My first gaming machine was a Compaq with a mini form factor, so I can relate. It was 'free' as well (the network admin was getting revenge on the parent company and started giving them away) and it served me well for a year. I know it's a gift horse, but given the hurdles I really am impressed you're making the effort. When you're done upgrading put out the specs -- I'll bet it's the buffest Craptiplex in the world by then.

Well, I got my new geforce4 card and the memory.
Let me just say, that its a whole new game.
I had no idea what I was missing.
Oh well, live and learn I suppose.

Thanks for everybodies input.
Z~

I finally installed it on my home machine last night (1.3ghz, 384MB Ram, GeForce2 GTS) and wow. This machine chokes every time you get in a plane, and i have all the settings turned WAY down. Crazy. I didn't realize how spoiled i was on my work machine. I'm thinking about going out and getting a new card today just so i can get a good rate on this game. Anyone have any suggestions on a sub $100 card that will rock?? I've been an nVidia guy for a while, but haven't followed the recent updates... so what's the bad ass card to have at the moment?

Hmmmm....

/me considers getting one of those for his Optiplex at work.

Nah, never mind, then I'd never get any work done.

Man, i totally just realized i got the shaft on this Dell... I got a Dimension 8100 which lucky me uses RDRAM... which ain't quite as cheap as the prevailing standard stuff. Grrrrr. I don't mind the long load times as long as the RAM won't affect gameplay i guess. Ah well.

Loren, don't get a sub-$100 card for your home gaming machine right now. I don't think Sub-$100 will improve things much beyond that GTS you're running now. Doom3 is coming out soon, and none of the sub-$100 cards are going to run it with all of the features, you're going to have to scale back its settings for most cards.

Even among the more expensive recent GeForce4 cards, even some of those won't run it with all its features. There's one certain GeForce4 chipset that's supposed to be able to run Doom3 well but I don't remember its name. I'm going to wait until Doom3 is about to come out before I buy a new card, so that I can let the prices drop a bit and let the card technology advance a bit. Then I'll buy whatever card Carmack recommends for running Doom3.

I picked up a GeForce 3 Ti200 online for 90 bucks and I am stoked. I run the game at 800 x 600 (32) with all the settings at high and get nice, clean gameplay.

Carmack whore.

I dunno, from what i've seen and read it seems like the GeForce 4's are a big jump from the 2 series. And for under a $100 i'm not that worried if i have to replace it in 3-4 months.

doom3 isnt coming out anytime soon, last i heard towards the end of next year.

last i heard towards the end of next year.

Interesting, I could have sworn someone from id dropped a big hint at QuakeCon along the lines of "we don't like to take a game to E3 two years in a row".

I've got a 3-ti-200 and been playing all day at 1024x768. 32 bit. Everything cranked to high, runs perfectly.

My recommendation though would be a GF4, anything besides the MX variety (which is a glorified GF3 it seems). the ti 4200, 4400, etc. Should last 2 years or so at least, and in the $150 - $200 range, depending what kind of deal you find.

For that, I like www.pricewatch.com , and forums.anandtech.com - go and read the "hot deals" section, stuff pops up quite often there.

JAFO - just another $*$(%)_ opinion.

Sorry, been Lan-festing for about 24 hours straight now, and starting to lose it hopefully that answer makes sense.

hoowie

K, i'm fairly pissed. I just dropped $150 for a PNY GeFoce4 MX 440 at Frys (i'm impatient), and it's running like ASS. Framerates are all over the place and it chugs pretty often... and i've tried every setting known to man, updated ever possible driver, and nothings helped. I have 384MB Ram and i'm thinking that's not enough... but i surely thought i'd notice a difference from this card and a Geforce2..this one seems worse! I'd bring it back tomorrow... i just don't feel like driving to f'n Sunnyvale. Grrrr!!!!! I've been tweaking all night instead of playing and i'm a very unhappy customer!

I got a PNY GeFoce4 MX 420 (PCI not AGP) from Buy.com, and its smooth as silk.
And thats with all the settings in the game set to medium (I tried it on high, and I got a little bit of choppiness, so now I'm somewhere in between).
I have 512MB ram and a PIII 866.
Maybe it just seems so smooth in comparison to my old ATI radeon 7000.
I'm pretty happy with it though.
Is the 440 better than the 420?
Z~

As has been stated before, the MX line is their ``cost-effective'' line.

Yeah, but like Fusto said, it seems to be working damn good on most people's systems.

Fusto, when you get a sec...
While playing the game, go into the console by pressing "~" key, then type "console.showfps 1". That will show your fps in the upper right hand corner. Let me know what you're getting.

I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, 1.3 ghz p4, 384 megs of ram, a Sound Blaster Live Value, and that GeForce 4 MX 440... should be plenty to run the game smoothly. I have noticed it jolt when it's doing some hard drive reading (swapping i'd imagine).. which makes me wonder if i need some more RAM (stupid RAMBUS). I just don't get it... it's driving me nuts. There's got to be one little thing that's making it choke and i can't figure out what it is. I've turned off all extra processes and background apps, and updated all the drivers like i said. With the exception of the SB LIve! card... when i installed the new drivers, i got no sound whatsoever, so i put the original ones from Dell back in. Any insight into that one anyone?

In the mean time, i found a AOPEN GEFORCE4 TI4200 128MB VIVO at GameVE.com for $154 with free shipping. I'm definitely ordering that sucker and returning this MX.

Somebody else said something about turning down the ``resolution'' of the sound effects, too. Have you tried that? (I'm working blind here, since my CPU is simply not fast enough.)

Cool - if you can return the MX, then you've done well to upgrade I think. You'll see a lot better fps witht he new one.

