Best AGP graphics card for replacement?

[Homless Snark]

So here's my situation, i have an old pc i built in 2002. it had a radeon 9800 pro graphics card which if i remember was an AGP connection.

Anyway a few weeks ago screen went all green-streaks etc and then after awhile everything turns on but monitor says theres no input so i assume the gfx card is fried.

Anyway money is tight to the point where i could probably only spare $50-75 right now, so new pc is out of the question.

I see radeons going for 30 or so on ebay, but was wondering if there were better cards with that same connection

 

[Shakermaker]

The best card I could find. It's either that or one of a Nvidia 7600. Couldn't find those on Newegg though. AGP is almost phased out, so this kind of cards are getting harder and harder to come by.

 

[Dinnesch]

Don't get anything better than a Radeon 9800, seriously. If you're still on a computer so old that it uses an AGP port I'm pretty sure your CPU isn't anything better than some Pentium 4/Athlon XP.
I'm speaking out of experience, having used an Radeon X1650 AGP on a Pentium 4 3.4 GHz(like 2 years ago), and because of the CPU bottleneck most modern games still ran like crap(where they would work fine for people with the same card & a decent dualcore).

I would seriously suggest that you pick up a cheap second hand card for like $10 and collect money until you can afford an appropiate CPU/mobo at the same time(if gaming is a priority)

 

[Homless Snark]

hmm yeah if iremember correctly i believe it was a 2.4 ghz pentium 4.


running the newest and best isnt really a concern of mine as my roomate has that covered, or if its on a console i'll use it on ps3/xbox. However i was a huge counter strike player, minecraft, etc, etc and it got to the point where those games were chopping a little, so i was just looking for a better card to maybe bump those games up to higher fps.

 

[Acepilotf14]

I didn't know AGP still existed.

 

[Homless Snark]

it doesn't but im buying old-stock off ebay

 

[Hectic Glenn]

Also remember the power of your PSU will be limiting you. 2002 makes it at least a 9 year old PSU which isn't going to be great. Like Dinnesch said, you may as well go like-for-like and get the best 9800 still out there. I believe the standard one most people had was the 9800 pro 256mb version, I think there might have been a 512mb version or 9800XT which was a tiny bit better. My memory going back that far is a bit fuzzy though

 

[Laivasse]

I was in the same situation 4-5 years back and I switched to a x1950 Pro AGP. Gave me another couple of years on the comp, playing Source games and stuff like Bioshock. However the cards were tough to find even at the time and it DID require a new PSU. Also my old AMD single core CPU was equivalent to a 3.2GHz or 3.4GHz Pentium, so I would have had less than your bottleneck, OP.

 

[Homless Snark]

if i recall I believe my psu was a 400 or 450 watt power supply. When i get home tonight i'll be sure to take a look, been swo long I can't remember haha.

Took your advice and look into the radeon 9800 xt, but looks like its also just 256mb.

 

[Quixoticism]

Something like the 4650 would be decent. Of course you should go for the best thing you can get for the cheapest price. I would look for something a bit newer than the 9800. At least an x800/6600GT or better is something you would want and those are so old you should find them for almost free on ebay.

Edit: Something like these: x800/6600GT

 

[soulslicer]

the Geforce 7800 GS is the best AGP option nvdia has. Just get a 7800 GS its dirt cheap, i sold mine a few years back for like 50 usd, couldnt get any more out of it