Hard Light Productions Forums

Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Polpolion on January 06, 2006, 10:55:06 am

Title: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Polpolion on January 06, 2006, 10:55:06 am
Several people (okay, just ZMan) have been totally suprised when I say how much my computer stinks, and wanted to see my system specs, so here it is.

OS: Windows XP
Processer: Intel Celron Processer
897Mhz of something
Ram: 256mb
Graphics card: none; An Intel 82815 Graphics Controller is built into my mother board (gives me D3D,I think)
CD-ROM drive: Hypermedia, re-writeable burner, 52x24x52 seamless link thingy.
Hard Drive:71gb partitioned into 37/34gb, I can only use 37. (34 is incase I need to format)
Speakers: Big, old, chunky ones : HD-50 by Koss
Monitor: Philips 107S
Keyboard: regular 101/102 key; gateway
USB drives: 2 in back
Internet: DSL of some sort. I use the firefox browser.
Thingies you plug joysticks into: 1
Joystick: 1; don't know by who, 2 buttons, 2 axes gotta turn it ALOT before the game starts moving (I never use it)
Gamepad: 1; same company, 2 axes 4 buttons

umm.....I think thats it... let's see... I got a couple of PCI slots...yeah thats it.
You can start laughing at my horrible computer. I would buy stuff, but I'm saving my money.

 :sigh:  :( :( :( :( :( :(
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Fineus on January 06, 2006, 10:57:56 am
If it's any consolation, my dad still runs his business on a Pentium 2 350Mhz.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Martinus on January 06, 2006, 11:03:18 am
If you're looking to run top end games then you're out of luck, if you're not then you have quite a substantial system. Your machine will run dos games and emulators for the 16 bit consoles quite well. You'll probably be able to run a lot of rather excellent games like Deus Ex, System Shock 2 etc. etc. and it will run 'productive' software as well.

As I mentioned in another thread I posted, I picked up a 450MHz P3 for nothing, my sister has it now and is making good use of it. It's not what you've got but how you use it afterall.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: vyper on January 06, 2006, 11:03:33 am
Your dad runs Nasa?
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Martinus on January 06, 2006, 11:06:59 am
Your dad runs Nasa?
What fictional superNASA have you read about?

They all run z80's wired into pocket calculators down at Huston. ;)


BTW Sizzler, I'd start reading up on computer hardware. You don't seem to be familiar with some of the terminology and it's useful to know when you want to buy new parts.

Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: IPAndrews on January 06, 2006, 11:15:15 am
Your machine will run dos games and emulators for the 16 bit consoles quite well. You'll probably be able to run a lot of rather excellent games like Deus Ex, System Shock 2

Nah Deus Ex won't run well. I had a very similar (only slightly better) machine than that and it didn't run Dues Ex. Ironically it melted running System Shock 2. It wasn't a bad machine and as you say played emulators great. More than enough SNES and Genesis stuff out there to provide hours of fun. Even ran the Amiga emulaor (WinUAE) fairly well. In the end though my partner wanted to use the internet on it. Which meant upgrading the OS for security reasons. At that point a lot of run games that used to run under Windows 98 and 95 stopped working and my machine because a bit useless.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: CP5670 on January 06, 2006, 11:22:57 am
Try to get a used 9200 PCI card for about $30 off ebay. It will still run older games well and will be 20x as fast as than the Intel thing. There aren't very many great modern games right now anyway.

Quote
Nah Deus Ex won't run well. I had a very similar (only slightly better) machine than that and it didn't run Dues Ex. Ironically it melted running System Shock 2. It wasn't a bad machine and as you say played emulators great. More than enough SNES and Genesis stuff out there to provide hours of fun. Even ran the Amiga emulaor (WinUAE) fairly well. In the end though my partner wanted to use the internet on it. Which meant upgrading the OS for security reasons. At that point a lot of run games that used to run under Windows 98 and 95 stopped working and my machine because a bit useless.

