Suggest some graphics cards for these 2 PCs \ VOGONS

Suggest some graphics cards for these 2 PCs

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First post, by Ultris

Posted on 2016-12-02, 14:35

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I have two older Dell machines that work just fine, but I never use them because their GPUs are sub-par. One of them is a Dell Dimension L600r, and the other one is an OptiPlex GXa. Unfortunately, neither of them have AGP slots, so I will have to settle for PCI cards only.

The GPU in the OptiPlex GXa isn't the worst thing in the world. I believe it uses an onboard ATI 3D Rage Pro Turbo with 4MB of vRAM. The Dell Dimension L600r , on the other hand, uses Intel Extreme Graphics. From my experience, ATI cards aren't very compatible with older games, and Intel's graphics solutions have generally been very bad.

I'm sure that somebody is going to suggest a Voodoo card, and although I understand the appeal, the average prices of those cards do not agree with me one bit. For my age, it's hard enough to find a job that pays enough to spend a bunch of money on old graphics cards. So, ideally, would like to stay in a reasonable price range.

Thanks in advance 😀

Here are the general specs of both machines, if needed:
Dell Dimension L600R
Intel Pentium III 600E
256MB SDRAM
Intel Extreme Graphics
15GB Maxtor HDD
Windows 98SE

Dell OptiPlex GXa
Pentium II 233MHz
128MB ECC SDRAM
ATI 3D Rage Pro Turbo AGP 4MB
10GB Western Digital HDD
Windows 98SE

Reply 1 of 17, by emosun

Posted on 2016-12-02, 14:43

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radeon 8500 , geforce 2 or 4 , should liven those both right up

Reply 2 of 17, by Paadam

Posted on 2016-12-02, 14:55

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I don't think there's Radeon 8500 in PCI form and Geforce 2 and 4 cards in PCI form are only MX models.

Many 3Dfx and Pentium III-S stuff.
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Reply 3 of 17, by stamasd

Posted on 2016-12-02, 15:11

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You can get Geforce FX in PCI; also Matrox G400 and later. A few Radeons from the 9000 series were PCI also.

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Reply 4 of 17, by leileilol

Posted on 2016-12-02, 15:45

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Voodoo3 3000 for both 😜

long live PCem

Reply 5 of 17, by candle_86

Posted on 2016-12-02, 18:23

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Geforce 8600GT PCI

Reply 6 of 17, by Jo22

Posted on 2016-12-02, 20:06

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candle_86 wrote:
Geforce 8600GT PCI

Does that card also have that GF8 memory bug ?

It's been long ago, but I had an integrated GF8 many years ago..
Back in time media said it had a bug that caused the video memory to run out of memory.

Unfortunatelly, I can't find a good piece of information regarding that.
This is the best I could find so far..: http://mac.bigresource.com/MacBook-Pro-Nvidia … -Rj4CYYWei.html

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Reply 7 of 17, by clueless1

Posted on 2016-12-02, 20:42

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For a P3-600 and P2-233, stick with something closer to period correct, otherwise you waste GPU performance and introduce potential compatibility issues with games that don't play nice with much newer graphics card/driver combinations.

TNT2 for the P2-233 and Geforce2 MX for the P3-600 would do nicely. Even a TNT2 M64 on the P2 would be fine. It's about as fast as a TNT1, which was a 1998 card, and came out a year after the P2-233.

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Reply 8 of 17, by Tetrium

Posted on 2016-12-02, 21:10

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P3-600 could even do with a TNT2 or a Geforce 1. Any Geforce MX should do as well.

For the P2 233 even a TNT2 M64 should be more then enough (even for a P2 350 it's not that poor a match).

leileilol wrote:
Voodoo3 3000 for both 😜

One cannot argue this being a very poor decision 🤣

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Reply 9 of 17, by Rhuwyn

Posted on 2016-12-02, 21:24

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What OS and games are you wanting to run? Any Voodoo would be a good match as long as it plays the game your looking for. I wouldn't be opposed to a Geforce 2 MX or 4 MX either. They really aren't bad cards.

Reply 10 of 17, by clueless1

Posted on 2016-12-02, 21:44

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Tetrium wrote:
P3-600 could even do with a TNT2 or a Geforce 1. Any Geforce MX should do as well.

