ more for the AGP version! i figured at that point, i might as well upgrade my mobo too, and just suck it up...
BUT! my socket 478 cpu won't fit on any PCI-e boards! now it ends up being that i have to buy a mobo, CPU, and video card altogether. my 300 dollars that i decided to spend for a vid card suddenly is one third of the total cost.
i'm completely fine with my CPU. i have 1 gig of good RAM. i have a good PSU. i basically want a socket 478 board that i can slap a new card in, and migrate the rest of everything over to. so far i've found two candidates, but i can't find them here in japan;
:
the asus P4GD1 and the Albatron PX915P4C Pro...
does anyone have one of these, and can make a recommendation, or does anyone know of another that i"ve missed?
while i'm at it, do those cards sound like a good combo with my current (or soon to be current) rig? like i said, i was ready and willing to walk into the puter shop over here and plunk down 3-man ($300) for a good card, but thos new 500 or 600$ cards are just too much right now.
sorry for the ramble, thanks for reading.