Deus Ex is surprisingly hardware intensive considering how old it is, making even newer systems struggle a little in some places. SS2 should work much better though and is available on HOTU. You actually have a better chance of getting that game to work properly on an older system. I can get it to run on my main machine but only in 640x480, in which it looks like crap, but it runs fine on my older computer.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Martinus on January 06, 2006, 11:24:41 am
Nah Deus Ex won't run well. I had a very similar (only slightly better) machine than that and it didn't run Dues Ex. Ironically it melted running System Shock 2. It wasn't a bad machine and as you say played emulators great. More than enough SNES and Genesis stuff out there to provide hours of fun. Even ran the Amiga emulaor (WinUAE) fairly well. In the end though my partner wanted to use the internet on it. Which meant upgrading the OS for security reasons. At that point a lot of run games that used to run under Windows 98 and 95 stopped working and my machine because a bit useless.
I got Deus Ex to run on a 500MHz K6 with 256MB of RAM quite well, had a Geforce 2MX which my mate gave me, that replaced a Voodoo 3 2000. :) (I'm almost getting misty eyed, that was a great wee machine ;) ).
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Ford Prefect on January 06, 2006, 12:46:16 pm
Oh yeah?! *Spits*

Windows 2000
Pentium 3
RAM: 192 MB
Hard drive: 60 gigs

(http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b319/Mistah_Kurtz/thcookiemonster.jpg)
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Polpolion on January 06, 2006, 01:24:25 pm
oh man... windows 2000...i wouldnt wish that on my worst enemy...

 :eek2: :eek2:
 :shaking: :shaking: :shaking: :shaking:
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Scuddie on January 06, 2006, 01:25:13 pm
ORLY?

Emerson 386SX 16MHz
MS DOS 6.22
2MB RAM
40MB Hard drive
AdLib Sound Card

I don't think this one counts, though.

EDIT:
WTF?  Windows 2000 rocks!  Whatchatalkinbout sizzler?  Confusing Win2k with WinME?
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: karajorma on January 06, 2006, 01:29:03 pm
oh man... windows 2000...i wouldnt wish that on my worst enemy...

Sign of someone who doesn't know their MS OSs.

2k and XP are virtually the same OS. IF anything MS took a retrograde step with XP by trimming out lots of thngs 2k did well.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Martinus on January 06, 2006, 01:30:44 pm
Assuming you're not joking what do you use that machine for Scuddie?

I too can attest to win2K being rather great. I only grudgingly switched to WinXP when they refused to release a driver for some hardware I used and the games support was flakey.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Scuddie on January 06, 2006, 01:38:57 pm
Assuming you're not joking what do you use that machine for Scuddie?
I don't, but my nephew like to play Kings Quest games on it.  That machine does very old games quite well ;).
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Martinus on January 06, 2006, 01:41:27 pm
It's good to see legacy gear still running and being of use. I'd probably have used it as a firewall or something, I bet it's really conservative on power compared to modern machines. :nod:
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Polpolion on January 06, 2006, 02:41:03 pm
oh man... windows 2000...i wouldnt wish that on my worst enemy...

Sign of someone who doesn't know their MS OSs.









2k and XP are virtually the same OS. IF anything MS took a retrograde step with XP by trimming out lots of thngs 2k did well.

oh-well. I geuss I DO tend to hate things for no reason (macintosh, Ipod, gamecube, nintendo ds, Asian car companies, Bill Gates, Ohio...). But I still like (prefer) XP better.

P.S. I had 2k for couple years. Did NOT like it, but wasn't allowed to revert to 98, cuz my dad hid the CD while my hard drive was being formated.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Flipside on January 06, 2006, 02:50:32 pm
AMD 1400
256Mb Ram
Onboard Graphics
80Gig Drive

Admittedly, all that one does these days is sit there and be the Network server, but it IS actually possible to play EvE online with it :)
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Col. Fishguts on January 06, 2006, 05:01:23 pm
Bah, all you kids with you modern fancy doodads. I gave my mom my old, old machine for Word and email purposes, still kicking to this day.

