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Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card



 
 
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  #1  
Old January 1st 13, 03:45 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Damaeus[_3_]
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Posts: 79
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card

I've ordered an Asus Crosshair V Formula Z motherboard and it'll be here
Friday, I hope. I'm going to have Windows 8, which makes use of DirectX
11. I currently have a GeForce 7950GTOC graphics card with 512MB of video
RAM, which I bought when they were over $400, but I don't have that much
to spend on a graphics card this time around. I can go up to about $115
and I prefer an Asus-brand graphics card since I want to match it with the
Asus motherboard. But sometimes old-generation high-end cards are better
than present-generation low-end cards. I'm hoping to get something new
that's at least as good as my 7950GT.

I was trying to find something like CUDA cores to compare the 7950, but I
have noticed that the older cards don't seem to have a CUDA core
specification. I was thinking that the overall clock speed would be
something to look at.

The 7960 has a 550MHz core clock, while the GT 610 has an 810MHz core
clock, but it only has a 64-bit memory bus, while the 7950GT has a 256-bit
memory bus.

As for memory, it looks like even the lowest model of the current GeForce
line has 512 megabytes, so that's not a problem.

Also, I'm wondering about any special "features" like PhysX or any other
bells and whistles. I'm assuming all Nvidia cards have all the same bells
and whistles as far as real-time rendering goes, while the price comes in
when you start paying for extra memory, better memory, and faster clock
speeds.

So I guess the simplest way to ask the question for now is: What current
Nvidia card would be about the same as my old 7950GTOC? Finding that out,
I can then see how much that costs and find out how much better of a card
I can get with any extra money I can spend beyond today's equivalent of
the 7950 to maybe get something a little better.

Thanks for any help.

This is what I'll be running, by the way. The 7950 is currently listed as
part of my soon-to-be built system below:

..---------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Asus Crosshair V Formula Z 990FX | |
| AMD FX-6300 Vishera 3.5 GHz (AM3+) | |
| 4x4 GB Kingston HyperX DDR3 2133 | |
| Western Digital 320GB HD (NTFS) | |
| BFG Tech GeForce 7950 GTOC 512MB | EAT AT JOE'S |
| Mon: 27" Acer S271HL - 1920 x 1080 | |
| PSU: Thermaltake SP-850AH3CCB 850w | |
| (Installed New - July 2012) | |
| UPS: APC 1500 XS | |
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
| The only overclocked item is the factory-overclocked graphics card. |
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
| OS - Dual Boot: MS Windows 8 (64-bit) |
| MS Windows XP Home Edition - SP3 |
'---------------------------------------------------------------------'
  #2  
Old January 1st 13, 07:47 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 NvidiaCard

Damaeus wrote:
I've ordered an Asus Crosshair V Formula Z motherboard and it'll be here
Friday, I hope. I'm going to have Windows 8, which makes use of DirectX
11. I currently have a GeForce 7950GTOC graphics card with 512MB of video
RAM, which I bought when they were over $400, but I don't have that much
to spend on a graphics card this time around. I can go up to about $115
and I prefer an Asus-brand graphics card since I want to match it with the
Asus motherboard. But sometimes old-generation high-end cards are better
than present-generation low-end cards. I'm hoping to get something new
that's at least as good as my 7950GT.

I was trying to find something like CUDA cores to compare the 7950, but I
have noticed that the older cards don't seem to have a CUDA core
specification. I was thinking that the overall clock speed would be
something to look at.

The 7960 has a 550MHz core clock, while the GT 610 has an 810MHz core
clock, but it only has a 64-bit memory bus, while the 7950GT has a 256-bit
memory bus.

As for memory, it looks like even the lowest model of the current GeForce
line has 512 megabytes, so that's not a problem.

Also, I'm wondering about any special "features" like PhysX or any other
bells and whistles. I'm assuming all Nvidia cards have all the same bells
and whistles as far as real-time rendering goes, while the price comes in
when you start paying for extra memory, better memory, and faster clock
speeds.

So I guess the simplest way to ask the question for now is: What current
Nvidia card would be about the same as my old 7950GTOC? Finding that out,
I can then see how much that costs and find out how much better of a card
I can get with any extra money I can spend beyond today's equivalent of
the 7950 to maybe get something a little better.

