LadyCrimson

Yeah, hubby says 500. Agree on the forum thing too. I'm here whining, after all. Hah! But on the other side, sometimes advocates of something can be a little overdone too. It's a balance. Hubby's the one that buys the core PC stuff, and so far it's always been fine, he does well at price vs what you get for it for our usually modest needs. But he's a mass network/office/giant hub type guy - game-minded home machines are outstripping his knowledge on what's good for the price now, I think. Anyhoo...judging from Hades's googly eyes, that's enough from me on this one. Just frustrating, when ya wanted to be playing your game etc.

Just in case my experiences with this helps anyone else...reading the evga forums it appears it does want an 18 amp actually supplied on the 12V rail (tho you might get away with less if you're lucky) and looking under my PS again, it appears it's only 16. Thus that's likely the problem, since all the plugs are plugged. However, a lot of people seem to be having problems with display and drivers not intializing at all or inconsistently, while evga keeps harping it's the power supply (even if yours is good enough) or a bad card (when people exchange the cards 3 or 4 times...). Also, I have an MIS Neo type motherboard and some folks with those seem to have a lot of problems as well (one person said those moboards tend to undervolt the prcoessor/memory/AGP & he reset them higher which improved the cards performance/artifact problems for him a lot - I don't think I'll bother with that, but I did find it interesting. My husband says installing a new PS can be kind of a pain (30 minutes for him maybe, 3 hours and a lot of desk pounding for me, maybe) and he looks a little grumpy about doing it himself (hehe) and started grumbling how it might be less hassle to just build a new PC w/ a new MB etc. Anyway, I'm now completely undecided what I'm going to do. It's all about less hassle for us, more than anything else. ----------- Oh and about the 1280 resolution - that's just a personal preference. I found once I started playing in that for a while, I just couldn't go back...1024 looks washed out & less 'clean' looking to my eyes now, AA/AF or not. I mean, think about how once 1024 became standard, no one wants 800x600...same thing. If you're used to 1024, looks great. If you're use to higher, it doesn't.

I only have the sound and HD in there tho, besides the case fans. Unplugged, still noise. Oh well, I'll get a PS tomorrow and see if that works. Cross my fingers for simple solution.

Heh...yeah...I suppose it'll be easier to buy a power supply first and see if that works. With that quote it's a good possibility...too bad the stores are closed now, lol. Hubby says I could unplug everything else in there just to see if that made the card go to get a clue if that was really it or not.

Yes, that's plugged in, and actually, the 6200 had one too. The 7800gs box says 350W or greater, not 400...but I suppose that's still possible, especially if they mention that noise.

Yeah, plugged in and all that...board supposed to support up to AGP4 I think, if that's what you mean by standard. I'm looking for the MB drivers and such, maybe they need updating.

The rest of my system is fine...not the fastest hardware, but fine. (P4-3ghz/2RAM etc). I installed the card and it won't initialize, making a high pitched single tone (not beeps). So either it's broken out of the box or the no-longer-current motherboard is somehow not compatabile with it. Is there anyway/site to find out if a specific mobo has a problem with certain cards? And yes I'm irritated now.

Why I don't shop on-line...you can't buy, try/change your mind, return, and buy something else all in 4 hours. I went with the ge7800GS. The X850Pro had a nicer price tag but I'm still convinced ATI still has more compatiability w/game issues from reading all the game-tech help forum sections. The upgrade will also help my digital photography and such, but if I put this in and Oblivion still chugs badly on middling 1280 settings I'm going to be really PO'd. :angry:

That would be 350W

I can see why people like the ATI's in general beyond performance. They seem generally cheaper. I'd still rather have the nivida tho, I'm used to them. Well, hubby probably won't like the price tag for a vanity item but oh well, too bad. Thanks hades that did help. I think my power supply is pretty 'standard' or slightly above - I'd have to look. It's not superpowered tho.

It's an AGP slot, my mobo doesn't support PCIE. I guess that ge one is pcie? And LoneWolf, I know, I'm not usually quite that impulsive, but that stores close so I figured either it would be ok and I'd install or it'd suck and I'd go out again. I didn't want to go home just to reasearch and go back again to buy if it turned out it was ok. I'm weird that way.

Oh...I considered a ge7800GS but I thought I read some big debates on that one here vs. the 6800, or something...

it's not an all in wonder...but it's not a 'pro' either, just says X1300. Bloody cards and all their titles, it's confusing. I'm looking at Toms Hardware website right now. They say the Sapphire Radeon X1600 Pro AGP is $150ish online, which irritates me. I guess it looks like I should return it and wade thru traffic to go to Fry's. Bah.

But those are $100 more, at least in the store. I don't buy on-line. I guess I'm wondering if it's worth that much more to get the higher number if you're going to upgrade in a year or year and a half anyway. (edit) will I at least notice a noticiable improvement over my 6200? I suppose that's the most important thing to me, since that's why I bought one... ...and yes I can easily go back to the store and return or exchange it.

