Video Card Assistance, please? :) Options

[superstitious]

Ok, so it is very clear to me that I need a new video card. Either that, or update my driver. My problem is this. How the heck do I figure out what video card I have (I installed it with a friend talking me through it a few years ago). I know that I have a PCI Express. I can't find the cd that came with it. I looked in the device manager, under Display Adapters and it shows something like this:

-
RADEON X550
RADEON X550 Secondary

So two things. One, how do I know what type of video card I can get and two, how do I figure out what video card I currently have so that I can attempt to update drivers (attempts to update the drivers using the properties, driver tab were unsuccessful since apparently, I don't have the software).

Third, I love you.

lol

[yaamakoh]

Oh I heard of them before.

As for the video card, ATI has cheap, but really good video cards as of right now in the market... totally making nvidia panic. AMD is doing poorly right now, who owns ati, so if they ever do go out of business then I guess you're kind of stuck with current drivers, unless you find 3rd party drivers.

For value and performance, go for the ATI HD 3000 or 4000 series. For reliable and future upgrades towards drivers, go for the Nvidia 8 series if you're on a budget, 9 series for performance.

If you tell me what you're planning on doing with the computer with the new graphics card, I can probably narrow it down better for you. ie: games, hd movies, blue-ray rips, x264, dual monitors, t.v hookup, etc etc.

Of course everyones opinion is different =] but everyone here so far has suggest great cards.

Are you on a PCIx16 or PCIx16 2.0?