Cyrix PR200 (who remembers those?)
48 MB RAM
Matrox Mystique II
SoundBlaster 16
2 GB HDD

I have very fond memories of that machine, mainly from playing XvT and C&C Red Alert. But I also played FS1 on that thing, when I put a Voodoo2 in it.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Rand al Thor on January 07, 2006, 12:33:51 pm
Main computer now is an:

AthlonXP 2000+
WinXP
1GB Ram
nvidia GeCube Radeon 9200 128MB (Thats IS better than a Geforce Ti4200 64MB yeah? I just swapped em without really checking)
200GB & 60GB hard drives
Creative audio pci (I dont think Im even using that)

Its an alright machine for being a hunking mass produced piece of crap. And I ran Deus Ex on my old 300MHz P2 Dell with a voodoo2. Fairly low on the display settings but I played the entire game through comfortably enough.

I am Finally getting my OWN computer. No more family mucking it up.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: IceFire on January 07, 2006, 12:40:38 pm
Main computer now is an:

AthlonXP 2000+
WinXP
1GB Ram
nvidia GeCube Radeon 9200 128MB (Thats IS better than a Geforce Ti4200 64MB yeah? I just swapped em without really checking)
200GB & 60GB hard drives
Creative audio pci (I dont think Im even using that)

Its an alright machine for being a hunking mass produced piece of crap. And I ran Deus Ex on my old 300MHz P2 Dell with a voodoo2. Fairly low on the display settings but I played the entire game through comfortably enough.

I am Finally getting my OWN computer. No more family mucking it up.

Ideally every member of the family should have their own computer.  In my family thats how it works...I have the top computer at the moment, my brother close behind (soon to be leapfrogging ahead), and my mom and dad each have their own that are fairly old handmedowns that still do everything they would ever need them to do.  We basically build old computers out of bits and pieces picked up here and there and that does a good job for basics like e-mail and basic web surfing.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Roanoke on January 07, 2006, 12:41:24 pm
Deus Ex is surprisingly hardware intensive considering how old it is, making even newer systems struggle a little in some places. SS2 should work much better though and is available on HOTU. You actually have a better chance of getting that game to work properly on an older system. I can get it to run on my main machine but only in 640x480, in which it looks like crap, but it runs fine on my older computer.

System Shock isn't abandonware and the franchise is in a similar limbo to Freespace. Haven't looked on HOTU but I don't suppose it'll be around for too long if EA become inclined to show any interest.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Cobra on January 07, 2006, 02:45:57 pm
Meh. mine kinda sucks right now...

Intel Celeron 2.7 GHz
RAM: 256 MB
1 40 GB HD
1 80 GB HD
42x CD-ROM/CD-RW Drive (can burn AND play)
3 1/2 Floppy Disk Drive
1 free CD-ROM drive slot
6 USB Slots, 2 on front, 4 on back, 2 taken by joystick and printer in the back
ATI Radeon 9250 128mb
3 PCI slots, all taken
2 memory card slots, one taken by a stock card

Basically, I have an office computer with upgraded video capabilities.

So, you all now know how ****ty my comp is.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Descenterace on January 08, 2006, 05:31:39 am
Another system spec thread. These happen... what? Every week?

In terms of crappy systems, even my Duron 1200 webserver outdoes some of the machines here and it gets approximately zero traffic. Maybe I should build that pair of Pentium 3s for playing retro games?

Yes, for some reason I have a P3 450 and a 550 lying around, with sufficient supporting hardware to actually make two PCs out of them.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Kosh on January 08, 2006, 07:20:14 am
Quote
Deus Ex is surprisingly hardware intensive considering how old it is, making even newer systems struggle a little in some places.

Because it uses the Unreal engine. Hence, anything without Glide has problems.

Quote
Asian car companies

You know in Asia, many people think american cars suck. :p


My mother used a Pentium Pro 200 MHz machine for a few years. Then I gave her my old 1.7 GHz Celeron machine before I left the country.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: castor on January 08, 2006, 07:35:03 am
GeCube Radeon 9200 128MB (Thats IS better than a Geforce Ti4200 64MB yeah? I just swapped em without really checking)
:D R9200 is about the crappiest vid card you can find.. you'd be better off with the 4200.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: CP5670 on January 08, 2006, 11:54:08 am
AMD 1400
256Mb Ram
Onboard Graphics
80Gig Drive

Admittedly, all that one does these days is sit there and be the Network server, but it IS actually possible to play EvE online with it :)

I have that same processor in my retro game system. It runs very hot but works well enough. I need to stick with the motherboard it uses for its ISA emulation functionality, so I'm not going to be upgrading that computer much.