Thanks for any help.

This is what I'll be running, by the way. The 7950 is currently listed as
part of my soon-to-be built system below:

.---------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Asus Crosshair V Formula Z 990FX | |
| AMD FX-6300 Vishera 3.5 GHz (AM3+) | |
| 4x4 GB Kingston HyperX DDR3 2133 | |
| Western Digital 320GB HD (NTFS) | |
| BFG Tech GeForce 7950 GTOC 512MB | EAT AT JOE'S |
| Mon: 27" Acer S271HL - 1920 x 1080 | |
| PSU: Thermaltake SP-850AH3CCB 850w | |
| (Installed New - July 2012) | |
| UPS: APC 1500 XS | |
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
| The only overclocked item is the factory-overclocked graphics card. |
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
| OS - Dual Boot: MS Windows 8 (64-bit) |
| MS Windows XP Home Edition - SP3 |
'---------------------------------------------------------------------'


nVidia GeForce GTX 650 ($120) versus nVidia GeForce 7950 GT PCI-E

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....=681&card2=445

Single point benchmarks don't have much merit, but if you're as
lazy as I am, it's a start.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php

GeForce 7950 GT 284
GeForce GTX 650 1815

That doesn't mean it's 6X faster all the time. Just for
some specific thing.

You can also use their "Best value" chart. This gives you
a rating of the equivalent of "3DMarks per dollar". But it
could well turn out, that a very "efficient" card costs
$250 - you're getting a lot of "3DMarks per dollar" but the
price point just happens to be too high for you. I just picked
the GTX 650 randomly from the first site, and got lucky
on the price.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_value.html

HTH,
Paul
  #3  
Old January 1st 13, 08:23 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Damaeus[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 79
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 13:47:50 -0500 the following:

nVidia GeForce GTX 650 ($120) versus nVidia GeForce 7950 GT PCI-E

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....=681&card2=445

Single point benchmarks don't have much merit, but if you're as
lazy as I am, it's a start.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php

GeForce 7950 GT 284
GeForce GTX 650 1815


Thanks. While I was waiting for replies (both from here and from
tomshardware.com), I managed to do some digging and actually found that
GPU Review site and came to the same conclusion. I had been looking at
the GT 640; it had a much lower memory bandwidth, but appeared to be just
slightly faster overall. I have already ordered an MSI-brand GTX 650 just
a little while ago. I'm not typically one to buy mid-range cards, but
then I've never been quite as poor as I am right now. Looking at the
comparison on gpureview.com, it looks like the pixel fill rate is almost
twice as fast, the memory bandwidth is almost twice as wide, and the
texture fill-rate is way beyond twice as fast, which I assume is because
of the PhysX technology. I'll still get to see a little comparison
because I'll have to run the 7950GT for a few days while I wait for the
GTX 650.

I was just going to stick with the 7950 until I could get a high-end
graphics card, but I read that Windows 8 actually uses DirectX 11 to do
things more quickly (probably eye-candy stuff) so I went ahead and got
what I could afford now. It was $119.99 on Newegg.com with free shipping.
I really wanted the Asus version, but it was $124.99 plus shipping of
$6.98, which, I'm ashamed to say, would have overdrawn my checking
account.

Thanks again. I feel pretty comfortable that the GTX 650 will be at least
as good as the 7950 and it appears that it'll be significantly better,
even though the 7950 has 256-bit memory pipeline versus the GTX650's
128-bit pipeline.

I hope there's nothing wrong with any of my parts. I've got a little cash
in my pocket, but I was hoping to get something else not computer-related
with it. Shopping for parts stresses me out because I don't want to get
anything that's defective or that won't work as I was expecting.

