I want to buy a new graphics card for my computer as I think my present one may be causing some of the problems I have been experiencing. It's a NVIDIA RIVA TNT 2 64 PRO. My processor is an AMD 1532 MHZ. I don't require anything too sophisticated and I am on a budget with this so I am looking for something that is reasonably priced but will give me good performance and is also compatible with The Sims 2 game which is really the only computer game played on the machine. Many thanks

This is your motherboard:

K7VT2
ASRock
Slots AGP 1, AGP 4X/2X universal
PCI 5 slots, PCI 2.2
http://www.asrock.com/product/product_k7vt2.htm

So first off you are looking for an AGP card. Modern AGP cards are 8X/4X which sould work in your 4X/2X slot but it is something to verify. It would be a voltage issue if it exists.

An 8X/4X card on your board will run at 4X so it will not work at its' full potential (speed) but that is the limitation of your motherboard.

There is a BIOS update here:

http://www.asrock.com/support/Downlo...k7vt2.htm#bios

As to cards ATI is a good brand. Here is a good basic card listed @$99 (us)

Radeon® 9200 128MB AGP

System Requirements

Intel® Pentium® 4/III/II/Celeron™, AMD® K6/Duron™/Athlon®/Athlon XP® or compatible with AGP 2X (3.3V), 4X (1.5V), 8X (0.8v) or Universal AGP 3.0 bus configuration (2X/4X/8X).
64MB of system memory
Installation software requires CD-ROM drive
DVD playback requires DVD drive

http://shop.ati.com/product.asp?sku=2335507

http://www.ati.com/products/radeon92...200/index.html

Thanks for your help much appreciated. Can you tell me what the difference is between Radeon®9200SE AGP only and Radeon® 9200 AGP and PCI? Also would a Radeon® 9250
AGP work in my computer?

You have an AGP slot therefore you would want an AGP card.

If your computer did not have an AGP slot then you would have needed to use a slower PCI slot.

The latest state of the art slot is PCI_E as in Express.

As to the 9200 comparison see this:

http://www.ati.com/products/radeon92...200/index.html

As to the Radeon® 9250 it still falls under the 9200 Series so, yes, it will work for you.

http://www.ati.com/products/radeon92...200/specs.html

System Requirements
Intel® Pentium® 4/III/II/Celeron™, AMD® K6/Duron™/Athlon®/Athlon XP® or compatible with AGP 2X (3.3V), 4X (1.5V), 8X (0.8v) or Universal AGP 3.0 bus configuration (2X/4X/8X) or PCI bus.
64MB of system memory
Installation software requires CD-ROM drive
DVD playback requires DVD drive

Note that they make two versions. An AGP & a PCI. These are not interchangable; they are two different types of slots. They just make an AGP version as well as a PCI version.

As said: you want an AGP card.

Radeon® 9250 AGP : Yes!

Thank you for your last reply. I am sorry for being such a dimwit but I need to get everything just right before purchasing my graphics card. I noticed that in system info it mentions PCI in PNP device id. Is my current card using a PCI slot? Would that explain why the screen ripples when I try to play The Sims 2 and why the game runs so slowly?

Name NVIDIA RIVA TNT2 Model 64/Model 64 Pro
PNP Device ID PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_002D&SUBSYS_00000000&REV_15\4&618 BA55&0&0008
Adapter Type RIVA TNT2 Model 64, NVIDIA compatible
Adapter Description NVIDIA RIVA TNT2 Model 64/Model 64 Pro
Adapter RAM 32.00 MB (33,554,432 bytes)
Installed Drivers nv4_disp.dll
Driver Version 6.13.10.2942
INF File oem9.inf (nv4 section)
Color Planes 1
Color Table Entries 4294967296
Resolution 1024 x 768 x 60 hertz
Bits/Pixel 32
Memory Address 0xDE000000-0xDEFFFFFF
Memory Address 0xDA000000-0xDBFFFFFF
IRQ Channel IRQ 16
I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB
I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF
Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\nv4_mini.sys (6.13.10.2942, 910.04 KB (931,882 bytes), 30/11/2005 19:23)

Many thanks

Bridget

Hi Bridget,

It's quite possible that your current graphics card uses the PCI slot but this, in itself, wouldn't cause problems. There's no problem specifically related to having a graphics card in the PCI slot - in fact, this was the common standard during the early to mid 1990s. As technology has improved, graphics cards required information to be transferred around the system more quickly than the PCI slots could handle so the AGP slot was invented and this became the standard from the late 1990s. Over the past 12 months, AGP slots have still been widely used in mainstream PCs but, for the top-end high-performance games systems, a new slot called PCI-Express has become the standard for really fast data transmission.

If you have an AGP slot, you would be well-advised to buy an AGP graphics card instead of a PCI model - not only is AGP faster but the range of graphics cards available for the standard AGP slot is MUCH bigger than those available for the old legacy PCI slot.

Hope that helps