This is my computer, will Rome work for me?

**Red Harvest** · 08-13-2004, 18:35

Ugggh, "Extreme Graphics." Intel's graphics are a serious curse on the industry. Does it have an AGP slot? If it does then you are in luck, otherwise you are SOL. Stay away from FX5200's and anything with MX in the name--you could do much better things with the money. You need to pick a budget though before people can really help you on picking a card.

**Inuyasha12** · 08-13-2004, 22:32

MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHETHER OR NOT YOU HAVE PCI OR AGP!!!

??????????

ummm i don't know what that is.
How do i find out?

And what do you mean by slot?
Do i have to unscrew the computer up or something?
Or is it back there and im just too dumb to see it

**crazyviking03** · 08-14-2004, 09:12

Yeah, you have to open up your comp. AGP and PCI are different types of slots in the comp (i dont know what they technicaly are) but tha tis all that matteres to you when putting in a card. You should be able to look either under properties for your system, or direct X diagnostic, and it shoudl tell you if you have agp or pci. You just open up your computer, pop out the original card, and pop in the new one, its really easy, you just have to be gentle in there. If you are lucky, your comp my have an extra unused slot, that way you just pop it in what ever is unused. (I am not explaining this very well, maybe some one else can chip in)

**discovery1** · 08-14-2004, 16:17

Don't you have to uninstall the old drivers also? Or am I just ignorant.

That aside, it's pretty simple to install. Just open up the case, remove the od card, replace with new, close case, and plug in. Although with high ends, you will need to hook it up to the power supply.

**CrackedAxe** · 08-14-2004, 16:30

Is it worth upgrading grfx cards yet or waiting until this new PCI-Express comes out? The industry seems to be saying that AGP is on its way out. anybody know anything more about this?

**Red Harvest** · 08-14-2004, 17:46

PCI Express graphic cards will require a new motherboard. They only make sense when you are ready to upgrade your system (not just the graphics card). These are just now entering the market, and you can expect teething pains. AGP isn't dead by a long shot. It will be phased out for newer cards a year or two from now, but AGP cards are not going to disappear for years. AGP slots are available on most home machines today (except for many Intel integrated graphics chipsets -- junk machines that businesses buy primarily.) There will be a market for them for years.

PCI Express and PCI are different critters. PCI cards just use an existing PCI slot. You can't find modern vid cards in PCI format, because PCI has been dead end for many years. There are some old graphics cards still made for PCI, but they are slow and about three or four generations old now.

Performance wise PCI Express will probably not offer much boost over AGP for some time. The increment from PCI to AGP was small for awhile as well. The current AGP bus at 8x is not really heavily used. You will barely see any difference from setting your AGP at 2x, 4x or 8x. The reason is simple, traffic over the AGP bus (and PCI Express) is still much slower than traffic on the card itself. So game and card manufacturers keep the AGP traffic to a minimum anyway.

The original poster needs to either check with his vendor, or find some documentation of his motherboard, or look at some other motherboard reviews to find images of what an AGP slot looks like. None of us can see it, so we can't tell him what he has. If he can find the model of the motherboard chipset, someone can probably track it down for him. Documentation and "help" on these pre-built systems are hard to come buy (not his fault.) When I mess with them I often have to open the cover to figure out what is really in there.