Damaeus
  #4  
Old January 1st 13, 09:08 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 NvidiaCard

Damaeus wrote:
In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 13:47:50 -0500 the following:

nVidia GeForce GTX 650 ($120) versus nVidia GeForce 7950 GT PCI-E

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....=681&card2=445

Single point benchmarks don't have much merit, but if you're as
lazy as I am, it's a start.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php

GeForce 7950 GT 284
GeForce GTX 650 1815


Thanks. While I was waiting for replies (both from here and from
tomshardware.com), I managed to do some digging and actually found that
GPU Review site and came to the same conclusion. I had been looking at
the GT 640; it had a much lower memory bandwidth, but appeared to be just
slightly faster overall. I have already ordered an MSI-brand GTX 650 just
a little while ago. I'm not typically one to buy mid-range cards, but
then I've never been quite as poor as I am right now. Looking at the
comparison on gpureview.com, it looks like the pixel fill rate is almost
twice as fast, the memory bandwidth is almost twice as wide, and the
texture fill-rate is way beyond twice as fast, which I assume is because
of the PhysX technology. I'll still get to see a little comparison
because I'll have to run the 7950GT for a few days while I wait for the
GTX 650.

I was just going to stick with the 7950 until I could get a high-end
graphics card, but I read that Windows 8 actually uses DirectX 11 to do
things more quickly (probably eye-candy stuff) so I went ahead and got
what I could afford now. It was $119.99 on Newegg.com with free shipping.
I really wanted the Asus version, but it was $124.99 plus shipping of
$6.98, which, I'm ashamed to say, would have overdrawn my checking
account.

Thanks again. I feel pretty comfortable that the GTX 650 will be at least
as good as the 7950 and it appears that it'll be significantly better,
even though the 7950 has 256-bit memory pipeline versus the GTX650's
128-bit pipeline.

I hope there's nothing wrong with any of my parts. I've got a little cash
in my pocket, but I was hoping to get something else not computer-related
with it. Shopping for parts stresses me out because I don't want to get
anything that's defective or that won't work as I was expecting.

Damaeus


If Windows 8 is using hardware acceleration in some important way,
it's hiding it pretty well.

Metro apps might use acceleration in some way, but I almost never
run Metro stuff on my Windows 8 desktop. My monitor isn't wide
enough for Snap (1366 versus my monitor is only 1280 across),
so right there, my hardware isn't good enough. I guess I have
to be "Apple Rich" and buy a brand new wide monitor with touch,
to be with the "in crowd". You know, the cool kids :-)

As for mid-range video cards, I always feel regrets later, when
I look at the my bone-yard of slow and lonely video cards. For example,
I have a bushel of FX5200s, and no more driver support :-)

The main benefit you're likely to get from the new video card,
is "buzz word compliance". Any new tech that games might use,
your new card will have it. Whereas the 7950 will likely run all
your old DirectX 9 games, you can look forward to running demos
for the newer stuff, to see what all the excitement is about.
And if some program needs GPGPU acceleration, you'll have a
chance of trying that out as well.

But will the new mid-range card make every heavy-weight game
run like butter ? Probably not. Games designed to run sluggish
on everything except Blue Gene, are still going to be slow,
and need the detail turned down.

Paul
  #5  
Old January 2nd 13, 05:32 AM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Damaeus[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 79
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 15:08:48 -0500 the following:

If Windows 8 is using hardware acceleration in some important way,
it's hiding it pretty well.


I was just going by some stuff I read about Windows 8 and DirectX 11. It
was saying that Win8 will run with an older card, but I'd be "missing out"
on some things that would happen faster with a DirectX 11 card.

Here's a snippet:

Here are some of the improvements you+IBk-ll notice in Windows 8
running DirectX 11.1. You can read through this detailed article
on Microsoft+IBk-s site for a complete rundown.

There has been a substantial increase in text processing
which not only makes text load quicker and look sharper, but
also is less intensive on the CPU, which allows other
applications to use the CPU while text is being processed.

Tessellation (which refers to creating two-dimensional
graphics by repeating the same triangle shape over and
over). There has been a significant improvement in how
Windows draws shapes and renders objects. They render more
quickly with fewer resources.

There has been a substantial improvement made in JPG and PNG
image rendering (40% less time, according to their tests)
which should significantly impact all users of Windows.

There have been improvements in how DirectX processes
screens that contain both text and embedded moving objects,
which is typically seen on web pages with embedded videos.

Source:
http://www.reviversoft.com/blog/2012...-need-to-know/

It sounded good to me, so I went for it.

