Buying/installing a graphics card

I'm buying a new monitor for my desktop PC. The box has a intel celeron E3400 CPU with on board Intel G33/G31 Express Chipset with 256MB of memory. The box only supports VGA output, so I guess I want to get a card that supports HDMI/DVI outputs. A few questions-

(1) The Veiwsonic monitors I'm looking at are 24" - LED - VX 2450 (LED) @ $220.00 or the VA 2431 (LCD) @ $179.00. This is primarily going to be used for business applications (spreadsheets/drawings, etc) but I'll also use it for Flight Simulator - the only graphics intensive app that I would be interested in. I can run FS X on it now, but the present CPU/graphics set-up doesn't allow the accelerator software to work. Is there that big a difference between LED vs. LCD technology to warrent the $40.00 difference?

(2) I don't need a top end graphics card, so my criteria are (1) cheap (2) have HDMI/DVI output capability. There are lots of them on Amazon and my eyes glaze over trying to decipher the differences between the various offerings. Any recommendations for a card that works with my CPU and would cost < $50.00?

(3) I'd install this myself...no real experience putting a card in a PC, but I can't think it's all that big a challenge. Are there existing connections that a graphics card would plug into on the motherboard? There must be connectors for both power and signal, right? Not interested in soldering any connections. I assume this would be relative easy to do, but any insight would be appreciated.

I got one for $39 at Frys and it had a $30 mail in rebate at the time
All you have to do is put it in the PCI-e slot and install the driver. No fuss, no muss, no problem.

seems to have all the bells and whistles I need...1 GB, PCIE-2.1, Direct X11 with HDMI/DVI, and VGA outs. Fanless, too.

A 24inch monitor you will need something with a little bit of umph, also your flight sim will look better. You don't need to spend a fortune on the card, plenty of good ones under $100 but make sure you have the right slot on the mother board,probably PCI-E, and that your power supply is up to the task even if its going to run off the slots power.

Install is very easy but remember to delete the old video driver before you install the new one.


Edit,
never mind I see you got something LOL

"but remember to delete the old video driver before you install the new one."

I was wondering about the sequences in stalling the graphics card and monitor. (1) I assumed I need to power down and install the card 1st with my old monitor, then (2) Power up and load the software for the card. (3) Then power down and hook up the new monitor, then (4) power up and install the monitor software (I assume it must have a low level default driver by design, so you can do the installation).

If I delete the old drivers before installing the new one...won't that make the monitor inoperative so I won't be able to follow the on-screen instructions?

Steps are:

1.Install card and hook up monitor

2.Using driver disc supplied with card, install drivers. In all probability the software will force a reboot, if not reboot manually. For the time being, put up with the huge text on screen.

3. Start the video card control panel and tweak your settings

I doubt whether you will even need to use the disc that came with the monitor, everything should work without it. In the device settings, the computer should see it as a Plug and Play monitor.

My box registers a pretty crappy 3.2 Windows benchmark, based on the graphic component lowest score. Some of the graphics intensive features in Win 7 can't run (aero, etc). I paid a premium to buy this box locally and support the town PC shop...I'm really surprised it didn't have a decent graphics card included....this one cost $35.00 after rebate and I'm sure it's going to have a huge performance boost on this PC.

And keep this old joke in mind:

Q. What's the difference between a computer salesman and a real estate salesman?
A. The real estate guy KNOWS when he's lying.

The town pc shop, unless otherwise specified, probably cater to people who want Word, email and a bit of net surfing. It's really up to you to specify what you want in a machine. Microsoft are famous for under-quoting the requirements of their operating systems.

Unless you're an intrepid ultra-early-adapter, best value for money can be had from waiting, reading articles and reviews on mainstream and fringe sites.

I came late to this thread, so belatedly I would have suggested this card. http://www.nvidia.com/object/product_geforce_gts_250_us.html Radeon vs Nvidia is pretty much a personal preference and both have their features.

Either way, would love you to check back into this thread when you have it installed and let us know what you think.

I'm sure the typical customer at his shop just wants a computer to do the basics and maybe handle mainstream games that don't require a separate graphics card to handle. I should have probably spent more time on this, but I knew his prices for the bare box was higher than what I could have bought it for. The house CFO (my wife) is a big advocate of shopping locally and we were able to get a small discount on trade-in. I checked out larger monitors he had for sale and they were pretty outrageously priced (a 20" monitor on display for $185.00). The benefit is that I can get them to react right away if I have a problem - they've replaced components in the past while I waited, so there's some value there. I think if I had gone with him for the monitor and the card, I'd be looking at a $400.00 bill instead of buying them both for $195.00 (after rebate).

