What are PCI and AGP slots????

[pyrate83]

What are PCI and AGP slots and are they there to enhance graphics and gaming??? I have an NVIDIA geforce4 mx420 card that came with but if I can improve my graphics and performance overall by adding one of these cards I might do that instead of buying a new card. Where can I buy them too????

[Faustus]

AGP is a system bus designed for graphic cards, in general is faster then PCI. PCI is the standard system bus for expantion cards, video cards can use it if you find a PCI version of a video card, but its not as good. Of course your video is only as good as what card is in the slot. Unless you play games I wouldn't worry to much over your video card. I'd worry more about CPU/RAM.

[Karate Media]

PLease don't take offense at this, but I'm gonna dumb it down one more level for pyrate...

Just to be clear, PCI and AGP slots are already on your motherboard. You plug peripheral device cards into them, and you can't add any more slots(reading your question , it was unclear if you thought that AGP and PCI slots were types of cards that you could buy).

If you crack open your computer (again, I don't mean to seem rude, but based on this questions and others, I'm unclear on how familiar you are with the innards) you'll probably see something like a row of white slots (probably 3-5 slots total) and one brown slot off to the side.

The solitary, lonely "brown" (the color may differ) slot is your AGP slot -- if it already has a card in it, this card probably has your monitor attached to the end of it (I'm assuming that nvidea card you mentioned is what would be already plugged into the slot). The white slots are PCI slots, and you'l probably notice things like your sound card, or ethernet/LAN card, plugged into them. PCI means (IIRC) Peripheral Component Interconnect, and most of your add-on cards (except graphics) will be PCI cards -- like if you want to add USB 2.0, as I did last Christmas...Pretty much any retail/typical graphics card is going to be AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port)

Again, I hope I am not talking down to you. I have noticed that you've posted a number of upgrade/performance type questions recently, so I am assuming that the more hands-on, tweaking aspect of computers may be new to you. And while there are a number of very intelligent people in the forum, I'm not sure if a DVD/VCD webboard is always gonna be the best place to post general computer questions. I often recommend hitting the local library and getting the most current edition of Scott Mueller's huge book "Upgrading and Repairing PCs"that they have on hand -- the newest one is up to edition 14, but it's also about $60 -- edition 13 or 12 will be pretty much just as helpful...there another similar book I also check out when my memory gets foggy (or I need to learn something new), but I can't remember the exact title....Also, keep pcworld.com, pcmag.com, thescreensavers.com in your favorites folder -- they're usually really good for explaining things in a very straightforward way...

I hope I could help...

[pyrate83]

Karate Media...you're not talking down to me and in fact you are right. I am new to the computer scene..esp. high performance computers since I have always just worked with a very slow computer in the past. And no, I haven't yet opened up my computer so I am not familiar with what really goes on inside. I probably would only trust myself adding RAM at this point. Thanks for clearing things up and I have added the web sites you mentioned to my favorites list. Again thanks for the information....it helps! :P

[Karate Media]

Ain't nothing scary about cracking open a computer...just make sure it's unplugged and make sure you touch something metal before you touch anything on the inside...


And I can't recommend enough having a honest-to-god book with you when you open that sucker...sure, you may have printed out all that information off the web, but a book is bound and has an index...no lost pages and no searching the floor for the right printout...and trust me, if you rely completely on your computer, you're gonna end up elbow deep into the thing and realize that you forgot to print out an all-to-important document or two!

Now get crackin'

[Solarjetman]

There is a GREAT book out there that describes basically every computer hardware part known to man. It is called "Upgrading and Repairing PCs" by Scott Mueller. You can tell that it goes very in depth by just looking at the number of pages... 1608!!! I have the 11th edition, but they are up to 14 now.

You can find it on Amazon here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0789727455/qid=1057698230/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/104...907807-8045523

It is ment to be much more like a reference or school textbook, but you could just sit down and read a certian section you are interested in learning. There are over 160 sample pages on Amazon you can browse and see if this is something you might be interested in purchasing. If you are interested in getting into Computer Hardware, I have not found a better source of info in a single spot.


EDIT:
DOH!, I just read Karate Media's full post That makes two suggestions on this book I guess!