Jenny, Inland, Drac - just found out what kind of a video card my old Dell Dimension has - it's a Nvidia 64 MB DDR GeForce3 Ti 200; will have to get something identical or upgraded from this one - advice on what NVidia card/where I should get it?

The motherboard, sound card, and video card will come with a driver disc, or you can download drivers from the websites of the individual components. If the motherboard comes with onboard ethernet, the drivers for it will be included on the driver disc with the rest of the motherboard drivers (or on the website of the motherboard manufacturer if you want to get the latest drivers from their website).

Most motherboards come with onboard audio and sometimes onboard video, but if you're not using them, you don't need to install the drivers for them.

Without upgrading the power supply your choices are slim - maybe a low profile Geforce 6 6200.

EVGA 256-A8-N401-LR GeForce 6200 256MB 64-bit DDR2 AGP 8X Video Card

Your AGP bus is only 4x, but the card will adjust down. Unfortunately, the card is only slightly faster than the Ti at 8x.

I'd keep the Ti. It could be useful running older 3D games that don't run well with newer cards.

Ok, I agree with you Jenny. Nate (my Michigan nephew) is coming back for a visit again in 6 weeks - this will be the end of August - so we'll order these new PC parts then.

Incidentally, Mom's studio is just about done - only a top for her desk has to be put in, the windowsills (2 windows) have to be put in, and a couple of shelves have to be put in - not much work on the part of these 2 nephews. Mom's computer stuff etc., has been put back and hooked up, including my laser printer, but the laser printer isn't hooked up - we're waiting for my ever-busy Penna. nephew to attend to all of this.

So Jenny, could you find the right Nvidia Ti video card for my Dell Dimension, please? I'm a complete moron when it comes to picking out the techy stuff on the computer, be it a PC or a mac.

Oh, and before I forget, should I get a quad core processor for that new PC or stick with that Pentium Dual Core processor that my nephews picked this Feb.? I wonder if there is such a thing as a Pentium Quad Core Processor - should I get this instead?

Does the card that's in the computer not work any more? If it still works, I wouldn't bother getting another card unless you want a backup. But if the card isn't working, there are currently two used ones on Amazon for around $10 + $5.49 shipping. Do a search for
Geforce 3 TI
at Amazon. Unfortunately the Dell 8200 uses RDRAM, which is rare and expensive.
http://www.4allmemory.com/memory/dell-dimension-8200/


A Core 2 Duo should be OK for the foreseeable future. It's mainly the video card and the RAM that affects whether you can play a game or not.

Jenny, Inland, here are some error messages about my Dell's video card nearly a year or so, possibly 6 months ago when I installed my 80 Days Around the World PC game (for XP) and started playing the game when the game crashed (it never did this before - even on same PC when I played it upon ordering game from Amazon.com) and the computer restarted, showing this dialogue box onscreen that indicate a possible device failure pointing to the Dell's video card - now that I reread their contents on Photobucket, I don't know if I really do need a replacement video card, or only a new driver?

Possible device failure?
details of the error message 001
Details of the error message 002

According to the system requirements -

80 Days - System Requirements

Your Ti 200 doesn't have enough memory to run the game.

Edit

Try replacing it with something like this and you won't have to upgrade your PSU -

JATON 3DFORCE6200Twin-LP GeForce 6200 256MB 64-bit DDR2 AGP 8X

That's strange - I was able to play 80 Days all the way up to the arrival in Bombay, India on the Dell Dimension after I first got the game about 5 - 6 years ago.

My Dell Dimension has: 1.7 GHz Pentium 4 processor, 80 GB hard drive space on drive C, 120 GB on drive G, a 64 MB NVidia video card, 512 MB RAM.

I wonder why the game crashed (this never happened before when I replayed it, like, 2 - 3 times 2 - 3 years ago) this time I tried another replay?

EDIT - Just saw that video card, Inland. Will show everything - stuff about the old Dell, these new PC parts - that was posted by you and Jenny100 on pages 13 - 14 when Nate comes back in 6 weeks.

Thanks for the link for the video card, Inland. Is my Dell's video card really failing?

And will games that specify a NVidia graphics card in particular play with no problems on this video card you linked me to Inland?

The video card I linked to will play many games (but not all). It is far from stellar, so don't expect too much, but I would think it should play 80 Days without issue.

I doubt your card is failing, it may be a driver issue (or the fact that it only has half the required video ram required).

Try running a different driver, one like the one below -

GeForce3 Ti 200 Driver 5.13.1.2189

According to ***gpureview*** a Geforce 3 TI 200 can come with either 64MB or 128MB of video RAM, and according to Inland's link ***80 Days*** requires a 64MB card but recommends a 128MB card.

If you could check the Display tab of your dxdiag, you could find out whether you have a 64MB card or a 128MB card. (Click the Start button in the lower left of your computer screen, then Run. Type
dxdiag
in the box and OK it. Look at the Display tab.)

The amount of video RAM on the card may be marginal if you only have 64MB. But it should be enough to play at least as far into the game as you did the first time. Do you remember "updating" the drivers since last you played it? Try the drivers Inland linked to. Dell also has drivers for the Geforce 3 TI 200 ***here***. I found it under "Video" in ***this list at Dell***.

I totally missed the 64 MB minimum - so Jenny's right, the game should play.

I think it's most likely the driver that's causing your problem.

From what I saw of the error message (in your image link) you have a 64MB card.

Yes, Jenny, I do very clearly remember that around the time I bought 80 Days 4 - 6 yrs ago, either it or some other game wouldn't play or perhaps I got an error message, don't recall details, but I do very clearly recall that my Penna. nephew - then a teenager - told me that the problem (maybe the game - 80 Days or another game - had crashed, again don't recall details) was the video card, and he d/l a new driver for it and he installed it to update the video card, and from that point on, the newer games - like 80 Days, et al, played without a problem of any kind in the Dell.

Ok, I d/l the driver. Is this the latest one for that particular card?

Oh, and before I forget to tell you, Jenny and Inland, ever since my Dell PC had the latest video card updates after I got my HP Compaq laptop in Aug. 2005 - the Dell's Hard drive had to be wiped approx. every yr or so by this nephew since it kept getting malware from the internet, but he'd always install all the latest video card drivers before returning the tower back to me, and the last time he had to wipe it and do a fresh OS install was a year ago, only he put Windows 7 on the Dell but I didn't want Windows 7 so I had to use the Windows XP disc that came with the computer to reformat (wipe) the hard drive again and do a fresh install of Win XP, so, no, the video card drivers were never updated since I did this - and I'm all eager to do this. It might save me the price of that replacement video card, money better spent on games!

So could you please give me a step-by-step guide on how to install the new video card driver I just d/l and update the video card?

Just follow Jenny's link (the Dell link) and download the driver.

Once it's copied to your hard drive, locate and run it - it will self install.

The ***Dell webpage*** with the driver has Installation Instructions. Just click on where it says "Installation Instructions" and it will give you a step-by-step.