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#1
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Looking for a new graphics card
Hi,
I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. I've read about the GeForce 6800 Ultra chipset, but apparently it recommends a min of 480W. Can anyone recommend a decent graphics card, with a budget of £400. thanks, Mark. |
#2
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On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 01:35:13 -0000, "Mark"
wrote: Hi, I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. 250 WATTS is a bit underpowered. I would at least go for a 300-350 watt PS. Those are pretty cheap nowadays. I think the best card is the plain jane 6800 128 megs. You dont need 256 megs really and most of the benefits for high powered cards come at high res 1600x1200. For one thing most people are switching to LCD screens and native res is usually 1280x1024 for best quality below 1600x1200. Right now theres kind of high 6800 prices in the US the plain jane 6800 if you do a pricewatch search is $260-280. There are intermittent sales down to 240 . The other card is the 6600GT though Im not sure if there even is an AGP version cant remember. That goes generally for 200-220 but Ive seen some recent sales down to 180 with rebate. The 6800 if you can get it in the lower 200s is a better deal cause you can unlock the pipes on some of them and OC it a bit making it a fair amount better than a 6600GT. They come with the same amount of pipes but with the 6800 some have been disabled since it physically has more same as the GT and Ultra - theyve just been disabled. For you youd have to to spend a lot more on PS and ridiculous amounts on an ultra/ I dont believe in spending over 200 but Ive broken that rule recently but NO WAY would I spend over 300 - the value of that card is going to plummet the most since you always pay the greatest premium for cutting edge stuff. For me the 6800 128 meg is the sweet spot now and in the future - if the 6800 GT 128 meg falls a bit it would be in the sweet spot. Then of course later the 6800 256 meg GT if it fell in the low 200s. Most are probably getting the GT though since its a bit more affordable but I think the 6800 128 meg is a better deal IF you can get it in the low 200s. |
#3
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Mark:
I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. I've read about the GeForce 6800 Ultra chipset, but apparently it recommends a min of 480W. If you check the Dell forums you'll find many people running the latest video cards on Dell 250W power supplies. According the link below, a 250W Dell PS is roughly equivalent to 365W due to differences in how Dell rates their PSU. http://www.spongebobsupgradesite.com/index.html I'm running a 5900XT with no problems. -- Mac Cool |
#4
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On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 01:35:13 -0000, "Mark"
wrote: Hi, I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. I've read about the GeForce 6800 Ultra chipset, but apparently it recommends a min of 480W. Can anyone recommend a decent graphics card, with a budget of £400. thanks, Mark. See if the Dell uses a standard power supply, and upgrade that first. Without a larger power supply you shouldnt' try to use anything more power hungry than (roughly) a Radeon 9600. That would play HL2, but it wouldn't be loafing along at it, and not something you could expect to get longer term use out of, for the next generation of games for example, unless you only run at moderate resolutions. Geforce 6600GT seems to be the darling right now, good price/performance tradeoff. 6800 series is a bit better of course, but realistically you might need reassess the rest of your system, an older system will be the bottleneck for a £400 video card so you might look into other upgrades first if you really want/need £400 worth of video card. |
#5
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On 22 Jan 2005 04:28:44 GMT, Mac Cool wrote:
Mark: I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. I've read about the GeForce 6800 Ultra chipset, but apparently it recommends a min of 480W. If you check the Dell forums you'll find many people running the latest video cards on Dell 250W power supplies. According the link below, a 250W Dell PS is roughly equivalent to 365W due to differences in how Dell rates their PSU. http://www.spongebobsupgradesite.com/index.html I'm running a 5900XT with no problems. They rate them honestly, perhaps slightly conservatively, but "spongebob's" theories only hold water if comparing to a generic. Any decent name-brand power supply (Antec, Sparkle, Delta, etc) would have higher true capacity in a (between) 300-350W model. FX5900 is a pretty power hungry card, but isn't it one of the last to draw so much from the 5V rail? That would tend to make it more suitable for a smaller PSU running a 12V-based P4 or Athlon box. I had a website article in mind that detailed the FX5900's power rail usage but can't recall where at the moment. Perhaps I remember wrongly but wish I had the link to refresh my memory. Seems like it only uses a couple amps of 12V power, mostly 5V. |
#6
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You are VERY limited in the video speed you can achieve with an AGP 4X
motherboard and only a 250 watt power supply unit. Sorry -- DaveW "Mark" wrote in message ... Hi, I've got a Dell Dimension 8100, (that comes with a AGP 4x port and a 250W supply). I'm looking to upgrade my NVIDIA Riva TNT2 to the best that I can, mainly for playing Half Life 2. I've read about the GeForce 6800 Ultra chipset, but apparently it recommends a min of 480W. Can anyone recommend a decent graphics card, with a budget of £400. thanks, Mark. |
#7
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kony:
They rate them honestly, perhaps slightly conservatively, but "spongebob's" theories only hold water if comparing to a generic. Any decent name-brand power supply (Antec, Sparkle, Delta, etc) would have higher true capacity in a (between) 300-350W model. Theory? I can't vouch for his numbers but he states they come from testing, not from theory. Look over the results of Tom's Hardware PSU testing and you'll notice that while name brand PSU usually test higher than their rating, none of them rated more than 75W above their rating and the majority were within about 10% of their rating. The whole thing could be bogus for all I know, but the Dell forums are full of people successfully running late model cards on 250W supplies. There were a few failures, but the clear majority were successes. Overall I would say that the Dell PSU seem to be very good quality and underrated wattage-wise. I had a website article in mind that detailed the FX5900's power rail usage but can't recall where at the moment. Perhaps I remember wrongly but wish I had the link to refresh my memory. Seems like it only uses a couple amps of 12V power, mostly 5V. Probably this article: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/vid...-nv-power.html -- Mac Cool |
#8
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On 23 Jan 2005 04:57:37 GMT, Mac Cool wrote:
kony: They rate them honestly, perhaps slightly conservatively, but "spongebob's" theories only hold water if comparing to a generic. Any decent name-brand power supply (Antec, Sparkle, Delta, etc) would have higher true capacity in a (between) 300-350W model. Theory? I can't vouch for his numbers but he states they come from testing, not from theory. Look over the results of Tom's Hardware PSU testing and you'll notice that while name brand PSU usually test higher than their rating, none of them rated more than 75W above their rating and the majority were within about 10% of their rating. The theory is not about the Dell's PSU, it's that others rate them differently. They don't, when a decent brand. Generally speaking, the moderate, 250-300W supplies out there have a higher percentage increase for peak. We can't directly compare to Tom's Hardware since they didn't test one. The whole thing could be bogus for all I know, but the Dell forums are full of people successfully running late model cards on 250W supplies. Dell does use good power supplies, but that doesn't make it a good idea to run one near it's peak sustained load. There were a few failures, but the clear majority were successes. Overall I would say that the Dell PSU seem to be very good quality and underrated wattage-wise. Yes, they have always been better than (Compaq for example) but even so, consider that even with the peak rating given, it's still a lower peak than a $30 Sparkle 300W. IMHO, a Sparkle 300W might power a higher-end video card but it's not a good idea, when a card/system costs that much it's prudent to put a proportionate amount into power as well. I had a website article in mind that detailed the FX5900's power rail usage but can't recall where at the moment. Perhaps I remember wrongly but wish I had the link to refresh my memory. Seems like it only uses a couple amps of 12V power, mostly 5V. Probably this article: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/vid...-nv-power.html Yes, I think that was it. What I was trying to recall was which PSU i'd found to have insufficient power previously... My FX5900XT is volt-modded and o'c pretty far, it'd be using more than even the F5950 in those charts. Upon inital testing of the volt-mod I'd put it in a box that used 5V rail for CPU power to an Athlon Barton @2.5GHz, and found the Antec PP303X (300W) power supply couldn't cut it. Previously the box had been running from integrated nForce2 video, and adding the FX5900XT just pushed it over the edge. I had a Thermaltake 420W handy so I threw that in and it's been running fine ever since. I meant to swap it back out for another PSU but never got around to it, so it seems the Thermaltake is holding up pretty well. |
#9
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kony:
Yes, they have always been better than (Compaq for example) but even so, consider that even with the peak rating given, it's still a lower peak than a $30 Sparkle 300W. That's only a guess but I don't have a Sparkle, nor the inclination to do the testing, so I won't argue the point any more than that. I actually bought an Antec True 380 when I bought the 5900XT, only to find out my Dell uses a proprietary PSU and the Antec will not work without cutting new holes in the case. Now I have a brand new 380 sitting here unused, waiting to start life somewhere. I keep debating on whether I should sell it or keep it for a future system. -- Mac Cool |
#10
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On 24 Jan 2005 02:49:44 GMT, Mac Cool wrote:
kony: Yes, they have always been better than (Compaq for example) but even so, consider that even with the peak rating given, it's still a lower peak than a $30 Sparkle 300W. That's only a guess but I don't have a Sparkle, nor the inclination to do the testing, so I won't argue the point any more than that. I actually bought an Antec True 380 when I bought the 5900XT, only to find out my Dell uses a proprietary PSU and the Antec will not work without cutting new holes in the case. Now I have a brand new 380 sitting here unused, waiting to start life somewhere. I keep debating on whether I should sell it or keep it for a future system. If it's your only spare you ought to keep it. That is, if you can't just switch quickly to use of another system for primary needs should that one go down. I don't know how soon you'd built that future system though, nor how much return you'd get on the initial price so only you know what's worth the time to do... |
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