Metro apps might use acceleration in some way, but I almost never
run Metro stuff on my Windows 8 desktop. My monitor isn't wide
enough for Snap (1366 versus my monitor is only 1280 across),
so right there, my hardware isn't good enough. I guess I have
to be "Apple Rich" and buy a brand new wide monitor with touch,
to be with the "in crowd". You know, the cool kids :-)


I don't want a touch-screen. I just got a new monitor in November,
anyway, and I was planning on it lasting me at least five years. And my
head is so far away from the monitor that I'd have to sit up and lean
forward instead of just relaxing while I do my thing.

As for mid-range video cards, I always feel regrets later, when
I look at the my bone-yard of slow and lonely video cards. For example,
I have a bushel of FX5200s, and no more driver support :-)


I wish I'd kept my old GeForce 6800 GT (AGP). That's what I was running
on this motherboard before I built the Fatal1ty rig. But since I didn't
think I'd ever need it again, I gave it to a co-worker. I've been wanting
to stab myself in the eyes ever since my Fatal1ty broke down. That card
ran really well on this Abit NF-7, and it would certainly be light years
better than this crappy 5600XT.

The main benefit you're likely to get from the new video card,
is "buzz word compliance". Any new tech that games might use,
your new card will have it. Whereas the 7950 will likely run all
your old DirectX 9 games, you can look forward to running demos
for the newer stuff, to see what all the excitement is about.
And if some program needs GPGPU acceleration, you'll have a
chance of trying that out as well.


Yes, I'm looking forward to demos. I've got to do some writing and try to
get something published before I can make some money. lol

But will the new mid-range card make every heavy-weight game
run like butter ? Probably not. Games designed to run sluggish
on everything except Blue Gene, are still going to be slow,
and need the detail turned down.


Well, the basic specifications make the GTX 660 look faster than the
7950GT overall: more memory bandwidth, higher clock speed, faster memory,
faster pixel fill-rate, faster texture fill-rate. I would think that it
would run anything the 7950GT can run, and do it faster. I'm not into the
latest high-demand games, although I'd like to be. I'd probably just
continue playing what I have now until I can get a top-of-the-line Nvidia
card. The newest game I have right now is The Sims 3, which runs on
DirectX 9. And since there was a problem with my old motherboard (that
bad, leaking capacitor that was like that from the day I got it just over
six years ago), which I now think was the cause of jittery animations in
most games, even if my new rig only ultimately runs games at the same
speed as my old one, at least it won't have THAT particular jitter
problem, which wasn't exhibited in all my games, but it did manifest in
The Sims 3, Deus Ex, the PlayOnline portal program to Final Fantasy XI,
Age of Empires III, and some other game I tried to play that I can't
remember the name of. It didn't affect Farmville 2, Cityville 2, or Final
Fantasy XI. But at least now I'll have a chance to try the 7950 on a
different motherboard so I'll know for sure whether it was the motherboard
or the GPU.

I'm getting significant improvements in the CPU and memory, plus the
motherboard, of course, and just the faster CPU alone should boost game
performance, even if the graphics card itself doesn't.

AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core 4200+- 2.1GHz ---- AMD FX-6300 Six-Core 3.5 GHz
2GB DDR2 800 ---- 16GB DDR3 2133

Since the CPU speed affects how fast the video card can do its thing, the
combination of all these upgrades at once will probably impress me enough
that I won't care, and then there's the DirectX 11 thing. I'll be current
on that, at least. And this isn't a final solution card...it's temporary,
too.

Damaeus
  #6  
Old January 2nd 13, 05:56 AM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Damaeus[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 79
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 15:08:48 -0500 the following:

Whereas the 7950 will likely run all your old DirectX 9 games, you can
look forward to running demos for the newer stuff, to see what all the
excitement is about.


Oh, the video card I ordered from Newegg.com is shipped with a free full
version of Assassin's Creed III. Someone reviewing a video card said that
his came with that game, too, but said, "the game and video card was a
dissapointing present to my son cause he could not play the game it came
with." I don't know if that means it didn't run well on his machine, or
his son was not good at playing it, or if it was too violent and his
parent or guardian would not allow him to play it.



