Friend of mine needs help...

[Spoonoop]

Hello, a friend of mine really wants to be able to play Half-Life 2 at a decent performance but doesn't want to spend all to much on his computer, maybe he will if he has to, but would like some of your opinions so I could help em out.

His Computer:

Pentium 4 2.8 GHz
254 MB of RAM
Intel 82845G (64 MB)

His CPU seems very good, I told him his RAM should be at least 512 MB, and I told him I never head of his graphics card in my life! So those are the 2 biggies, RAM, and Video Card. I told him you could get a Radeon 9600XT for about $150, but he wants to know if you can go lower, maybe get a cheaper ATi card that will still be able to run HL 2 fairly well.

Thanks

 

[Dedatorv]

Well, his ram is fine if he doesn't want to spend a lot of money on. He will need a new video card though because I can pretty much tell that it is a onboard one and will not be supported for Half-Life 2. The best bang for your buck is to go for a Radeon 9600XT, if he still gets performance problems then it is best to go for more ram later on.

 

[Asus]

Yeah, you gave him good advice.

You can get a 9600Pro for around 100$ and should play HL2 at around 40-50FPS.
I would have him buy at least a 256MB stick but if he could 512MB would be even better.

 

[SubKamran]

More RAM, a 9700 Pro or 9600XT. I'd recommend searching NewEgg.com for a refurb 9700 Pro...there was one for $135 which is the same price as a 9600XT for better performance.

 

[bosox188]

Well he can get a 9600 pro for $115, if he wants he can get a 9600 non pro for around $100, maybe $90. As for ram, he doesn't need to upgrade but 512 would be good. His processor is awesome. Oh, just remembered, does he have an AGP slot?

 

[Spoonoop]

Cool, thanks for all the helpful tips and about the AGP slot, he doesn't know how to check, but he said he got it at the beginning of 2004 and it's a Dell, I suppose all the new computers have AGP slots these days?

 

[Asus]

Cool, thanks for all the helpful tips and about the AGP slot, he doesn't know how to check, but he said he got it at the beginning of 2004 and it's a Dell, I suppose all the new computers have AGP slots these days?

Nope, not all.
He better double check. It's a short brown slot above the 3-5 white PCI slots inside his PC on the big board.
If he does not have an AGP slot then he will have to get a FX 5200 or Radeon 9200 PCI version.

Do you know what model his Dell is?

 

[SubKamran]

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductdesc.asp?description=14-102-254R&depa=99&type=Refurbish

For easy reference, that's a steal

 

[bosox188]

Oh shit it's a Dell he might not have one. Is his graphics Intel Integrated Extreme 3D Graphics? And which model is it, the 2400, 4600, 8400, XPS...?

 

[Spoonoop]

Hmmm... talking to him on instant messanger and told him to look at his System Model in "dxdiag" and he said it's a Dimension 2400, is that a good thing? :O

 

[bosox188]

No it's not a good thing. It's a very bad thing. Because the Dimension 2400's only come with Integrated Intel Graphics, and have no AGP slot. He's gotta get a 9200 or 5200 PCI. If he wants to play HL2, he should get the 9200 PCI. But if anybody can find a PCI version of the 9000 or 9100, that would be the best option I think, but I couldn't find any.

 

[Spoonoop]

Oh damn, good thing were figuring this stuff out! I'll tell him about it. Thanks alot man!

 

[bosox188]

No problem, and I found a PCI 9100 (thank you google).

http://store.yahoo.com/compuvest/330000257-02.html

It's 64mb, I thought there would be a 128mb but there's not. But this is probably the best PCI card you can get.