I'm just recently getting into PC gaming, before the games my PC ran what I needed fine (Web-editing, basic programming, emulators, etc) but I've neglected to upgrade my video card, and I won't be able to do so for atleast 2 months, my PC is a Celeron D 3.0Ghz / 768MB RAM, my soundcard is just a little basic 6-channel CMI8738 PCI card, and my graphics card is a 64MB ATI Radeon 9000 (AGP), in general, the only games I really play on the PC is Quake 3, Civilization III, Half-Life, Counter-Strike and Sid-meiers Pirates, but I am wondering what I can do to run say, Halo, a bit better, I have it running, but I have to have textures at low and on a 800x600 res to get past 23/ish fps, I'd also like to know if my specs will run Sims 2/MS Flight Simulator 2004? Is there anyway I can get better performance out of my video card? Anyone have any recommended games that will run on my hardware? and a recommended graphics card to upgrade to in a few months? Thanks for any help.

well, with y our current video card it would be rather futile to try and overclock/tweak it to play any game you have in mind just a little better. you are gonn have to upgrade your card as games are becoming more and more advanced using shaders and such. your RAM might have to go up as well but at the moment its fine unless you plan on playing HL2, Farcry, or F.E.A.R anytime soon. if i was to give a suggestion on a vieo card i would either go for a one of the Radeon X Series or an nVidia (bleh i hate nVidia) 6800Gt or higher. and a word of advice, stay away from the GeForce FX5200, all that card will give you is major problems, although the price is attractive. But those are just suggestion other wil argue on it but Ultimatly its up to you.

Actually with that setup you can play Sims 2 fairly decent (i managed to play it at 1024x768 max details with a 9200se pci card that is maybe 1/3 worse than the card you have now) Oh and FS2004 is very scalable just remember to put clouds on low detail and you shouldnt have any problems I believe the 3d engine for FS2004 is the same as the old one FS2001 and FS2002.

The 9000 sucks. If you want better performance & are on a budget, go to newegg.com & look at the Sapphire cards. They're running a rebate sale for the next couple of weeks. Depending on how much you're willing to spend, there's a 9600Pro, 9800SE, 9600XT, or X1600Pro...all AGP cards. BTW, those cards are listed by performance, & I think the pricing coincides.

For just the games you listed, this would work fine as long as you have an APG slot. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102600 If you want something for games like FEAR, an X1600 Pro is all you really would want on a systems such as yours. Anything more is overkill. Please help survivors of Hurricane Katrina! www.redcross.org

Just had a look & the lower priced 9600Pro ($33) & X1600Pro ($100) are both out of stock. The 9800SE is no longer listed...that leaves the 9600XT. I ordered one myself on Sunday. I would have gotten it today but no one was home to sign for the delivery :(

Yup, that's the one I ordered!