First post, by FFXIhealer
Tapping the Vogons opinion database again here. The new project system is my original Windows XP computer. It was SUPPOSED to be a gaming rig, but I can tell now that it's horribly crippled for that task. And I'm guilty of doing it back in the early 2000s. The system was built around 2002 with the following specs:
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 1800+ Palomino 1.53GHz (133MHz FSB, 11.5x multiplier)
Motherboard: Abit KX7-333
BIOS: Phoenix AwardBIOS 6.00 PG (06/05/2002)
AGP Version: 2.0 (x4 mode supported)
Chipset: VIA KT266/333 (yes, I know people here hate these)
Memory: 256MB PC2100 (DDR-266) SuperTalent running at 133MHz (SPD)
Graphics: ATI Radeon 7500 64MB
Sound: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 PCI
I have done the following upgrades since then:
Memory: 2GB (1GB x 2) PC3200 (DDR-200) SuperTalent running at 166MHz (SPD)
Graphics: ATI Radeon 9550 256MB (this is more of a downgrade, as it turns out)
Stupid me at the time thought a higher number on the ATI cards meant better performance. /facepalm
So I'm looking for some advice. I've pretty much maxed the system RAM out at 2GB here and it's running at FSB+33MHz as verified by CPU-z. Also I'm not looking to upgrade the processor because then I'd be competing with my gaming laptop, which runs a 2.1GHz Pentium M and a GeForce 7800GTX graphics card. What I'm looking for is the best I can do for the period of the system...roughly 2003.
I am looking at (on Ebay) an ATI Radeon X 850XT Platinum Edition "NEW" Factory Sealed for $100. That's awfully expensive for such an old item, but I think the AGP cards are becoming rare and retro gaming is driving the price up. I was looking for a 9800xt but couldn't find anything outside of the Mac versions without spending over $100 there as well. Looked at the lesser 9700 Pro and it was also hard to find and up in the $100 price range. So I looked higher and found the X850xt noted above. I'm still limited by the 4x AGP bus, but I have a 500-Watt power supply, so no issues there.
Games to run on this system include:
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
Doom 3
Half-Life 2
F.E.A.R. (barely meets hardware requirements)
Gaming Resolution: 1360 x 768 x 32bit (16:9)
I should probably add - I live in the U.S.A.