New video card.

[Blarg]

I currently have a radeon 9800pro and I want to get a geforce 8600 or something around there. Do I simply take out the old card and put the new one in and everything will work, or do some cards not work with some PC's and if they don't how do I check if my comp will accept the new one before I buy it.

[Koga]

Check to make sure you have the tight type (PCI [shitty]/AGP[good]/PCI-e[good]).
Check to makre sure you have ample power supply for the card.
Pull old card out, shove new card in.
You are going to need to switch out the drivers as well (OmegaDrivers.com is good place if you don't like default drivers)

[Blarg]

I 'think' I have shitty PCI because my brother mentioned something about the graphics card being attached differently when he looked inside. My comp is 3-4 years old and has a 9800pro in it currently. So do computers that old only have 1 type or could it have both PCI and AGP or PCI-e slots in it.

[Killgannon]

it wont have PCI-e and AGP together, however it can have PCI-e and PCI or PCI and AGP

[Snowknight26]

it wont have PCI-e and AGP together, however it can have PCI-e and PCI or PCI and AGP

Actaully, I think ASRock and ULi have made one that has both.

[Kaisha]

it wont have PCI-e and AGP together, however it can have PCI-e and PCI or PCI and AGP

Actaully, I think ASRock and ULi have made one that has both.

They do, as I have that exact motherboard in my PC currently, although it was a pain in the ass finding ULi drivers that actually allowed my AGP card to work properly.
(which I found over at nVidia)

[Blarg]

Ok so I tried looking on google images for what an AGP or PCI-e slot would look like so I can open my comp and see if I have one but I can't find a good pic of them. What do those slots look like?

[Kaisha]

AGP are typically further into the motherboard than a PCI-E slot, where-as a PCI-E slot is basically lined up with the standard PCI slots, and usually has a small slot right below it. (small slot being a 1x speed PCI-E slot)

[EDIT] Forgot to mention your average motherboard typically has printed right below the slot (directly on the surface of the motherboard) if it's an AGP or PCI.

[EDIT2] Quickly photoshopped a pic of the mobo I own found on Google, hope it helps any.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...STUFF/mobo.jpg

[Koga]

Check Wikipedia.

[Epical]

Well, if I remember correctly, the 9800 Pro only came in AGP, so I think that solves that.

[Sigi]

Be certain that your board supports the .8 volts spec of AGP (AGP 3.0), since otherewise you will be forced to use a lower-end card that is truly compatible with the AGP2.0 specs. Some AGP 3.0 cards DO NOT function in AGP 2.0... card won't get fried, but it just won't perform.

[Melena]

PCI slots are always white, AGP is predominantly brown, PCI-E is usually black or in some cases a neon blue or other random bright color, as well as the slot on PCI-E is thinner then AGP and PCI. As for the voltage on your agp slot, unless you have one of the origional AGP boards from 97-98, your fine. you can pretty much slap any agp card out on the market in your system so long as your power supply can handle it.

[Sigi]

Not true Melena... The current crop of ATI cards have issues with the 1.5v slots. They *do not* work in anything other than .8v . I wouldn't be surprised if NVidia cards had similar issues. I had to deal with that little problem when I got a decent Radeon 1650 for my system... and it wouldn't work at all.

Easy way to find out is reading the documentation for the motherboard/system specs.