Damaeus
  #7  
Old January 2nd 13, 06:46 AM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 NvidiaCard

Damaeus wrote:
In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 15:08:48 -0500 the following:

Whereas the 7950 will likely run all your old DirectX 9 games, you can
look forward to running demos for the newer stuff, to see what all the
excitement is about.


Oh, the video card I ordered from Newegg.com is shipped with a free full
version of Assassin's Creed III. Someone reviewing a video card said that
his came with that game, too, but said, "the game and video card was a
dissapointing present to my son cause he could not play the game it came
with." I don't know if that means it didn't run well on his machine, or
his son was not good at playing it, or if it was too violent and his
parent or guardian would not allow him to play it.



Damaeus


It could be that the serial number in the box didn't work, or
there was some other "delivery failure" between seeing the
claim the game was included, and actually getting to use it.
Check some more reviews, to see if anyone else had a problem.
And since that offer would accompany other models of cards, there
may be other reviews with more details available.

Paul
  #8  
Old January 8th 13, 08:57 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Damaeus[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 79
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 Nvidia Card

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 15:08:48 -0500 the following:

But will the new mid-range card make every heavy-weight game
run like butter ? Probably not. Games designed to run sluggish
on everything except Blue Gene, are still going to be slow,
and need the detail turned down.


Hello again. I got my new system built. It turns out that this new video
card might have been necessary after all. I built this thing on Friday
and used my old GeForce 7950 GTOC -- the one that was in the motherboard
with the bad capacitor, which we discussed in another thread. And when I
booted it up to install Windows 8, I'd see the Windows logo and a little
timer/spinner, and then my system would reboot. I was using all the
default settings in the BIOS.

I asked around in some web forums (using my friend's computer, of course)
and someone told me to change the BIOS to run the memory at its rated
2133MHz and to change the voltage and timings. So I did that and actually
got it up and running long enough to see the Windows 8 product key
verification screen. But the product key was no good, so I decided to
install Windows XP just to have something to use while I was getting the
Windows 8 situation sorted out.

WinXP gave me blue screens on installation, so I made a slipstream disc
(learning along the way not to use Windows Vista to do this because it
ruins the key validation) and finally got XP up and running. I thought I
was doing great until the system rebooted itself after XP had been up and
running for about an hour. Irritated with it, I tried lowering the memory
speed. Then I lowered it some more. Then I did a little more research on
the memory and found that 2133 MHz was its maximum tested speed at which
it would run, but 1333 MHz was its standard speed, just like the BIOS
detected automatically. But the system would run most poorly at those
settings. I was certain to shorten my uptime by trying to load Farmville
2. My PC rebooted every time with that attempt at loading a game, as well
as rebooting when trying to launch Stormfall, another browser game. I was
starting to think it was a bad motherboard or bad memory or something, so
I started getting together some Memtest floppies to run a memory test, and
I was preparing my case for an RMA on the motherboard, especially since it
came in the wrong box. It's an Asus Crosshair V Formula Z that arrived in
a box for an Asus Rampage IV Formula, and it had a bent pin where the
Q-Connector goes, a dark smudge on one of the SATA ports, and a greasy
fingerprint on the CMOS battery. I ordered an unopened box, but somehow I
don't think this was unopened.

Anyway, I was expecting a new video card today and decided to just wait
and see if that made a difference. And so far, it has! The BIOS is
currently set at its full default settings (except I disabled the Republic
of Gamers startup logo) and WinXP has been up and running for probably
20-25 minutes or so. My old 7950 GT would "rev" its fan when the system
would reboot. Additionally, HWInfo32 shows this new video card's GPU
temperature to be idling at 26+ALo-C, while the 7950 GT was idling at 57-60+ALo-C,
even though the fan was running on it, though only at 20%. The new card's
fan is running at 40%.

Right now, I'm ecstatic because at least it runs at default settings,
which is what I was after. I want stability, not overclocking. I just
hope that running that old 7950GT in THIS motherboard didn't spread its
sickness to my new hardware.

I'm calming down a bit, but I'm still finding it hard to relax. I'm
hoping this system lasts me at least six years like my old one did, unless
I get enough money together to build computers more often. It'd be nice
to be able to build a new one about every two years or so.

