Upgrades help

[Tom]

Hi, Just like to ask a few questions about a few upgrades I have planned...

Sound Card:
What should I look for when I buy a sound card? I jsut want something that will BLAST music out without it sounding horrible (I have some ok speakers)
Which Make of soundcard would be best?

Graphics Card:
How do I tell which type of graphics card I need to fit my PC? I play a few games that need a fairly good graphics card but dont really want to spend too much (No more than £75ISH) ... What would be best?

RAM
I need 2x 512MB DDR ram, How do i check if DDR2 ram will fit? What speeds / Voltage should I be looking for, for best performance...?

Thanks a lot in advance..
Tom

[b]Thread is old and locked - MidiMoto[b]

[syphus]

In most cases, the quality of sound that your PC produces is almost completely dictated by the quality of the speakers. The better the speakers, the clearer the sound, and the higher the signal to noise ratio, the better your audio sounds. Of course, it’s possible to have speakers which exceed the quality of your sound card, which is where products like the Creative SB Audigy series, and new Creative X-Fi come in. By delivering a more accurate and less noisy signal to the speakers, the sound has a higher range, with more subtlety, and ultimately can be amplified better.

A common mistake people make when matching soundcard and speakers however, is comparing signal to noise ratio. For example, a Creative SB Audigy 2 ZS has a SNR of 108dB (very good) and the Creative Inspire 5200 has 75dB SNR. It’s tempting to compare the two and make the statement “The Creative Inspire cannot take advantage of the Audigy 2 ZS’s high SNR�. Although in this example, the Inspire 5200 are grossly inferior speakers, this is due to frequency response, not SNR. SNR is a measurement of noise produced by the device, so the best way (not quite mathematically correct) to consider the relationship between sound card and speakers, is to add the two SNRs, but double the noise, as opposed to subtract the lower SNR from the higher, and call the remainder excess.


The best way to tell what type of card fits into your PC, is to check. The same applies to your memory problem. We will be able to explain your options if you give us your Chipset manufacturer and model. If you don’t know it, download CPU-Z (it's a small program that doesn't require installation. click here for a direct link to version 1.31 download, current 12/12/05), run it and click on the Motherboard tab.



It will also try to tell you what best option for graphics is in the Graphic Interface box bellow, but it’s better to get a human’s take on that. Post back, and we'll explain things

[Tom]

Thanks for the detailed reply...



Aparantly I dont have a graphics interface.... :-\

I can't work out anything from the Chipset numbers on there...

As for memory from that I'm guessing my system will only take DDR and SDRAM ?

Thanks for your help

[syphus]

The Intel 845GE

DDR 266 and 333 (PC2100 and PC2700). It’s the only chipset in the 845 series (including 845 845G, 845GV and 845GL) that doesn’t support SDR/PC133. You might be confused by the way you memory is reported as DDR-SDRAM. This is because DDR is an SDRAM type, i.e. the full name for DDR is Double Data Rate Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory. This is as opposed to older PC133 and slower SDRAM, more recently dubbed SDR (Single Data Rate) to avoid confusion.

As I said, CPU-Z will try to discover your graphics interface, but it does this in reverse; it identifies your graphics card, then how it is connected. In your case, you’re most likely using the Integrated Graphics that all the 845G-series inherit. This of course, does not have a graphics interface, because it is integrated into the Northbridge. But we can tell from this, that you should have an AGP 2.0 slot (2X/4X). Although this is not a newer 3.0 (4X/8X) slot, you’re actually quite lucky in that a 4X slot supports older 2X cards, and all AGP 3.0 cards support 4X mode. AGP 3.0 (8X) on the other hand, doesn’t support 2X cards (unless specifically modified to do so by the manufacturer, which is rare).

Now to answer your original questions

Graphics Card:
Your system can take any AGP card on the market today. I’m guessing your CPU is probably a bit old now though. Your chipset supports 400/533 MHz FSB, which gives you a maximum CPU frequency of 3.06 GHz. Commonly, people with this age chipset have 2.4 GHz. This would mean that if you bought a very high end graphics card, your CPU would be a serious bottle neck. I would recommend something in the Radeon 9800-series or GeForce FX 5900-series. Although these may be harder to get hold of today, anything faster will likely be wasted.

RAM:
You can get 2*512MB DDR, and it will work fine. Although your system supports a maximum speed of DDR333/PC2700, you can still buy and install DDR400/PC3200; it will simply select a slower speed to run at, with the added bonus of superior latencies. DDR400 is often cheaper than DDR333, which is more difficult to obtain.


I hope that answered your questions sufficiently.

[Tom]

Originally Posted by syphus

I hope that answered your questions sufficiently.ÂÂ!

It has.. thankyou very much

[syphus]

My pleasure

Any other questions, post them

[Tom]

http://cpc.farnell.com/jsp/endecaSea...KU=CS11183&N=0

That fits perfectly into my budet £50 inc VAT & Delivery...

Is That a good price for that card??

[syphus]

That's ideal. It's either that or a PCI GeForce FX 5200.

[Tom]

I figured i'd save myself £20 so I decided to go on eBay for it..... :-\ Big mistake eh.

Should this card fit?
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...MEWN%3AIT&rd=1

It slotted in fine, but when I tried to turn it on the Bios just let out one long beep. :'(

Thanks a lot for your help.

[syphus]

That could well mean the card is defective. Try it someone else's system...


That marketing talk on the auction is great though:

Celestica's Gold Edition RADEON 9200 SE delivers a dazzling 3D experience to PC enthusiasts with the best performance in its class, optimized for today s most compelling gaming environments and applications. Driven by an advanced quad-pipe architecture, RADEON 9200 supports the AGP 8X standard, doubling the bandwidth of competing products and enabling more engaging characters and effects. The Gold Edition RADEON 9200 includes highly customizable tools that help redefine visual realism. SMARTSHADER supports DirectX 8.1 feature sets, enabling cinematic-quality lighting effects, while SMOOTHVISION delivers the sharpest, clearest textures without sacrificing frame rates.

They make "Quad-pipe architecture" and "best performance in its class" sound like good things, and "supportsDirectX 8.1" and "AGP 8X" sound like features. ;D

[Tom]

Ok... thanks Syphus, I don't know what I'd do without you. lol ;D


Happy new year.