Quote
System Shock isn't abandonware and the franchise is in a similar limbo to Freespace. Haven't looked on HOTU but I don't suppose it'll be around for too long if EA become inclined to show any interest.

It was on there two years ago, anyway. I originally played that version and it has everything except the movies, although my parents got me a cheap copy of it when they went to India recently. (appears to be a genuine one; it was retail boxed at any rate)

Quote
Because it uses the Unreal engine. Hence, anything without Glide has problems.

Unreal and UT work well though. It's only this game. In a large fight the framerates just tank on most hardware for some reason. I think this is actually the only game (aside from those running through emulators) that I got a very noticeable improvement in from overclocking my processor (by 45%) and it also gets a solid 75% boost with SLI.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Polpolion on January 08, 2006, 02:14:22 pm
Is the first UT abandonware yet?
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: wolfdog on January 08, 2006, 03:27:36 pm
Well, my dad still uses an ol P166 (not even mmx) with 64 megs of EDO RAM, a 1MB cirrus logic onboard graphics chip and a 1GB SCSI hard disk...
oldest working system I have here is a 486dx2 @60mhz. (you can overclock the thing without cooling it  :D )
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: CP5670 on January 08, 2006, 04:04:08 pm
My oldest operational system is my 1990 Mac:

Motorola 68030 33mhz processor
4MB 16mhz RAM
160MB hard drive (SCSI ;7)
2X CD drive
no FPU (:()
230W power supply (:eek:)
14.4k internal modem

It still has all my awesome games on it. I grew up with things like Lemmings, Infotron, Crystal Quest, Prince of Persia, Spectre VR, Monkey Island and Fate of Atlantis. And I have one of those old game collection CDs with around 500 more games on it, some of which are excellent.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: ZmaN on January 09, 2006, 04:23:29 pm
Yea my familys computers are like icefire's setup......

I have the top PC, (see specs in my sig).. 
My sister has my old pentium 4 1.7 Ghz with 512 MB SDRAM and Onboard video AND sound,
My smaller sister who has an Athlon 1200mhz and a Geforce 2 MX 400 64 MB,
then my Moms, the Athlon XP 1700+, the crappiest computer of all (suprisingly, even though its the 4th best...) 
Then my little sister and little brother have a computer I made for them for christmas, using an Athlon 850mhz, 256 MB SDRAM, and Onboard video and sound... (they're gettin my old sound blaster live installed shortly...)
My dad has a Dell Inspiron Notebook with a Pentium M 1.6 Ghz with 512 MB of RAM, and Intel 915 video, and its pretty quick...


my mom has windows 2000, the rest of the PC's have XP Home or Pro on them....  They're all networked together on Cable internet using a netgear router, and the they are ALL IN ONE ROOM!!!!  its always hot where i am...
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Ghost on January 09, 2006, 04:26:55 pm
Ok, so the 1990 Mac guy is really really bad, but OP, you're far better off than I am. Here's my specs(my room computer, not my dad's computer which I play games on):

OS: Win 98
Processor: Hell, I don't know. The computer was bought in '98.
254 meg of RAM
Video Card: Nvida RIVA TNT2
8x cd drive
Floppy drive
Aaaaand the only really A1 Supar good part about all this is the fact that I'm hooked up to cable internet.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: JoeLo on February 17, 2006, 09:06:54 pm
I was in the integrated graphics boat until recently, then having no AGP or PCI-E ports, I installed a Radeon 9250, they really not that bad plays Half-life 2 on medium 2xAA and 2xAF. Quake IIII plays fine medium 1204x768 everything turned off. Halo lags like crap based on crappy engine design. This is my main computer.

