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LF video card advice/suggestions
Hello.
I need an upgrade and I'm looking for advice on a couple of things. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
first off, here are my specs (if I leave out anything important, just let me know) -
INTEL Vista PC
Intel Core Quad CPU Q6600 2.4 GHz
4.00 GB
32-bit OS
Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT
PSU - ZU400w - I plan to get a new one according to what I need to run the card, so please just let me know what I need if you have any card suggestions.
I really can't afford much more than 250$ for the card.
one more thing that I'm not sure about.
my PC is a Cyberpower and I ordered it online 5 years ago. It is technically a 'custom'built' PC, but I did not change much from the default set-up (it was on a holiday deal).
So... my PC has 2 video cards (you can make fun of me for doing this. i don't mind). I was told afterwards that the main reason to have 2 is if you have a second monitor, or if I run 2 games at once. So my question is.. can I go down to just 1 video card?
Comments
Tell us More about your PSU. / How much is your budget if you need to factor in a PSU and a Card.
You just take one card out if you only want 1 card.
TSW - AoC - Aion - WOW - EVE - Fallen Earth - Co - Rift - || XNA C# Java Development
You can definitely use only one card. A Nvidia GTX760 GPU will fit perfectly into your $250 budget. I would recommend a Corsair TX650 PSU to go along with it. Corsair PSUs are among the best.
Now, to your bigger problem. Your CPU is very old and will definitely bottleneck your GPU by a long margin. But to change your CPU, you need to change your motherboard as well so that will add up a lot to your budget. Honestly, a GTX760 won't be anywhere near its full power on a Q6600. Even worse, your CPU supports only DDR2-1066 RAM which are outdated as hell which will bottleneck your GPU even more. The common norm for RAM today is DDR3-1600 which are available quite cheaply.
TL;DR - If you want a $250 GPU to work even remotely good on your computer then you need to toss it away entirely and start from scratch. Otherwise you should just buy a cheap GPU to make things work and save up so you toss your PC away in the future.
ZU 400 watt
and ty for the quick reply.
ty for reply.
The truth is usually the saddest. I figured this might be the case.
So after I made the thread, my roomate asked what I was doing. It led to him offering to give me a Radeon R7 260x that he just bought and later realized could not use in his PC. Any reason why it would not be compatible with my specs?
Since it would be kind of a waste to pour money into an outdated system, should I just go with the Raedon R7 260x?
I don't see a reason why it would not be compatible with your specs as long as you have a working PCI-e 2.0 slot which were fairly common in the era of 9400GT and Q6600. But you probably might have to get atleast a better PSU to provide some headroom. 400W is very tight and i would still recommend you to get that TX650. If you upgrade your whole system in the future, you can still use your PSU in the new system as well.
Awesome. Thanks!
I don't see a reason why it would not be compatible with your specs as long as you have a working PCI-e 2.0 slot which were fairly common in the era of 9400GT and Q6600. But you probably might have to get atleast a better PSU to provide some headroom. 400W is very tight and i would still recommend you to get that TX650. If you upgrade your whole system in the future, you can still use your PSU in the new system as well.
Also remember that is not a "certified" PSU, and 400w on demand is not guaranteed.
TSW - AoC - Aion - WOW - EVE - Fallen Earth - Co - Rift - || XNA C# Java Development
If he is giving you a "free" 260x then I would just put it in the PC and see how it does. You could always buy a PSU and put it in there and when you get a new PC use that PSU.
At this point if you want to PC game its probably time to start saving for a new PC.
When you get ready to buy or build post here and get replies before you buy. As buying a pc with two 9400s and a 400w PSU would not be recommended, ever.
What cyberpower sold you as a " gaming" pc is a very solid argument for building instead of buying a "special" deal from them. They love for people who are not sure about components to buy PCs like that, almost as much as a used car dealer loves to see an 18y/o girl walk onto the lot alone wanting to finance a car.
I agree.
I will add a note of caution: A GT9400 is not a very powerful card at all. 1 R7 260 will pull as much (or slightly more) power as 2 GT9400s. Even though the power is the same, it's being drawn differently (1 PCI slot, 1 PCIe connector, rather than 2 PCI slots) - it could be your older power supply won't handle it well. Best case, it works fine. There is the possibility that it sorta works and is glitchy (game artifacts, crashing, hard lockups, cold reboots), and there is a non-zero chance that it could actually damage that new video card.
So I would consider that PSU upgrade at the same time you drop in that video card. You don't need much - 400W is the bottom end of "enough" for a R7 260X, but it needs to be a good 400W model. I wouldn't go any higher than 600W (it starts to get expensive and there's absolutely no need for the additional wattage).
I also agree.
Queue funk music, dim lights.
Yes, that's the plan.
the box recommends 500W, so I'll just go with that.
Apevia X-Jupiter Jr.
The brand of the PSU is 'Topower'. Looks/sounds generic to me.
I plan to get a 500W PSU for the card. What is a recommended brand PSU?