Installing a new video card-not sure how???

Dell Dimension 3000
XP SP2
Pentium 4
1.2G Ram
Card- Intel 865G

Questions:

If I insert this into an empty PCI slot will it work???
ATI Radeon X1300 Pro PCI-Express 256MB Video Card

If it does,
Is my Intel an actual card, in a PCI slot right now that would need to be removed? along with removing the drivers.


thanks, need info and help

Dell Dimension 3000

Cons
No AGP/PCI-E Expansion Slot



Sorry cant upgrade that pc as far as i can find out about them, the intel is integrated into motherboard, you could use a pci (not a pci-e) vid card, but dont really bother its a waste of money and slow

As a rule anything that uses intel video graphic is usually never ment for upgrade at all, they plain suck :>

how to change them (thats a agp but its still the same way anyway)
http://www.fonerbooks.com/r_video.htm

Forsa Nvidia Geforce 5200 128MB PCI Video Card
or
ATI Radeon 256MB Video Card (9250)

Would that be an improvement at all ???

Least youd get into SL with those, but expect a grusome slow experience <5 fps

From my experience with DELL they're almost impossible to upgrade because of they way they build them. They're built to run on that set up for a long time without upgrades. Then you just get a brand new computer. It's not worth spending money on a crappy PCI card in a crappy computer. You're better off going out and buying a whole new computer (Something that isn't DELL).

thanks for info,

I got educated from 2 RL tech experts about video cards and yes, need new PC.
A PCI card would be no improvement.

Forgot to ask...........so........

Best PC to buy????
Mac???

shure if you want to spend 1200$ on a 499$ pc just so you have the option of running mac os

apple Summary
Subtotal $1,199.00
Specifications

2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1GB 667 DDR2 SDRAM - 2x512
160GB Serial ATA drive
SuperDrive 8X (DVD+R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Keyboard & Mighty Mouse + Mac OS X - U.S. English
ATI Radeon X1600 128MB SDRAM
17-inch widescreen LCD
AirPort Extreme

HP
price after rebate $739.99
Operating System Genuine Windows Vista(TM) Home Premium (32-bit)
Processor Intel(R) Pentium(R) D 925 (3.0GHz, 4MB,800MHz FSB)
Memory 1GB DDR2-667MHz dual channel SDRAM (2x512)
128MB NVIDIA GeForce 7350LE
Networking No Modem
Hard Drive SAVE $40! 250GB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
Primary CD/DVD Drive LightScribe 16X DVD+/-R/RW SuperMulti drive
Front Productivity Ports 2 USB, 1 FireWire IEEE 1394, audio ports
TV & Entertainment Experience No TV Tuner w/remote control
Sound Card Integrated 7.1 channel sound w/front audio ports
Monitors HP 17-inch LCD Wide Flat Panel Monitor


thats 1ghz faster, 90 gb more disk space, and a nvidia card that wont give SL trouble for 460$ less

but it wont run mac os, and its one or 2 programs that windows doesnt have

Talk to your real life tech friends about building your own. It's not that difficult and it is really quite fun to do. My first "home built" was a "bare bones" special I got at a computer fair. Bare bones are a case, motherboard, power supply, hard drive, cpu, some ram and maybe a few other basics. You can get a pretty good (to excellent) bare bones that you can add all the goodies you want. Things to look for are motherboards with at least 4 PCI-e slots, capable of more than 2 gigs of ram, and fast ethernet on board (you don't need to use a good expansion slot for a network interface card.....waste to time, money, and you'd be using a slot unnecessarily). In a case look for lots of cooling options (fans) and the capability for big wattage power supply (500 watts is about minimum these days). If you want glitsty and lights and plexy glass side panels expect to pay for them.

What I do is scavenge off the computer I'm replacing all the good stuff like hard drives, audio cards, video cards and stuff I've added that I want to keep. I usually put the hard drive from the older computer as a second drive in the new one......use the new hard drive as the primary (HHD 0), DVD and CD burners, zip drives and stuff fall into the scavenged stuff. Look for maximum upgradability (think of all the stuff you might want and try to get a basic computer with the capability to run that as a later time. You shouldn't need a monitor but if you are still running a CRT, I would suggest an LCD (you'll love the difference).

You'll get an instruction manual on how to install all the pieces and how to set up your CMOS. Get a phillips screw driver and put it all together install your operating system (you'll need one of those ). And enjoy the the experience of being a "geek".........LOL

It's fun..........and you can do it in less than one day. Probably about 4 hours easy. And when you add up all the costs you'll find you probably spent a little less than your Dell........PLUS you won't wind up one day like now............being told to toss it because it's un-upgradable. I friend of mine has a computer I gave her (the one before this machine that I'm using right now that I built) that is over 5 years old.......still kicks butt. LOL.

Hiya, Alan!
Peggy's right...talk to your RL techie friends and then build your own.
I spent less than $750 to build a PC *just* for SL. (my mac is still my main machine). The most expensive component was a copy of XP.
The machine I came up with can easily have its processor, RAM, and vid cards upgraded as needed for at least the next 4 or 5 years....as is, I get 50 fps in most sims. (that is, after my poor DSL network finally loads all the textures.

And I paid the 12 year old whiz kid neighbor-boy $50 to put it all together...although, it only takes an hour if you own your own screwdrivers. PC's have become like Lego blocks--plug and play.