Halo 1 & 2 for PC
This topic has moved here: Subject: The Buyer's Guide to Graphics Cards
  • Subject: The Buyer's Guide to Graphics Cards
Subject: The Buyer's Guide to Graphics Cards

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if your looking for a good Halo card (read: Halo generation games)

then i reccomend the GeForce 4 series of cards, 4 years ago i got a new comp from Dell (thats before they became crap) with the second best card available: the GeForce 4 Ti 4200 with 64MB RAM (note: I have 512MB system RAM). I still have the same computer today, and it playes Halo just fine (can get full graphics options with limited lag if I turn the resolution down to 800x600, for single player) but for multiplayer i just turn all the candy down to medium or off (depends on which setting, i turn specter off completly as well as particles, the 64MB of ram just can't take it).

But now, they have the new generation GeForce 4 series, the GeForce 4 MX, they upgraded the arcitecture to allow 128MB of onboard RAM to be put on it, and did a few other things to, so if your lookin for a really in-expensive card that can play Halo and a lot of the newer games with acceptable graphics, then the GeForce 4 MX cards are the way to go. We are talking under a hundred dollars here, this isn't a power card, its for your cheap arse user who doesn't need to play Half Life 2 at full graphics settings and with full 16 players in multiplayer. But if you want great graphics for the price, I have to say the GeForce 6600 group of cards, and if you want to splurge, then get the GeForce 6800 Ultra. Or if your looking for a compromise, and your lucky, find a GeForce 5700, and if your not lucky, get a GeForce 5600, most stable cards they sell other than the GeForce 6 series. I haven't heard good things about ATI other than they are fast, I'm the type of gamer who still plays games from 1995, and I want to be able to play them, as far as that goes, I haven't heard good things about ATI cards, but I know GeForce cards can, cause my friends have the GeForce 5600 and GeForce 6800 (standard) and they are fine running the old games.

that my Toonie

  • 01.17.2005 10:23 AM PDT
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Surprisingly, my computer runs multiplayer levels much better than it does campaign levels.

  • 01.17.2005 7:57 PM PDT
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Campaign levels can have lots going on: weather, AI, more enemies, much larger environments etc. Having fast internet is also very good for multiplayer. I have Comcast and rarely get lag unless some 28k jerk comes in :)

[Edited on 1/17/2005 9:31:42 PM]

  • 01.17.2005 9:31 PM PDT
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I didn't know there was such thing as 28k. I have a wireless connection on this computer. 54 MPS.

  • 01.18.2005 6:19 PM PDT
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Well, that's your router's maxmimum bandwidth. Mine's the same, I have a linksys at that speed. However, internet available for most people has a max of 3Mbps (comcast!!!). T1 and T3 and up have huge bandwidths, but those cost near $1000 per month and are used for servers and such.

28.8K came before 56.6K, then ISDN and DSL, and now Cable. However, the precursor to 28.8 was 14.4K....think about downloading anything at that speed.

I remember the days of napster and 56K dialup...good memories :)

  • 01.18.2005 6:50 PM PDT
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OMG! I remember dial up. When I was little that was all I knew so I didn't know that there was faster internet out there, however, the internet speed when I was young didn't matter because my favorite thing to do was play helicopter (http://addictinggames.com/helicopter.html)

  • 01.18.2005 8:01 PM PDT
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Dude, at my high school, that has been the most played game in the computer lounges for about three years. It is so simple, yet so hard to master. Some guy skipped classes and did it for 8 hours straight!

  • 01.18.2005 9:39 PM PDT
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Wow that guys a loser. It's fun but I have a short attention span, I usually quit after a while. My high score is 1111. That's off topic... About video/graphics cards. Well actually this is about sound cards. I saw this sound card called like the audigy something and it says it comes with like 5 different games with it, Halo being one of them. Why would you bundle a game that requires tons of graphics power with a sound card???

  • 01.18.2005 9:45 PM PDT
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Lemme guess...Audigy 2 ZS.

Yeah, most soundcard companies do that. They do it to sell the cards because few people have sound cards. The number with video cards is low, but those with sound cards is lower, so they try to sell it by bundling games. Not a bad deal though. You get nice, non gristly sound that usually clogs the processor power and also get cool games.

Myself? I have the Audigy LS...hence why it's not in my sig, mainly cuz i'm embarassed about it. It's terrible, it's gristly, they basically took some metal and silicon, put it into a waffle iron, and called it a sound card. It did come with Hitman 2, but that's really no consolation.

The best (and really only) card companies are Sound Blaster (they make the audigy cards) and Turtle Beach (catalina series). I haven't tried Turtle Beach yet. Anyone out there have one?

  • 01.18.2005 9:59 PM PDT

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What does this have to do with Graphics cards????

But I have a SoundBlaster Live! card, works just fine for me, crisp sound, though it really depends on the game, cause some game sounds are just cheap........

  • 01.19.2005 9:56 AM PDT
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I don't really care how my game sounds. It can't really change your sound quality too much at all.

