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My wife's computer is a Dell 1100 and the motherboard has intergrated graphics. She want to play some newer games, not the smokin fast kind but ones that require better graphics production. She has been playing Evil under the sun game and at a certain point the game looses it's background, a white washout. I figure she needs a better video capability so I need to install a video card for her.
What I want to know is do I need to get a 64 bit or 128 bit card, and what brand will give me the best value for my dollar.Thanks for your help,
Jim Smith
The video hardware is non-upgradeable.
This laptop is not bad at all and has a decent CPU upgrade path, but the video is integrated Intel 845. DirectX 7 hardware.
The first thing you should do is ignore the Dell video drivers and install the Intel drivers from Intel's website. This should correct any issues with games, and other 3D apps. Dell tends to use the initial intel release drivers, and never updates them, just adds alot of bloatware to them.
I know for a fact that this chipset will play titles like HL2 and pretty much any game on steam as I use to own an 1100. Just download some updated drivers.
Here is the link:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/dow...
Click on download, once the package downloads, open it up and install it.
Core 2 Duo 1.86
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Jim, how much RAM is installed in the computer. Integrated graphics use shared system RAM. The amount of RAM used by the intgrated Intel graphics are dependent on the total amount of RAM installed in the system, up to the maximum that the chip can utilize. You may be able the up the performance by increasing the RAM. Check in the BIOS to see how much RAM is currently being used and how much is possible. An add in card is also a viable alternative.
You may have AGP graphics with no AGP slot available.
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You are limited from what I see on the unit. There is no PCI-E video slot so you would need a basic PCI card since the specs list only 3 of them and no other ones. Whatever card used the more memory the better. You will not find any more than a 256mb ones in either nvidia or ATI. There are recommendations for both and you will get many of them if you search for suggested video cards. The B110 is definitely not a gaming system since there are no PCI-E slots and the audio is only 2.1 instead of 5.1 HD sound.
Good luck
Richard
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Thanks for the input guys. I know it's not a gaming system but if I can get a card for 50 or 60 bucks that will keep her going a while longer it's still cheaper than a new system.
Thanks again,
Jim
Jim Smith
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OK guys I purchased a new video card for this computer. I bought an Nvidia FX 5500.
I installed the card according to the instructions (not a difficult task) and then started the computer with the monitor conected to the new card.Windows loaded but I only had about half of the icons I usually have and they were twice the size as normal. I'm figuring it's because the card drivers have not yet been installed.
So I load the disk in and answer the questions and it finishes and prompts for a restart which I say yes to.
When computer restarts I can hear the windows music and so I know it loaded but my monitor is black. no cursor no nothing.
Now a friend told me I didn't have to remove the Intel graphics controler because it was intergraded into the mother board, but I have this black screen problem so I am wondering should I remove the Intel controler or not?Maybe some one here has had a similar problem and can help.
Thanks JIM
Jim Smith
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Did you try booting with the video connected to each output one at a time? Try getting to VGA mode to see if you get video from the card. You can remove and reinstall the driver on the chance that it did not install correctly.
Richard
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I have booted with monitor connected to each output and the only one that works is the onboard Intel control. The new card shows in device manager that it's there but the computer is not recognizing it. I will try the remove and reinstall to see if that helps. Thanks again
JIMJim Smith
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Look in device manager to see how the card shows there. If there is a yellow or red punctuation mark next to it post the message. Of course you will need to do this while the monitor is connected to onboard video.
BTW if the MBoard graphics are PCIx then you should be able to install a standard PCI video card and use BOTH at the same time. You may need to enable using multiple monitors or there may be a setting in the BIOS to disable onboard graphics.
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