I just checked, the single player demo doesn't do anything at all when I hit the "~" key, and the multiplayer we sat on this weekend won't start when I'm alone (just got home from a Lan-fest we did yesterday). So I don't know what my numbers are.

I have video sttings to "high", 1024x768x32 @100, graphics high, effects high, environment mapping on, lightmaps on, shadows on, just noticed 80% only for texture but can't think sure that makes too much difference, and view distance 100%. Sounds are quality 22khz, high detail, hardware accelerated (5.1 Philips soundcard). Using the Nvidia refresh rate fix to lock 100Hz in the game mode for the monitor.

I'm picky about graphics, I easily get motion sickness and take Dramamine to play for long. I can't even have the guy next to me shake his foot while playiing, because I can see my monitor jiggle just that little bit. And I had a very pretty screen all day yesterday. The clouds and smoke, etc. were all very smooth with no sharp edges, everything simply looked great. One of the prettier games around this side of Serious Sam. Athlon 1.4~266, 512 MB RAM, Gainward GF3ti200, with the Philips super duper soundcard.

One of the guys mentioned the game being a memory hog, but not sure what that was based on. The good soundcard should keep the CPU from being hit, but primarily it's all up to the vid card anyway... What do you see in 3dmark2001? Or do you use it? I typically hit 7000, give or take depending if antivirus and other such things are running. I can set the CPU to run at 1.5 all day long and turn the GF3 overclock sliders up to 200 and 450, and hit about 8000 on it. But I typically don't do it, since when I do play games I do it for like 24 hours at a shot and figure overheating and killing something ain't worth it.

I can think of a few variables though - 1) The full version you are playing is a lot more demanding than the demo we were playing, though I doubt it at least a little since they'd want the demo to be outstanding enough for everyone to buy the game. 2) You've got some wierd thing toggled on or off that makes a substantial hit on it all, either in the game or out. V-sync perhaps, or something similar? 3) We simply have different definitions of acceptable, though I know mine are pretty high.

I get fluctuation between about 40-60 fps.... Athlon 1.3GHz, 768 SDRAM, MSI GeForce 440MX (which I got for $90) 800x600 32bit color, with everything turned all the way up... SB Live! with hardware acc. turned on, at 44 khz. I don't know if this will help.... We do have the same speed processor... but mine is AMD, not Intel

Yeah, something's definitely screwy then if your getting that good. I think i've narrowed it down to my OEM Dell SB Live! Value card... i'm gonna toss another one in and see if that helps. *Crossing fingers*

Im getting about 35-60 fps. It varies depending on mode of transport.
Flying the plane on a full server (32 users) with a bunch of other planes and lots of action brought it down in the twenties for a second or two but that was the worst it got. Have also had it up in the 80's while flying a plane through some action.
Total average? I'd have to say about 45.

Z~

Well, I 'm a bit suprised there on the choking, I have a GForce2 GTS card, 512MB RAM, Athlon 1.4Ghz, and had the settings at midway., 800x600x16bit, and I'm not having any problems when I get into a plane. I do know the game is a big RAM hog, so you might want to just go ahead and put more RAM in.

Now I've got a GForce4 Ti4600...Cranked the settings up to full, 1024x768x16(Forgot to set it to 32), and it's still pretty smooth. I'll need to get online tomorrow night.

UT2003 demo under Linux runs nice also with the new card

Im getting about 35-60 fps
What are you guys doing to monitor the fps? Is it a seperate program or is there a function in the game?

Loren told me how.

In the game press the ~ key.
That pops up the console.
Then type: console.showfps 1 and hit enter.
That then puts a framerate counter up in the left hand side of the screen.
You'll have to turn off the radio commands (f8) to really see it.
And it doesnt show up when your somewhere dark, because the numbers are black.
Press ~ again to close the console.
Z~

Interesting, I could have sworn someone from id dropped a big hint at QuakeCon along the lines of "we don't like to take a game to E3 two years in a row".

This was more of a joke that had the audience laughing, basically aimed at Daikatana and Duke Nukem (taking) Forever. There was no specific talk that Doom 3 would come out before next May, or even a minor hinting. When it's done is the mantra, and right now the engine is done (and has been for months beyond tweaks), and now it's just up to the artists and such to crank out the content.

And yes, on the video card arena, a sub $100 GeForce 4 MX is not going to show much improvement over a GeForce 2 GTS. They are actually the same basic card. (Engineering redid the core to be a bit cheaper to make and Marketing slapped the 4 on the name). The GeForce 4 Ti on the otherhand would be a decent step up from the 2 GTS.

After I missed this I subscribed to CompUSA's ads... got an email today which had this link for next week. Does this look like the same thing to you guys. The emails description read: Caviar SE 120GB, 7200RPM, Internal EIDE Hard Drive- $149.99 after savings and rebate. Now isn't the SE the 8MB Buffer??

Yes, that should be the one with the 8MB buffer. Not quite as good as the deal that guy was talking about, but still good.

I think this is pretty much the same thing... for $50 he was taking in a internet ad where it was $150. CompUSA would price match it, then slap on top of that the $100 MIR. I never knew CompUSA price matched internet prices. I know Staples does...

Go here for a video card comparison chart. It includes most recent cards except for the newest Radeon 9700 from ATI (which blows away the Ti4600).

In regards to the MicroCenter advertisment for a WD 120GB drive, the ad was a misprint. It had the correct SKU# but listed the cache as being "8MB" when it should have said "2MB". Although this was immediately recognized, many people used (unscrupulously) the printed ad to receive price matches at various local stores before the stores found out that it was a misprint. Believe me, I was having dreams of a 360GB RAID monster setup for about $100