Yo, I'm going to copy and paste a post I wrote for a guy who was thinking of upgrading. While all of it doesn't apply to you, allot of it does.I'll edit out what I think you don't need. I'm exhausted now, but I'll check this thread later this weekend and answer your questions if you have them.
Here's some info for you now...
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Hey man. I just built my 1st pc, and I too had a Dell that was giving me fits. that's why I decided to build my own. I know your just talking about vidoe cards now, so I'll give you that recommendation. But, I'll throw out some other info as well about parts, building, ecd.
Video Card-
You already have it.
Processor-
I bought a Athlon 64 3800. I recommend you buy a Athlon 64 system, 3000 to 3500. The performance will be stellar. My research shows that the Athlon 64 was the processor of choice. I know lots of people love their intels, but I had one and it sucked. AMD has been great to me so far.
Personally, the Athlon 3500 socket 939 system is a very nice buy. Its like $350, and the 939 board is their main board. Meaning you won't have to change motherboards in the near future when you want to upgrade again. That being said, you may want to go with an Athlon from the 754 socket system. It will be like $50 cheaper. I don't know the name of the 754 processor, but there is one out there thats near identical in perfomance to the socket 939 3500 and its cheaper.
Ram-
Get 1 gig of ram. Definitely. Its important to find out if the ram will work with your motherboard. Check out the ram manufacturer/mother board manufacturer's website for more details.
Low latency ram (The expensive stuff) is not needed. It doesn't effect performance by any real notice. I bought some Crucial Ballistix, but it was overpriced. I just did it because I wanted teh best. But, it was money to burn. Go for the cheaper ram. You'll save money and get the same performance, save 1-5 fps less.
Motherboard-
The best boards are made by asus. Look for them, although there are several good boards to buy. Most people choose their boards on which ones off the best overclocking options. I do not. I run things at stock speeds. In my mind the most important thing is stability. Asus and abit offer the best from what I have seen. You must do research to find out if your psu and memory is compatible with your motherboard (I found some Antec power supplys (psu's) did not work well with abit boards).
You must also remember to buy a motherboard that is the same socket type as your processor.
Case and power supply-
The most underrated part of your system. I highly recommend you pay good money for a case and power supply. Most cheap cases have shitty airflow which means high tempatures which means an increased chance of burning out your computers components and poor performance in general. I recommend a case made out of aluminum, with 120mm fans, or a case with 80mm fans that has fans on the side window as well.
I went with a modded Lian Li PC-65. The mod was a window mod that gave two fans on the side. That alone lowered the temps 10 degrees.
Your psu is extremely important as well. Most people just a case witha preinstalled psu. Even name brand cases like antec sometimes use generic (poor) psu's that aren't as quality as the psu's they sell seperately. Your psu determines how well everything in your system will run. It is the heart. A good psu will also lower the temp of your system, because components will not overwork on less juice. The more juice, the less work.
I highly recommend the neopower 480 watt. This is a bit overkill, but you won't have to upgrade for years and it will give everything you need power. You'll also notice that it has a cable management system, so you have less clutter in your system.
If the neopower is not to your liking, I'd recommend anything by Antec. They make excellent psus. Get something over 350 watts.
Sound card-
Most people will say use onboard sound that comes from your motherboard. This is a viable option. However, I recommend you get a sound card if you have the cash. It will take stress off your processor, and give you increased gaming performance. The audgiy 2 ZS is a fantastic card for a good price.
Speakers-
Klipsch 2.1 promedia. If you only buy one thing, buy these motherfuckers. They are incredible. If you wanta surround sound system, get the 5.1 system. I don't have the room for it, so the 2.1s are just fine. They are insane. Amazing quality, and the volume turned up half way fills my entire 2 bed room apartment!!!!
Hard drive_
Get a big hard drive man. At least 60 gigs. Seagate and western digital make the best. An IDE drive is fine, you don't need any of that sata stuff. Its the easiest to install and performance is excellent.
Compatability-
Finally, do as much research as you can about the parts you plan to buy. Find what works together (ram with the mother board, psu with the motherboard), what doesn't work together, and what works best together. Sometimes you get increased performance from choosing the components that aren't the best, but work best together.
I recommend just diving in and reading benchmarks and all other sort s of geeky shit. At first I didn't know wtf any of this meant, but within a month I designed a pc that totally destroys my old dell. I went from this-
Dell 8100 series
1.7 ghz (So bad, even though it was listed at 1.7ghz, this model actually performed worse then the pentium 3 series in some cases, yet cost much more!)
SB live value!
Altec lansing 2.1speakers
Radeon 9800 128
256 mb ram
20gb hd (sucked ass!!!)
Shitty performance on most games. Doom 3 wouldn't run, BFV crashed, I squeezed as much life as I could from it. Only upgrading the ram to 642 mb ram helped, but because this fucking model of dell uses RD ram it cost me an arm and a leg.
Upgraded to
Athlon 64 3800+
eVGA GeForce 6800 GT
Asus A8v 939 motherboard
1 gig crucial Ballistix ram
200 bg seagate hard drive
Klipsch 2.1 speakers
Audigy 2ZS
Modded Lian Li Case
The result isn't even comparable. Plays anything out there at the highest settings maxxed without a problem. This thing wipes its ass with my old dell. I went overboard on some shit, but my point is you will be allot better off ditching dell and making your own.
I won't lie to you. Building a pc can be a pain the ass. Its not as easy as some make it out to be. Problems will arise. So far I had 2 or 3 problems that made me question building my own. But, after I fixed them (there is always an answer, you'll find it if you look hard enough), I realized that I'm much better off building my own. You know allot more about your system, you don't pay the marked up costs on an alienware or dell, and you don't need to call their fucking tech support that doesn't speak English or have a clue.
There will be problems. The answer is ussually right there in front of you though. The more research you do, the less problems.
Check out sites like tomshardware.com and
http://www2.hardocp.com/ for the forums and articles to learn. Remember, I didn't know SHIT about my pc and was totally afraid of evening opening it up. I designed it, built, optimized that motherfucker and fixed any problems that came up. If I did it, anyone can. No doubt.
Good luck.