For the P2 233 even a TNT2 M64 should be more then enough (even for a P2 350 it's not that poor a match).

Is there an echo in here? 😀

Reply 11 of 17, by emosun

Posted on 2016-12-03, 07:44

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Paadam wrote:
I don't think there's Radeon 8500 in PCI form

yes it came in pci.

Reply 12 of 17, by Tetrium

Posted on 2016-12-03, 08:40

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clueless1 wrote:
Tetrium wrote:
P3-600 could even do with a TNT2 or a Geforce 1. Any Geforce MX should do as well.

For the P2 233 even a TNT2 M64 should be more then enough (even for a P2 350 it's not that poor a match).

Is there an echo in here? 😀

lmao! Well, it's true, right? 😁

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Reply 13 of 17, by leileilol

Posted on 2016-12-03, 13:19

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Though if you have a Geforce256/2/4MX there's no real point in having a TNT/TNT2 instead. It just matters which is the more conveniently available one and the TNTs offer nothing unique to the table that an early Geforce can't do.

I'd pick Geforce over TNT though. In those system's specs i'd ignore everything after Geforce4MX for the sake of driver bloat.

Yes this is an echo but jeez don't put a geforce8 in there.

long live PCem

Reply 14 of 17, by bhtooefr

Posted on 2016-12-03, 13:33

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And the GeForce 8 series is hilariously unreliable, anyway.

There's a reason why almost every high-end laptop from 2007-2008 has had at least one motherboard replacement...

Reply 15 of 17, by Putas

Posted on 2016-12-03, 17:18

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If you don't have specific graphics demands I would not sweat it. Especially the weaker system won't do any wonders.

Reply 16 of 17, by stamasd

Posted on 2016-12-03, 17:39

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Jo22 wrote:
Does that card also have that GF8 memory bug ? […]
Show full quote
candle_86 wrote:
Geforce 8600GT PCI

Does that card also have that GF8 memory bug ?

It's been long ago, but I had an integrated GF8 many years ago..
Back in time media said it had a bug that caused the video memory to run out of memory.

Unfortunatelly, I can't find a good piece of information regarding that.
This is the best I could find so far..: http://mac.bigresource.com/MacBook-Pro-Nvidia … -Rj4CYYWei.html

That thread if you read carefully talks about a memory leak that happens in a specific driver version for OSX. They even talk about installing Windows to use the Windows drivers that don't have the bug. It's a software issue, not a hardware one, and it appears limited to that particular version of the OSX drivers.

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O

Reply 17 of 17, by FFXIhealer

Posted on 2016-12-04, 04:43

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Ultris wrote:
Dell Dimension L600R Intel Pentium III 600E 256MB SDRAM Intel Extreme Graphics 15GB Maxtor HDD Windows 98SE […]
Show full quote
Dell Dimension L600R
Intel Pentium III 600E
256MB SDRAM
Intel Extreme Graphics
15GB Maxtor HDD
Windows 98SE

My non-authorative answer: GeForce 2

The first time I leaped out to the ATI Radeon 7500 64MB card was with a 1.53GHz Athlon, so I dunno how well they'd work with just the 600MHz P3. I'll tell you this much though, the 32MB TNT2 AGP card I got only cost me $10 USD on E-bay and it's pretty strong in its own right for ~2000 games. The only thing is it lacks Hardware T&L (that's GeForce). I found one on E-Bay for $22 USD, but it's only a 16MB version.

Ultris wrote:
Dell OptiPlex GXa Pentium II 233MHz 128MB ECC SDRAM ATI 3D Rage Pro Turbo AGP 4MB 10GB Western Digital HDD Windows 98SE […]
Show full quote
Dell OptiPlex GXa
Pentium II 233MHz
128MB ECC SDRAM
ATI 3D Rage Pro Turbo AGP 4MB
10GB Western Digital HDD
Windows 98SE

Easily: ANY Voodoo2 8MB or 12MB card you can get your hands on and a pass-through cable. You can use the ATI chip as your 2D source and the Voodoo2 for gaming with great compatibility with pre-1999 games. Found one on E-bay for $30 USD. It's an STB 12MB version.

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