AGP graphics card wanted

[Proto]

Trying to sort out my Tacx Fortius trainer out with the newer Tacx Trainer Software but it's making unreasonable demands of the attached ancient Dell 4500.

I managed to get it to run with 2GB of RAM, but the installed graphics card (nVidia GeForce FX5500 256MB) is inadequate for the required screen resolution. It's the now obsolete AGP format, which is limiting my choice a bit.

Anyone got a bigger/better card that lurking in the back of a drawer they could let go. Bigger the better, 1GB would be good! Even happy to pay for it!!

Cheers

 

[ian turner]

Try http://www.dabs.com/products/evga-geforce-6200-300mhz-512mb-agp-dvi-84XZ.html?refs=42220000&src=3 .
What do you mean can't handle the resolution ? It's good for a 22" monitor !! Or is it just too slow ?

 

[Proto]

I'm using with a 32" LCD TV. The screen at 1200 x 720 doesn't show the lower part of the Tacx Page, and some of the controls are not visible. I'm hoping that by increasing resolution I can get more of the pages to show, including the all important 'start' button. I'm guessing this might be because the software was written for 4:3 not widescreen.
Out of my depth a bit!

 

[ColinJ]

I'd check the settings on your TV! You might find that it is zooming the page to fit the width, but that is cutting off the top and/or bottom of the page. I have various picture sizing options on my old Panasonic analogue TV, one of which merely stretches the picture width to fit the screen, but another preserves the correct aspect ratio of the picture but cuts off the top and bottom of it. I have control of the height of the picture though, and can compress it vertically so that less is cut off.

 

[ian turner]

Minimum spec is 1024 x 768 and recommended is 1920x1080 which is to say a 1080 tv,
Best to look in the taxc forum for stuff like this where you'll find the following which suggests that you might be able to force your tv to accept 1024 x 768 (or maybe not) but it will look bad as well there are only 720 vertical pixels afterall.

 

[fossyant]

Can't imagine the Tacx software is going to be that graphics intensive. Probably down to TV settings and the max resolution supported by your card.

 

[Proto]

Thanks all.

Think I'm going to dump the PC attached to the Tacx and give up on it. Circumstance has sort of forced my hand.

The main home PC decided to go belly up yesterday (blown motherboard, but hard drive is okay), so I think I'm going to source a newer and higher spec machine from a local firm who sell refurbished PCs. Use my salvageable hard drive and possible the graphics card (PCIe), use that to run the Tacx and then buy a decent laptop for the home/office. This way I can upgrade to the newer, and supposedly much better, TTS3 or TTS4 software. I am currently on Fortius and TTS2 software. The TTS4 especially needs a much higher spec machine that anything I have (or had!) at the moment.

 

[ian turner]

Fortunately the minimum spec on tts4 is the resolution of a 720 tv