Intergrated Graphics

[Miyake]

intergrated graphics mobos

can i put a pci graphics card in when the chip on the board gets out dated?

and will the graphics be ok on the mobo if i get a intergrated card?

[Cygnuz-Y]

You can put a PCI Graphix card but i don't recommend it....

And the Graphix will be OK, but if you like to play, then get an AGP port Mobo...

[3RA1N1AC]

PCI 3D graphics cards used to be okay. games didn't require the bus speed to be extremely fast, a few years ago. but now they do. games NEED AGP now. so if you're thinking of getting a motherboard with only PCI slots and you expect to play games, nix that idea unless you're really jonesing to play old games.

what sort of integrated graphics chips are available on motherboards right now? geforce 2 mx? geforce 4 mx? intel graphics? those are all fine for 2D applications-- but for games, they suck. you'll want to upgrade your graphics after trying to play Splinter Cell or Unreal Tournament 2003 for 15 minutes on one of those chips.

so, if you can use integrated graphics, that's up to you. get a motherboard with integrated graphics and an AGP slot. or get a motherboard without integrated graphics and an AGP slot. whatever you do, just make sure you get an AGP slot.

that's assuming you play games.

if you don't play games, then who cares. get the cheapest card in the store, they're all the same anyway, as far as 2D goes.

btw, you should have said what you actually use your computer for, so that we understand what kind of graphics card you need. if you don't need a 3D card, then you probably wouldn't have any need to upgrade for at least a couple of years because 2D cards have not made any significant advances in the past several years besides DVD playback & tv-out... so obviously the 2D aspect takes much longer to become obsolete than the 3D aspect.

[Path0gen]

Nvidia are good just stay away from the MX versions if you're after performance. Apparently Geforce4 MXs' are just overclocked Gf2's!

[theprisoner]

I would go for ATI cards, because there much faster(the newest card FX5900 just tied with the ATI Radeon 9800 256mb pro)

[sparsely]

A very important thing you should know about onboard graphics also is that they use a portion of your installed
system RAM do to their work. Where an AGP card may have 64,128, or even 256MB of RAM for itself, an integrated
chip will use your system resources. If you don't have the funds for a decent AGP card now, I'd say go ahead and get a
board with a graphics chip, it can always be disabled later when you've saved up some cash....then you can install a bad-ass
card. If you do go that route, I'd recommend buying a little extra RAM, unless you're already getting like 384 or 512MB.
But definitely get a motherboard with at least a AGP 4x slot.

goodluck

[lynx]

It really depends on the board/chipset.

I recently tried a board with built in GeForce 2 GPU (not mx) 3D graphics using 32MB of system memory. And because it is part of the southbridge chip, the performance is very good, almost what I would expect from a top range AGP card and certainly much better than a pci card.