Need help solving an eBay mystery

ageispolisageispolis
edited October 2006 in Hardware
Hello all - a newbie here. Great site - learning a lot

I've decided to bite the bullet and upgrade my PC, or even build a new one from cheapo bits and pieces off of ebay. Budget is small, but I'm really just looking for something that'll allow me play slightly more up to date games than Unreal GOTY (my current machine even struggles with that!). It's a P3 664 MHz with 384 MB SDRAM, and a 20gb drive. (I can hear the scoffing already!) Very much a noob when it comes to PC hardware though, but learning a lot since I started looking into this.

There's a machine on ebay that caught my eye - claims to have a 3.0 GHZ p4, ASRock motherboard, 512MB DDR ram with 3 slots for more, 256Mb Radeon 9200 PRO, 80GB drive, and 52 speed CD-RW writer. Loads of bells and whistles on the case too. I'm only really concerned with board, chip, memory, and graphics though. I'd make do with what I have in terms of everything else.

Few problems with it - did a bit of research, and couldn't find anything about a 256mb Radeon 9200 pro - just 128mb 9200s. Asked seller what the story was and got the response, 'The chipset is Radeon 9200 Pro AGP (0 x5960) and the memory is 268435456 bytes'. Think this person is an ebay dropoff shop employee and sounds like she knows less about computers than me. So first question is, is there any such thing as a 256mb Radeon 9200 pro?

Also asked seller which exact asrock motherboard was in the machine, and response was 'The asrock motherboard is www.abit.com.tw/IC7/IC7-6(inteli875P-ich5'. Doesn't make much sense, but when I googled bits and pieces of the above I found there's such a thing as an Abit IC7 board - maybe that's what it is? http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/mainboards/display/abit-ic7_2.html
Has an AGP slot, so at least I could upgrade the graphics card.

Should I run a mile cos of the possible errors in the listing, or does it sound like this thing could be OK in spite of the errors, once I get a decent AGP graphics card and more memory?

Thanks for reading what's turned into an essay. Would appreciate any input!

Comments

  • Sledgehammer70Sledgehammer70 California Icrontian
    edited October 2006
    I don't know how much you want to spend on this system, but it is pretty much outdated in the graphics department, has a small Hard Drive, and lacks a DVD player.

    The 256mb Radeon 9200 pro is at the very bottom end of ATI's offerings. it is a step above onboard graphics but is by no means a high end or even a mid range card.

    You can pick up a system that will out class this one with a nice LCD monitor at Dell for under $500
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited October 2006
    yeh, what you get all depends on how much you want to spend, if you are wanting to spend a minimal ammount, then get a dell, I wouldnt buy that though, about the only thing up to date somewhat is the memory. the processor is quickly ageing, AGP is a dead end interface, the memory included while adequate will become sub-par in a 4-8 months. and the hard drive is small.

    I would stay away, but if you could tell us you want to spend, then we can help you out.
  • ageispolisageispolis
    edited October 2006
    Understand what ye're saying - I do realise it's by no means top of the range, but when you look at the spec of the machine I'm used to, anything's got to be an improvement! I'm in Ireland, so dealing in Euros - budget is low at in or around the equivalent of $500. Dell are pretty pricey over here - I've found it difficult to come up with custom package from them that includes a decent cpu, memory and graphics, that doesn't include lots of other stuff I neither need nor can afford.
    Bearing that in mind, I was thinking this machine could be respectable enough if I was to add another 512MB ram, and get a radeon x1600 pro in there? I could get those 2 bits for around $275, and see how the bidding goes on the machine itself. Don't think I can afford even a halfway decent machine if I was to try building it from scratch, so going second hand and slightly dated, is the only other option.
    What concerns me though, is the vagueness and possible errors in the listing itself. God knows what I'd end up with.
  • Sledgehammer70Sledgehammer70 California Icrontian
    edited October 2006
    building machines form scratch is pretty cheap here, but as you said in ireland things are a bit different. I guess if thats the best you can do than I guess you need to work with what you can get.

    But I am sure if you look into other auctions at Ebay you can find something better...
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