I don't like the grass off, it makes the flat CGI ground look terrible, no matter how great the rest of it looks, and I don't like it, loses immersion. I found that turning off the Bloom/HDR but leaving things like water/distance/drawing effects on etc. worked to give me an almost playable sensation while still looking pretty decent at 1280, just with non-smooth edges and lack of that soft 'glow' on everything. I just can't play in 1024 anymore..but I still bought a card. As to the female faces...yeah I spent an hour on her face I think. I turned her age to not quite the minimum, that helped. The rest didn't look right until I started making the cheek/chin adjustments while looking at the side of her face instead of head-on. The faces are much improved, but still mostly ugly...especially when the game likes to zoom in every time you talk to an NPC...scary.

So I thought the store still had some ge6800's on the shelf, but nope....didn't want the 6600, so I looked at the ATI's. I know nothing about them and the youthful salesguy (who plays Oblivion, haha) said the X1300 was probably close to the 6800 in comparison (AGP terms). Being an impatient soul I brought it home. Before I open the box thought I'd ask the geeks here....was I stupid, or will this card work until I upgrade to a PCIE setup in a year or two? lol

All I know is on the old computer, with the case on, the computer would flake out in the hot weather...with it off, it was fine and had nary a problem...and it still works, I still use it. That was a smaller case than the one on the current PC tho, and didn't have all the extra fans and whatnot.

Well I started to chug in the towns...still playable, but I turned off AA/AF in order to stay in 1280. I think I'm going to run out and buy a 6800 card while I still can. Hah. I spent about 15 minutes after waking up trying to chase a deer in the forest and take a 'picture' of it...yup...very cool. I'm not sure I like the new persuasion mini-game tho. :D

I used to keep my cases open...my old computer still is. It gets really really hot in this room in summer, plus in order to attach it you needed a lot of screws, making it a pain in the arse to take it off if you needed...so it was just easier to leave it off for more airflow. My main PC has better cooling and a snap on side so I leave it on. As to dust, you can just take it outside now and then and blow it around with canned air.

For those wondering, the below is what my game looks like in the dungeon. Shrunk from 1280, obviously. In screenshots it looks a bit jaggedy around her neckline but in-game it's not noticable really. Not bad I think considering the bottleneck that's my vid card. I'm always behind on the video, heh. Haven't had any performance issues using Bloom/4AA/4AF, going to try higher ones next. I tried HDR but it chugged like a mo'fo so back to Bloom it was (I don't even know what those things mean...bah)... I still haven't gotten outside, that's one long intro level, and I'm tired. Reading back in the thread a little, for reference, the Print Screen key didn't work until I edited the ini file in the MyDocuments folder, not just the ProgramFiles one. Or maybe it has to be both, I don't know, didn't check that. But I've been using Fraps (bmps), like Hades - I tend to like 3rd party screenshot programs better than PrintScreen for some reason.

Bah...enough abusing the system...(I can switch to my 2nd puter and websurf while listening to my sneaking footsteps, haha)...just wanted to see if one still could. lol Gotta get outside so I can see all the pretty stuff and see how it looks w/my old video card. I suspect I won't get really far into the 'plot' - I just like messing around with things. Two things I notice...I don't like the interface quite as much as MW - it seems more clunky, even if it's a bit more streamlined. In FP I tend to flail away at a monster before they're in range, because they apparently can hit me before my eyes tell me they should be able to so better safe than sorry. Disorienting, guess I'll get used to it, but it didn't feel that way so much in MW. 3rd person looks better to me but hard to taget stuff that way. Anyway, back to the game to get out of this bloody starter dungeon.

I'm on 1280x960, most settings 'on' and middling vid card quality settings and it looks/runs fine so far...I'm not outside yet tho...and I'm not as picky as, say, Kaftan. :D Question, do the skills that you increase in the tutotrial dungeon stick with you when you leave it? Or am I wasting my time increasing my sneak skill while away from the PC by abusing the system...I heard they fixed the stacking, broken alchemy, apparently didn't alter the sneak one tho.

I have fairly bad back issues too, although mine's upper back, between the shoulders, so it's a bit different. I work a lot on my arms and upper torso for muscle support around the neck/upper spine. Tai chi type movements and such. Definitely help...every time I slack off for too long I end up spending a day or three in bed.

Excellent? No...but it's not crap. The vid card's a little older tho (nvidia 6200 I think), and still AGP, so I won't have top of the line texture smoothing and all that tech mumbo jumbo, no. But I suspect it'll still look good. edit - the rest of my pc meets or exceeds the 'recommended' specs tho ...damn that's one long install....

That's a nice feature, letting you change once. Reading the brief manual, also nice you can buy for sale houses now, instead of finding some empty house to dump everything in, lol. I suspect I'll probably wander and explore more than 'play'...like I did w/MW. The install screens are pretty.