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Video Card Upgrade


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#1
Ben Garman

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Hi guys,

I play games very frequently on my desktop computer and they are almost always very new games such as the Half life 2 games and other FPS, but i also play MMPORPGS such as WoW. Essentially i want a video card which can play all of my games on the best graphics settings possible or at least a very high graphics setting so i get the most out of each game.

My current card came with my Dell when i bought it so i'm guessing isn't brilliant. It seems sufficient to play most games standard graphics but it struggles with HL2 ep1 and with ep2 coming out with yet more advanced graphics capabilities i am sure it will struggle yet more from now on. Should i upgrade, and if so, to what card? (Bearing in mind compatibility with my PC and a price cap of £100 i think...pref cheaper.)

Thanks in advance guys, wasn't sure whether this counted as gaming or upgrade so i posted it here...

System Spec:

Dell Desktop E520
MS XP Professional SP 2
nVidia GForce 7300 LE (is it worth upgrading this to 7600 GT?)
Intel Core Duo 1.86Ghz
2GB RAM
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#2
Titan8990

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You will definatly want to go with a Geforce 8 series card. It will support DX10 and soon all the games will be rolling out using DX10. Right now isn't a good time to buy a card though. ATI will be releasing there new series soon which in turn will reduce the costs of the Nvidia cards. The 8600 GT is only around $30-50 more than the 7600 GT and will be a much better investment in the long run.
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#3
james_8970

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As titan has already mentioned wait till after may 14th to even consider upgrading. On the 14th of may ATI's new line will be released, then benchmarks will be released. However I don't recommend buying a graphics card till the end of May or beginning of June as prices will be bloated since people will pay an extra 50$ for bragging rights. After this period prices will settle down to what we'll see for a while and you won't be fustrated for buying a card when you could have saved money waiting an extra week. Also I can see there being shortages on ATI's lower range for the first money since HP and Dell are rumoured to have taken the majority of them.
James
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#4
SuperSam

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The way it's going now, with ATI keep pushing the release date further and further away, they have lost a tremendous amount of sales to nVidia. I've been saying I'm going to buy an ATi R600 over the 8800s for a long time now, I think I'm just going to give in and get an 8800.
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#5
Ben Garman

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So what your effectively saying is, wait for the ATI range to be released, but still go with a GeForce which by the end of May should be lower price? And you recommend the 8600 GT or the 8800?

Thanks very much for your replies by the way,

Ben
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#6
james_8970

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No, actually it has been confirmed, ATI has confirmed that they are going to be launching on the 14th. Also to back up this claim, there have been numerous sites that have posted up the test page to sell the R600 and have a screen shot of this. The HD2900XT will be going to 540$CND and 485$ USD.

No, I don't recommend going either way till I see benchmarks. But the Nvidea cards have so far been a disappointment in the budget range. Even if ATI's cards don't beat them, Nvidia's prices will go down.

James
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#7
HPDV8315LOVER

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You forgot about making sure you have enough power on your power supply. Make sure you have at least a 400 watts power supply.
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#8
Titan8990

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I would actually reccommend more than 400 watts but 400 is the minimum. If you have a 400 watt PSU I wouldn't worry about it but if you do need to buy a new one I would go with 500-600 watts. Buying a quality PSU also matters a lot. I prefer Thermaltake and Antec PSUs.

Also check out this sticky: http://www.geekstogo...ng-t154926.html

Edited by Titan8990, 06 May 2007 - 02:57 PM.

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#9
Ben Garman

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Ok cool, but how do i know what wattage my PSU is? (presumably PSU is Power Supply Unit)
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#10
Titan8990

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Your assumption is correct. It should be written on the side of the unit along with the brand and model #.
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#11
AnthonyJ

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Ok cool, but how do i know what wattage my PSU is? (presumably PSU is Power Supply Unit)

since you have a dell ill guess its around a 250-375w
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#12
Ben Garman

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since you have a dell ill guess its around a 250-375w


which brings me back to the original question...which video card would be a worthwhile purchase for my pc?

cheers guys, sorry to labour this one, just wanna make sure i get it right :whistling:
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#13
james_8970

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That seems to low. I can't see there being anything below 400W. Wait till next monday, there is going to be a GPU that'll be released which has such low power requirements all it needs is the power from the PCI-E slot. If that thing overdoes it, anything will.
James
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#14
Ben Garman

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i checked out dell e520 tech specs in the dell site and it says: Chassis - 305 Watt DC Power Supply. Is that PSU?
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#15
james_8970

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305 :whistling:
Yes thats the PSU.
I'd stick to what I have already recommended, thing is you may have to wait another 2 weeks before we see it anywhere. I have never heard of a 305W PSU.
James
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