  • 01.19.2005 4:31 PM PDT

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uh hu, buddy, it don't matter if you have the latest sound card and speakers, if the game you are playing only uses 16 bit sounds, trust me, it makes a world of difference compaired to if it uses 28 bit or 64 bit sounds.

  • 01.20.2005 8:07 AM PDT
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Heyyo,

Ok, Synthmilk, I'm gonna have to correct you dude...

Nvidia GF4 MX400 is CRAAAAP. Buy a GF2 MX220, you can probably find them for like $10 CDN. Not much different since the GF4 MX440 is BASED off the GF4 MX220... I have no idea why Nvidia had to be retarded when they first released it and put it full price.... they just wanted to sap the money out of us... Nvidia a good company? hah!

I had a GF2, upgraded to a GF4 MX440 by trade in + $80... jesus was I ripped off. So I tried again, with a GF FX5600... this card was useless! On Halo? I'd freak out at the worst times, had a hard time on Death Island, and flashlights just obliterate the framerate, so fighting tanks, and warthogs dead-on was next to impossible...

Needless to say, I'm pro-ATI now. Nvidia ripped me off badly twice, and if I ever buy Nvidia again, they better not sell me another crappy videocard not worth the price, or I'll film myself burning it, pissing onnit to put the flames out, and finally blowing it up into peices with a 22 Caliber rifle..

I now have an Sapphire's ATI Radeon 9600 PRO, and it's a fine card, and runs my games nicely, and for the price I paid? I feel like it's worth the cash. ;)

ATI still does do some tricking, like the ATI Radeon 9800 PRO being sweet and good price, but the 9800XT is a rip-off. Too expensive, and barely outpreforms the 9800 PRO. Ati just made this one to win the videocard speeds war for a while. Also their current lower-priced PCI-X vidcards seem to not be doing well, especially for their price.

The only Nvidia card I see worth the cash on the market is the 6600GT (AGP version), all the others can burn in hell for all I care...

  • 01.20.2005 10:24 AM PDT
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Why aren't they doing well? Sale wise or is it just that they aren't worth the price or they are just crappy cards or something. My friend has one and his is great!

  • 01.20.2005 4:21 PM PDT
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I run Halo PC on an ancient Radeon 7000, and it works fine - it's just that vertex shading, transparencies, and other nice-to-have details are sorely missing. I want to update now, but my wallet doesn't agree with me.

  • 01.20.2005 5:08 PM PDT
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Yeah maybe you and your wallet should compromise. Get an x700!

  • 01.20.2005 5:55 PM PDT
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You could always rob a bank to get money. I mean, it's not like we'd tell anyone...

<_<

>_>

  • 01.20.2005 6:45 PM PDT
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Ok so I got my x700 and installed all of the software etc but I once I double clicked Halo, it said that hardware acceleration may be disabled so I ran dxdiag and then everything worked and then I downloaded every update I could think of and nothing worked.

  • 01.20.2005 10:11 PM PDT
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Did you uninstall the old drivers? That will prevent you from using the card...

  • 01.20.2005 10:26 PM PDT
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Well Halo PC works but when I try to run custom edition it shows the little Halo window open up and then the moniter says "no signal" and it flashes from that to being black. By being black I mean that the moniter is on but it's colored black therefore making it looks sort of grayish black. It just switches from NO SIGNAL to black and then finally it says error and then it says that my hardware accelerator may be disabled so I ran dxdiag and everything was working. Halo PC works wonderfully but CE doesn't work at all.

  • 01.21.2005 7:34 AM PDT
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Try reinstalling HaloCE. Either that or open up ATI Catalyst and tell me the 3d settings.

  • 01.21.2005 10:37 AM PDT

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ThE_MarD, buddy, you need to download the latest drivers, and the latest DirectX version, don't know how you got a GeForce 5600 that sucks, prob got it from a bad vendor, cause my friends works just fine, plays DOOM 3 on High setting like a dream.......

  • 01.21.2005 1:36 PM PDT
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If something like a Radeon 8250 (correct me if I'm wrong) is inadequate for Halo PC, should it be considered a miracle if I get it to work on a 7000?

  • 01.21.2005 5:48 PM PDT
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Um, totally. I doubt it will run at all. Either that, or your computer will display 2 colors on screen.

  • 01.21.2005 6:59 PM PDT
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Posted by: sexy legs davis
What type of card do you have? ATI's Catalyst software actually has a menu for overclocking. If you select 'enable overdrive', it will push the card's RAM and core as hard as it can go w/o overheating. It's quite nice, really. It will never overheat that way, plus you can always look at the little thermometer just in case.

If you have Nvidia...well, I've never o'ced one. Does anyone have suggestions?


how do you do that?

do you have to have the control center to see that option?
or is it a third party thing

cause i dont see it in the control panel (i have catalyst 5.1)

  • 01.22.2005 12:40 AM PDT