Looking for a new graphics card

[Mark]

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.

 

[John]

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.

 

[Mac Cool]

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.

 

[kony]

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.

 

[kony]

Mark:


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.

 

[DaveW]

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

 

[Mac Cool]

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/video/display/ati-vs-nv-power.html

 

[kony]

kony:

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.

Probably this article:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/ati-vs-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.

 

[Mac Cool]

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.

 

[kony]

kony:


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...

 

[kony]

The Sparkle 300W (FSP300-60ATV ?) has been spec'd to have a
peak somewhere in the neighboorhood of 390W, IIRC. I don't
now remember where I saw that though.

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.

By the above I meant, even if it won't fit properly in the
case, a system running with a PSU half-out of case beats a
system not running at all, should the original PSU ever
fail.

 

[Mac Cool]

kony:

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 used to have computers in every room. The whole house networked, but
over the last couple of years I've been selling off everything and I've
stopped building systems for people and myself. My system broke and I sold
it and bought a Dell. I was working 80 hours/wk and I didn't have time
anymore to fuss with computers. I quit that job and will be starting a new
job soon. My new boss told me that if I have to work over 45 hrs/wk, then
I need to hire more people I have been itching to build something
again but I didn't have any money!!

I was going to build an El Cheapo system for my upcoming MAME cab, but I
might just put the Dell in it and build a new uber system and scratch the
itch.