Anyway, with my 7950GT in this thing, what few times I was able to run
Coasterville, I was impressed with the fluidity of the animation. I never
got to run that game in my old rig because it came out after it fried, but
it certainly runs far more smoothly on my new stuff than it does on my
roommate's PC, which has the same amount of RAM as my old system, and the
same speed dual-core processor, but his has an integrated Intel G33/31
graphics chip which may make a difference in some browser games.

That's my update, long-winded though it was.
  #9  
Old January 8th 13, 11:03 PM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 NvidiaCard

Damaeus wrote:
In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, Paul nospam+AEA-needed.com
posted on Tue, 01 Jan 2013 15:08:48 -0500 the following:

But will the new mid-range card make every heavy-weight game
run like butter ? Probably not. Games designed to run sluggish
on everything except Blue Gene, are still going to be slow,
and need the detail turned down.


Hello again. I got my new system built. It turns out that this new video
card might have been necessary after all. I built this thing on Friday
and used my old GeForce 7950 GTOC -- the one that was in the motherboard
with the bad capacitor, which we discussed in another thread. And when I
booted it up to install Windows 8, I'd see the Windows logo and a little
timer/spinner, and then my system would reboot. I was using all the
default settings in the BIOS.

I asked around in some web forums (using my friend's computer, of course)
and someone told me to change the BIOS to run the memory at its rated
2133MHz and to change the voltage and timings. So I did that and actually
got it up and running long enough to see the Windows 8 product key
verification screen. But the product key was no good, so I decided to
install Windows XP just to have something to use while I was getting the
Windows 8 situation sorted out.

WinXP gave me blue screens on installation, so I made a slipstream disc
(learning along the way not to use Windows Vista to do this because it
ruins the key validation) and finally got XP up and running. I thought I
was doing great until the system rebooted itself after XP had been up and
running for about an hour. Irritated with it, I tried lowering the memory
speed. Then I lowered it some more. Then I did a little more research on
the memory and found that 2133 MHz was its maximum tested speed at which
it would run, but 1333 MHz was its standard speed, just like the BIOS
detected automatically. But the system would run most poorly at those
settings. I was certain to shorten my uptime by trying to load Farmville
2. My PC rebooted every time with that attempt at loading a game, as well
as rebooting when trying to launch Stormfall, another browser game. I was
starting to think it was a bad motherboard or bad memory or something, so
I started getting together some Memtest floppies to run a memory test, and
I was preparing my case for an RMA on the motherboard, especially since it
came in the wrong box. It's an Asus Crosshair V Formula Z that arrived in
a box for an Asus Rampage IV Formula, and it had a bent pin where the
Q-Connector goes, a dark smudge on one of the SATA ports, and a greasy
fingerprint on the CMOS battery. I ordered an unopened box, but somehow I
don't think this was unopened.

Anyway, I was expecting a new video card today and decided to just wait
and see if that made a difference. And so far, it has! The BIOS is
currently set at its full default settings (except I disabled the Republic
of Gamers startup logo) and WinXP has been up and running for probably
20-25 minutes or so. My old 7950 GT would "rev" its fan when the system
would reboot. Additionally, HWInfo32 shows this new video card's GPU
temperature to be idling at 26+ALo-C, while the 7950 GT was idling at 57-60+ALo-C,
even though the fan was running on it, though only at 20+ACU-. The new card's
fan is running at 40+ACU-.

Right now, I'm ecstatic because at least it runs at default settings,
which is what I was after. I want stability, not overclocking. I just
hope that running that old 7950GT in THIS motherboard didn't spread its
sickness to my new hardware.

I'm calming down a bit, but I'm still finding it hard to relax. I'm
hoping this system lasts me at least six years like my old one did, unless
I get enough money together to build computers more often. It'd be nice
to be able to build a new one about every two years or so.

Anyway, with my 7950GT in this thing, what few times I was able to run
Coasterville, I was impressed with the fluidity of the animation. I never
got to run that game in my old rig because it came out after it fried, but
it certainly runs far more smoothly on my new stuff than it does on my
roommate's PC, which has the same amount of RAM as my old system, and the
same speed dual-core processor, but his has an integrated Intel G33/31
graphics chip which may make a difference in some browser games.

That's my update, long-winded though it was.


