Graphics Upgrade

What AGP Graphics card should I get for my computer?

My computer is the following, it's quite old. Compaq Prescario Windows XP Home Edition Amd Sempron(tm) 3000+ , MMX, 3DNow, 2.0Ghz. 512MB DirectX 9.0c. Three PSI slots and one AGP slot .. I want to keep this inbetween $150-250 in terms of pricing. I also only play two main computer games .. The Sims 2 and the expansions, and Fable: The Lost Chapters.

Public Comments

1. I would personally look at the Nvidia line and look at the 7600, 7800 and 7900. Of course the 7800 and 7900 are the better cards but much more expensive. I have personally owned a 7600GS and was amazed how much faster it was than my onboard video and my older video card. It made Oblivion much much better to play. If I was in your situation instead of putting all your money into a $250 video card I would look at buying an extra 512MB Ram, faster processor and new video card. $50 and you can get an Athlon processor which will be 2-3x faster than your Sempron, $30+ and you can double your RAM and another $125 or so for a 7600GS. For under $250 you will have a much much faster machine all around
2. XFX Geforce 7600GT 256MB I have one and it's best in value/performance I would also invest in a better heatsink/fan than the stock one cuz it tends to run alil hot buy it on www.newegg.com =) or if you want to spend more money, go with the newer 7950
3. Most of the latest AGP cards should do it, although AGP is almost no-longer manufactured. If you want the most top-of-the-range AGP card possible, (or at least the top one I could find), you could get an nVIDIA GeForce 7800 GS AGP with 256mb of memory. It's quite a beefy card, handling all the big-games such as Farcry, Half-Life 2 episode 2, et cetera. I'm not sure about price, I got mine for $147 AUD so see what you can find should you decide on this card.