Games on FX5200

I hate to ask this question, but I'm upgrading my little brother's computer for christmas with an fx5200. I know its far from a gaming card, but I would like to know what games are playable with it. He's not really a hardcore gamer, so its not like I'm not looking to get Call of Duty 4 working on it, just some old games at decent settings that will run smoothly. He would specifically like shooters, though any suggestion is welcome. Other specs: 1.8ghz P4, 768mb RAM, XP.

I know you all don't seem to be fans of these "gaming on non-gaming cards" threads, but I was really hoping for your help as christmas is coming up fast.

Thanks in advance.

 

UT classic/'99
Counter Strike
Quake 3
Half Life
Half Life 2 with DX7

 

My roommate has this card, it's not too bad for older games.
Here are some games i've installed on his machine and played so I know that you can definitely play (he has a P4 Dell with 768mb ram, fx5200 128mb)

Half life 2 medium settings (lower-med res)
Call of duty 1 med-high settings (mid res)
Call of duty 2 low-med settings(dx7 mode lower res - online can be shaky)
Dawn of War med-high settings (low res)
Doom 3 low settings (low res)
Farcry low-med settings (low res)
LOTR: Battle for Middle Earth low-med settings (low res)


Fairly newer games that I know will not work or are a slideshow - Oblivion, Ghost recon advanced warfighter, FEAR, Battlefield 2, Hitman: Blood Money, Company of Heroes

 

Why dont you let him use your Coolr master desktop?

 

Thanks Lifeflayer and Chonga, he actually just now asked me about Call of Duty, so thats probably what he'll get.

HA HA HA HA HA!!! Actually I'm away at college, so he's stuck with the old one for a while.

 

If i was you I would look into dropping $40 and getting a 6600 instead. My little brother was using a dell desktop with a 5200 to play WOW and it played like crap. I overclocked the card and ended up frying it so I wanted to upgrade it for him. Since this comp only had a 250w psu i bought him a 6600 from compuvest and it works fine for what he needs and sounds to me it would work for you also.

 

How much are you paying for the FX5200?

 

Any game that will work fine on a 1.8Ghz P4 will be fine with an Fx5200. No point in saying it can't run Company of Heroes or Advanced Warfighter, when it doesn't even meet the minimum requirements cpu wise. Call of Duty 2 wouldn't run very well, nor would virtually any game after 2004. You're cpu throttled rather then gpu in this instance.

 

is have an 5200 and can play cod 2 on low medium sttings in directx 7 mode without lag. also cs 1.6 is playable as well as the c and c series except for zerohour and tiberium wars

 

I played Far cry on low res with 512mb ram, 2.4 Celeron and Geforce 4 MX. So you'll be able to play far cry.

But You can find much better cards pretty cheap these days. Try one of the Geforce 6 seires.

 

Spend an extra $20...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102085

 

Well if he has one of the towers like I have with only a 250w psu I would be a little wary of that radeon 1650. Trust me finding a psu for my comp turned out to be hard/expensive without case modification and I'm not sure but I think like all other ATI cards it is power hungry and could cause some system instability. I know for a fact that the 6600 will work and its a decent card especially when matched with his other components. If he has the case I would suggest the 7600gs (or even a 7300gt-basically same thing) over the 1650 anyday but would probably run $80.

 

LOL does he even have a agp slot?

 

That is a good question because I think some fx5200 are just PCI right? If so I think there is a nvidia 7300(gt?) PCI and I know there is an ATI 1550 and 1300 but they are expensive and dont perform well so lets hope he has an agp slot.

 

Well I already bought it (it was $36) and recieved it, plus I was on a tight budget (my parents are actually paying for the upgrade, which also includes RAM and a mouse), but I think this will work fine for him, at least for a while. And yes the computer has only PCI.

Thanks for pointing out that about the processor Havok, I didn't even think about that. I'm just so used to dual cores now.

Just for comparison, can anyone tell me how warcraft 3 plays on a 5200 with a similar spec'd computer? Right now I believe he plays on all low settings, 800x600 and can play with maybe 2 or 3 opponents on a small map. And it still gets pretty choppy in big battles. Its his favorite game and it would be nice if it would run a little better.

Thanks.

 

A PCI Fx5200 will perform even worse then the already mediocre regular AGP edition, but again given his processor and some of the games you've listed even the pci version will drastically improve his gaming experiences on the games he is able to play already on the older card. It is definitely an upgrade

 

Coomand and conquer generals, half life 2, hitman series (excluding bloody money, u may be able to run but not recommened coz of turtle speed frames), call of duty and medal of honour 1 and 2 etc.

 

It will play better than that. What's his present card? I played WC3 at higher settings on a TNT2 M64 and 866 MHz PIII and 1024x768 (native for that screen). Wasn't choppy on three person maps.