Raedon X300 video card--- not enough?

[captain_kickass]

First of all, let me state that I am not very computer literate, especially when it comes to hardware, so if this is a dumb question, I would appreciate not being called out on it.

That being said: The Civ 5 requirements with video are: 512 MB ATI 4800 series or better, 512 MB nVidia 9800 series or better. I have a Raedon X300 video card. Is this good enough? I ask because I'm searching for the reason that the game will start and then crash 2 seconds later, and I'm unsure if it's my video card or not.

If my video card is not good enough, about how much would a correct one be, either new or used?

I appreciate your help. I'm DYING to play Civ 5!

 

[The_J]

...er...i think you are looking at the requirements for Civ4.
For Civ5 it's at least a Radeon 2600 or a Geforce 7900.

-> you are way under the min. specs.

 

[tokala]

captain_kickass, the cards you listed are the recommended ones, minimum are the one The_J listed.
Your card is indeed too old to run Civ5 at all, it's technically impossible. Any new dedicated card will be able to run Civ5, but you should check beforehand if it is AGP or PCIe or even PCI (You can check this via gpu-z).
The cheapest decent new card would be a ATI/AMD HD5550 DDR3 for ~$50, which is about halfway between minimum and recommended.
Used cards make not much sense, at least if the selection at e-bay is a good indicator

If your computer does not have a PCIe interface, things will get a bit complicated ...

 

[The_J]

captain_kickass, the cards you listed are the recommended ones, minimum are the one The_J listed.

the confusion .
Civ4 was the time of Radeon 9800 and Geforce 4800, Civ5 is the time of Geforce 9800 and Radeon 4800 .
-> didn't read his post properly .

 

[captain_kickass]

Does it matter if the card is 256 MB, 512 MB, or 1 GB? I have a Dell Dimension 4700 if that helps.

 

[tokala]

Yes, thats helpful. So you do have a PCIe Slot, and basically any halfway modern card will fit in there. Amount of memory is NO indication whatsoever of the performance of a video card, the exact model number and type of VRAM are important.

You will not need 1024 MB, unless you want a high-end card and/or an ultra-large monitor.
256MB are usually only on older and slower cards, so you want to avoid that, although there are a few exceptions.