The fan revving on the 7950 is normal. It's designed to run at
a high fan setting, until the driver loads. Then the fan is turned
down by the driver. There's only one problem with that - if you
happen to boot Linux while using the 7950 (like a LiveCD), the fan
could well stay at the top setting for the entire section. The
driver code might be in the NVidia-produced driver, but
not in the default Linux driver.

I hated that behavior enough, I control the video card fan
separately. The setting the driver uses, is now irrelevant.
The fan runs off a separate power path. I adjusted the fan
voltage, so I get the same fan speed as before (when the
driver was under control). It means I have the nuisance of a
few extra wires, right next to my video card.

+ACoAKgAqACoAKgAqACo-

You can still give memtest86+ACs- a try if you want. It's
all part of checking your new build.

I also run Prime95 for at least four hours, as it makes
a good RAM tester as well. Executables are available for
multiple OSes. This runs multi-threaded, and gives each
core something to do. (Sometimes the site is down, so if
at first you don't get through, try again a few hours later.)

http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft/

When it asks to "Join GIMPS", answer "Just Testing". Then,
you can use the program for its math testing skills. You can
set the testing for "mixed", which does large FFTs and small
FFTs. The large FFTs can occupy a lot of RAM, while the
small ones run in CPU cache. You get to select the amount
of RAM to use. On my 32 bit OS here, that might be limited to
around 1800MB. I've not tested any 64 bit versions of the
program yet. The "working bits" of the program, are
coded in assembler for speed. That also helps load the CPU
fully, and makes it a more demanding test to pass.

The program can detect math errors, and knows what the answer
should be. If your machine is the least bit unstable, the
program will detect that as a math error, and a red colored
screen entry will show the thread has stopped. A testing
thread stops if it detects a single error. If you
had a 4C-8T processor, maybe it'll run eight test threads,
and split the tested memory amongst all of them. In four
hours, you want all eight threads to maintain a "green"
status, still running.

If it did detect an error, it won't necessarily show a
memory address. You would have to use your brain, to figure
out test strategies, to narrow down the error to a particular
stick of RAM. It can be done, but it's a bit of a nuisance.
For that matter, even the readout on memtest86+ACs- can leave
you guessing, as to which stick is at fault. So in some ways,
the same problems exists when using memtest86+ACs-. Since
individual DIMMs have such high capacities now, in many cases
you can drop down to an individual stick of RAM, and retest,
and see if the error shows up. Running two sticks in single
channel mode, and swapping them for a second testing session,
is another way to get full test coverage.

Paul
  #10  
Old January 9th 13, 07:08 AM posted to alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia
Ant[_3_]
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Posts: 756
Default Need Advice to Replace GeForce 7950GTOC With a DirectX11 NvidiaCard

On 1/8/2013 2:03 PM PT, Paul typed:

The fan revving on the 7950 is normal. It's designed to run at
a high fan setting, until the driver loads. Then the fan is turned
down by the driver. There's only one problem with that - if you
happen to boot Linux while using the 7950 (like a LiveCD), the fan
could well stay at the top setting for the entire section. The
driver code might be in the NVidia-produced driver, but
not in the default Linux driver.


Yeah, I saw this behavior too with my old GeForce 8800 GT video card and
the closed NVIDIA binary drivers in Debian. I used to exit X to idle
console mode, but that made my video card fan spin loud and fast.


I hated that behavior enough, I control the video card fan
separately. The setting the driver uses, is now irrelevant.
The fan runs off a separate power path. I adjusted the fan
voltage, so I get the same fan speed as before (when the
driver was under control). It means I have the nuisance of a
few extra wires, right next to my video card.


Is it difficult/hard to do?
--
"For example, the tiny ant, a creature of great industry, drags with its
mouth whatever it can, and adds it to the heap which she is piling up,
not unaware nor careless of the future." --Horace, Satires, Book I, I, 33.
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/ /\ /\ \ Ant's Quality Foraged Links: http://aqfl.net
| |o o| |
\ _ / If crediting, then use Ant nickname and AQFL URL/link.
( ) If e-mailing, then axe ANT from its address if needed.
Ant is currently not listening to any songs on this computer.
 




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