Edited by Alzeimer, 11 January 2014 - 03:22 PM.
Replacing primary HDD, so OS as well
Best Answer Alzeimer , 05 January 2014 - 08:05 PM
My questions: Can I just whack in any old sata HDD, or would it have to be the exact same one as it was shipped with? As far as I can gather I can use any one which fits the PC's power and sock... Go to the full post »
#16
Posted 11 January 2014 - 03:21 PM
#17
Posted 12 January 2014 - 03:36 PM
Alas, it's not quite the raging beast that I remembered it to have been, but what can I expect from a system that's a decade old...
It's going to be really useful to have this extra PC in any case, so thanks a lot for helping me out!
I've got two last ways that I can think of to increase graphics performance, that I can realistically achieve at this time (money), and they are:-
1. Installing the latest GPU that the Dell XPS Gen 4 system supports;
The PSU has one single 6-pin connector for the GPU, but there's some spare HDD 15-pin power cables in there, which I could use an adapter for, if I had to use a 2x6 (or different, I guess) pin GPU. The PCI Express slot goes at 250MB/s, so no point getting a card faster than that. The part I need help with is narrowing down which cards to choose from; there are so many. But there's probably a single best choice, and as it would be an older card I doubt it would be that expensive.
2. Installing more RAM to my iMac (21.5, late 2009);
This iMac uses the NVIDIA GeForce 9400 256 MB, which I believe shares it's memory with the system memory. There's 4GB of RAM installed. Do you think adding more RAM would notably increase graphics performance?
It may be that I'm out of options for increasing graphics performance for the time being, please let me know what you think!
#18
Posted 13 January 2014 - 10:54 AM
For this I would need an additional 9-pin power connector, but I don't know whether to use a double or a single power adapter:
or
Please let me know what you think of the GPU choice
#19
Posted 13 January 2014 - 01:42 PM
A minimum 400W or greater system power supply (with a minimum 12V current rating of 26A)
Intel Pentium 4, AMD Athlon XP class processor or higher
50MB of available hard disk space
512MB system memory (2GB recommended)
Microsoft Windows Vista or Windows XP Operating System (32-bit or 64-bit)
These are the requirements for the GeForce 9800 GT.
If your Power supply meets the requirements you should be ok
#20
Posted 14 January 2014 - 08:36 AM
After a bit of research I found out that the GeForce 8800 GT is almost identical to the 9800 GT, so that expands the options a bit. I'm watching a few cards on ebay, I'll update on how the installation goes... or if I run into any problems!
#21
Posted 14 January 2014 - 10:06 AM
One rail is for your CPU and the other is for the rest of your peripherals (video cards, hard drives, optical drives ect) so if you look at the 9800gt requirements it is 26a so even if I am no expert at Power supply electric I think that your Power Supply would work too hard to run your video card.
Either find a different card with a lower consumption rating or change your Power Supply.
Also one more thing to consider is the space in your case since the 9800 and 8800 are big cards that require space and Dell setups are usually compact so not much room.
So consider the GeForce GT 220 good card for your system, smaller in size, no pci-express 6 pin connectors and only requires 18a (at full load) so you should be good.
#22
Posted 14 January 2014 - 05:55 PM
The space is not an issue here- I could fit a 10.5 inch GPU in the case with minor mods to HDD bay. With your card suggestion you include that there is no PCIe 6 pin connector; sorry in case there was confusion earlier, I was looking at 15 pin to 6 pin adapters in case I got a new GPU with two PCIe connectors. I already have one 6 pin PCIe GPU connector.
After a bit of research, I agree that the 9800GT would likely not even run at all, with my PSU, for lack of Amps. Such a nice card too. Well that's a shame.
I'm going to go home and re-think my life; whether I should hunt down a more powerful version of these Dell XPS PSUs; or if I should buy a dedicated add-in PSU just for the 9800 GT GPU.
However, I have also considered the GeForce GT 220. It's certainly better than the Radeon x850xt I currently have, according to benchmarks. Hmmmm. The easiest option would be to just find one of those.
Ok.
Bearing in mind that the rail with the GPU is limited to 17A, but that I have 10.5 inches of space and a single 6 pin connector, is the GeForce GT 220 likely to be one of the highest performance cards that I can run with?
Thanks for your advice man
EDIT: I've included a pic; the red card being held down by the green support is the GPU. That black and white cable labeled P5 is it's 6 pin connector.
Edited by Locla, 15 January 2014 - 09:03 AM.
#23
Posted 16 January 2014 - 08:18 AM
Radeon HD 6670 - 17A and a 400W PSU minimum
Radeon X1650 Pro – 18A and a 350W PSU minimum
GeForce GT 610 - 16A and a 300W PSU minimum
GeForce GT 520 - 18A and a 300W PSU minimum
GeForce GT 240 - 18A and a 300W PSU minimum
GeForce GT 220 - 18A and a 300W PSU minimum
GeForce 8400 GS - 18A and a 350W PSU minimum
to compare with your previous choices
GeForce 9800 GX2 - 35A and a 550W PSU minimum
GeForce 9800 GTX+ - 32A and a 500W PSU minimum
GeForce 9800 GTX - 25-30A and a 450W PSU minimum
GeForce 8800 Ultra - 35A and a 500W PSU minimum
GeForce 8800 GTX – 30A and a 450W PSU minimum
GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB - 28A and a 500W PSU minimum
GeForce 8800 GTS 320/640MB – 26A and a 400W PSU minimum
GeForce 8800 GT - 26A and a 450W PSU minimum
here is a link to video cars power requirements if you want to look at it
http://forum-en.msi....-graphics-cards
Hope that helps
#24
Posted 16 January 2014 - 12:25 PM
I'm watching a couple on ebay right now.
I should have included a list of my specs before now, sorry about that. Here they are:
Intel 2004 pentium 4, SL7Z4 3.73GHz/2M/1066/04B,
Intel chipset 925XE
4GB RAM Infineon PC2-4200 DDR2-533MHz,
1T WD HDD,
ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition,
Philips DVD+/-RW ,
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS,
NPS 460BB PSU (460W)
Many thanks for card suggestion, will update when installed
#25
Posted 25 January 2014 - 07:14 AM
This thread has got a bit off-topic so I'm going to create a new one for further upgrades.
Thanks for your help!
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