I checked your GE Force GTS 250 recommendation and compared to the Asus EAH5450 that I went with. I'm sure a fan would do a better job on moving the heat from the GPU, but I've always had lots of noisy fan issues...so I thought this was a plus. The EAH 5450 seems to have slightly better API specs (DirectX 11 vs. DirectX10, Open GL 3.2 vs. 2.1, and Shader Model 5.0 vs. 4.0). The memory clocking is clearly superior with the GeForce as is the memory access (256 bit vs. 64). So I'm sure that the GeForce would show an edge on graphics speed and performance. The PCIe interface was 2.1 for the ASUS vs. 2.0 for the GeForce.

I was working on a <$200.00 budget, so the $35.00 vs. $127.00 was definitely a factor. I'd be curious to hear how you evaluate these criteria in terms of price v. performance.

I will let you know how this turns out...I'm checking the UPS trace hourly to see the transit progress. :-)

No you don't have to but you should. If you are staying in the same family (ati to ati or Nvidia to Nvidia) then you can get away with it but if you go from ati to nvidia you really should remove the drivers so they do not conflict. Also you should use the most up to date drivers, those on the makers website the disk usually is out of date.

The current driver loaded is a generic PnP located on the G31/G33 chipset. It's a Microsoft driver (ver. 6.1.7600.16385). I could disable or uninstall this, but I'd think I should wait until after I load the new software and driver for the ASUS card. Otherwise, I'd end up with a braindead monitor, no?

On the other hand, I am toying with the idea of using this as a 2nd monitor set-up (the card has a VGA connector and 2 monitor capability). In this case, will the new drivers for the ASUS need the existing drivers or will the new software recognize the monitor and install the drivers from it's library?

Is that when you install the card into the motherboard and start it up again, the on-board video will be automatically disabled, and you want that to happen. The card you got, if I'm looking at the right one on newegg.com has 3 ports on the back that you can connect to. Use these for both monitors, but get one running good first :)

Leave the drivers alone for now since its just a PnP. Once you boot up find and load the proper drivers and you should be good to go.
With any luck at all this is going to be a simple upgrade.

Having the VGA output on the card gives me the option of using the other monitor, I think. I'll give it a whirl and see if I like having the dual set-up. Having a 23" screen should be all I really need, though....but it would look very cool having 2 monitors running! :-)

By adding a separate graphics card, will the main CPU handle the non-graphics side of the OS faster? I would think that would be a benefit, but just want to confirm it.

Since a video card has its own memory and GPU (the cpu of a video card) you will free up resources and should see improved performance. Another real cheep and easy upgrade that adds performance is more ram. XP likes 2 gigs (yes, it will run on far less..)Vista was a hog and ran like a dog on 2gigs, windows 7 should get at least 4. But all this depends on what you are really doing with the machine. I game so I need bunches of ram and a nice video card. Good luck let us know how the upgrade goes.

That's NOT a gaming card, nor is it one you would have for everyday use. In fact, it will perform worse for those purposes than a good gaming card costing only a few hundred bucks.

The reason for that is in its applications. The $4000 workstation card shown is only useful for professionals that require precision in design software, such as Autocad, perhaps Maya or 3D Studio, or architectural design software. Workstation cards such as this one are also used for game development, and in medical applications where extreme precision or very high-resolution video processing and/or realtime simulation of complex systems is required.

People that buy such hardware need it. That isn't a frivolous purchase (as I once thought, myself)- for many professionals in several disciplines, such expense is an absolute necessity.

But everything I know about your question is based on my reading Wikipedia a moment ago. Wiki sez onboard graphics can use some of your RAM, as opposed to a gpu with its own RAM; Wiki also suggests some BIOS might allow you to turn off the onboard graphics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_card

I'd guess some comparative bus speeds (frontside for the northbridge? pcie?) might matter -- perhaps depending on your ram and cpu and the particular onboard graphics and particular graphics card

So I'd say: test it! I might install a gpu and then go into the BIOS and turn off onboard graphics to see if the system got snappier

Works slick as a whistle. Took about 3/4 hour to install the card (5 minutes to install it and about 40 minutes to find a replacement screw that held the card in the slot properly). Win 7 didn't like the initial install and wanted me to restore to an earlier setting. I canceled that and rebooted the box a second time. Whatever misgivings Win7 had, that went away. My Window performance ratings went from 3.2 to 5. The graphics/gaming module had been the system anchor @ 3.2. It's now got a 6.2 rating. Amazed at how clear and readable the text is at 1920 x 1080. Screen management of windows is a joy....I can work on 4 docs at once without spending any time playing 'hunt for the hiding windows'.

I can recommend this monitor...great value (23" LED - Acer S231HL) for $160.00. The card seems to have all the graphics HP I need and the price is right @ $35.00.

Last question....which connection is better - HDMI or DVI. The monitor came with cables for both types, I'm using the HDMI connections, but I'm curious if there's any advantage in using the DVI.

on a computer monitor. May make a difference on a really big screen. HDMI includes audio, once again, moot on a computer.

Glad you have it all set up and working well. Next step is to try two monitors but beware; just as you can never go back from a 22 or 24" to a 16", it's hard to go back to one monitor after using two!