An old SoundCard pulled from a Pentium III, not concerned about quality just wanted to take the strain off my CPU integrated sound
Radeon 9250 PCI bus edition
Pentium 4 2.53 GHZ no HT
Dell Dimension 2400 Mobo
80 GB Dell HD
256mb of Dell Value ram
512mb of Patriot Value ram

I am at the end of the line here, and am upgrading to, once I get the cash a new AMD64 939, 7800GT based computer.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: JoeLo on February 17, 2006, 09:09:42 pm
I was in the integrated graphics boat until recently, then having no AGP or PCI-E ports, I installed a Radeon 9250, they really not that bad plays Half-life 2 on medium 2xAA and 2xAF. Quake IIII plays fine medium 1204x768 everything turned off. Halo lags like crap based on crappy engine design. This is my main computer.

An old SoundCard pulled from a Pentium III, not concerned about quality just wanted to take the strain off my CPU integrated sound
Radeon 9250 PCI bus edition
Pentium 4 2.53 GHZ no HT
Dell Dimension 2400 Mobo
80 GB Dell HD
256mb of Dell Value ram
512mb of Patriot Value ram

I am at the end of the line here, and am upgrading to, once I get the cash a new AMD64 939, 7800GT based computer.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Nuclear1 on February 17, 2006, 09:38:18 pm
Celeron 2.3 Ghz
XP Home
Nvidia GeForce 5700LE DDR
40 GB HD
256mb RAM

Yes, I know it looks like crap at first glance, but it runs anything as recent as Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault flawlessly and FSO without the adv_effects even better. :nod:
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: BlackDove on February 18, 2006, 03:21:27 am
Why is this +1 month thread here?
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Cyker on February 18, 2006, 08:01:33 am
Bah! Nothing wrong with having an old comp, as long as it does what you need :D

It always pisses me off when someone buys a 3000MHz 2GB machine AND JUST USES IT TO DO WORD-PROCESSING AND E-MAIL!!!

IF IT WASN'T AGAINST THE LAW I WOULD BEAT SUCH PEOPLE TO DEATH WITH THEIR 1200DPI LASER MOUSE!!!!


The sad and ironic thing is, with modern Windows OS, you can almost justify needing such a system to do Word Processing (Office 2003 on Windows XPSP2 is such a shocking resource hog... I dread Office 2010 and Vista SP2....)

Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: DeepSpace9er on February 18, 2006, 08:23:53 am
Still have a Pentium 2 being used for business.

P2 400mhz
384mb RAM
12Gb HD
11mb ATI Rage
CD, Floppy, and internal ZIP
WinXP Pro (It amazingly runs on this)


My main machine is

P4 2.8Ghz HT
120GB HD
1.5GB RAM
Audigy 2
GeForce 6600GT OC
XP Pro

Kinda lacking slighty in the gfx department but other than that runs great.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: KappaWing on February 18, 2006, 10:59:11 am
2.5 Ghz pentium 4 processor
GeForce 4, 512 megs
512 megs of ram
80 gig internal HD
80 gig external HD

As soon as i get the cash I'm gonna get a new AGP compatible mainboard and dual-link two Geforce 7800's and maybe get an extra gig of ram.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Taristin on February 18, 2006, 11:03:41 am
You mean a PCI-E SLI board so you can dual link. Cause you ain't doing it with AGP.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: JoeLo on February 18, 2006, 11:24:21 am
 My not main computer is amazingly old.

Aptiva Procceser
64mb of Rambus ram
9GB HD
Windows ME
ATI Rage 128

What I'm trying to say is this computer is really old and bad.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: KappaWing on February 18, 2006, 11:37:49 am
You mean a PCI-E SLI board so you can dual link. Cause you ain't doing it with AGP.

Yes thats what i meant to say, thank you.
Title: Re: Not everyone has a graphics card...
Post by: Andreas on February 18, 2006, 01:29:21 pm
A long time since I've posted anything here (my computer broke some time ago, that's the reason I've been away).

But now, behold!  :D
My new computer:
AMD Athlon 64 3400+
2,19 GHz
1024 MB DDR
Radeon X600 256 MB

PHEAR!1! :shaking: