Topic: Video Card question

[Lepton]

Thinking of getting a new video card.  How can I be certain that my power supply will be able to handle a high end card like an ATI HD 2900XT or NVIDIA 8800GTX??  I did not build the system.  It's a Dell Dimension E521 (no commentaries on that, please) that currently has an ATI X1300 PRO.  OS is Vista Home Premium.  I have never had to buy a new video card so I have no idea how one goes about it.  Any advice appreciated.  Thanks.

[Pestalence_XC]

OK, for your video card, your power supply has to be either SLI rated or Crossfire rated OR have 2 to 4 connectors with 6 pins that can push 30 amps OR 4 to 8 lines with 4 pin connectors to use the 4 to 6 pin adapters that come with the cards..

the cards them selves need 2 6 pin connectors giving a constant 30 amps of power.. the card won't always use that much power, but when playing something like Crysis or Hellgate using full settings, your card will need that much power..

Also make sure your case has a fan on the side over the Video card to give extra air.. the 8800 GTX and AMD Radeon 2900XT need all the cooling that they can get, they are very hot cards...

Also make use you are using a Mid Tower ATX case, the standard Dell or Gateway case is not big enough for the cards..

Preferably your Power supply is pushing at least 600 watts of power, or rated for 600 watts.. running the card on max specs will pull 545 watts of power (with CPU amd Memory at full load as well)

Finally Radeon and NVidia also use Shared memory along with the onboard memory..

I am running a BFG Geforce 8800 GTX OC2 with 786 Mb gDDR3 vid memory, but it still shares another gigabyte of system memory if it needs it.. the GPU's are running at 626 Mhz each at 1620 Mhz FSB on the Vid card.. it came stock with maxed out specs for the NVidia.. also make sure to get the NVidia software for Geforce that allows you to adjust system settings (for overclocking) not just for overclocking your system, but to enable your Vid Card cooling can to ramp all the way up to 100% capacity.. you want to run it about 90%.. but out of box, the default is 60% output and the card will bet really hot after playing 1 hour at max settings.. I run my fan at 100% all the time, mainly because my card came with a lifetime warranty, so if it screws up.. I get another for free.

The vid card is that reason why I bought 4 Gb of Patriot Extreme 4-4-4-12 latency 800 Mhz FSB gaming memory so that I can run at full specifications.. plus the memory is overclockable to 1096 Mhz FSB at 2.2 v

If you intend to put the card into a Dell tower case, you will have to relocate your HDD into a 3 and 1/2" bay and remove the HDD bays because the card is fricking huge.. I'm not kidding. The cards are about 10 and 1/2" long. It also takes up 2 PCI slots (only plugs in to 1 x16 PCIe slot, but the card is so wide with it's built in cooler that is covers a second PCI slot)..

the Radeons are exactly the same way.. my neighbor bought one last week and I put it in his Gateway.. we had to move the HDD to the 3 and 1/2" bay and  remove the HDD cage in order to fit the card into his machine.. then he had to get another power supply as his was only 400 watts and did not have enough power to run the machine at full specs on the vid card..

power supplies are pretty cheap at NewEgg.com. you can get a 750 watt for about $80 or so, and should still fit into your Dell tower.. that is if your power supply is not capable of putting out 30 amps on 4 of the 4 pin connectors or 30 amps on 2 of the 6 pin connectors (4 x 8A on the 4 pin connectors.. 2 x 15A on the 6 pin connectors) and pushing a total of 600 watts..

Hope that this information helps.

[Lepton]

Thanks.  That's the information that I was looking for.  I think my brain just melted though.

[jharvey18]

Speaking of new computers, and Dells, I'm going to be in the market shortly for a new machine.  I'm not a widespread gamer (the only games I have enough time for and interest in are Civilization IV and SFC:OP), so I'm not in need a of a high end gaming machine.

What I am looking for are recommendations on the key specs to keep an eye on.  I bought an GeForce 6600 (I know, I know it's nothing compared to what's available today) about a year ago, but I had to shelve it because my Dell Dimension 4400 didn't have enough power to keep up.

So my two questions are:

1) How can I be sure that the new PC I buy will have enough power for my video card plus other peripherals (I have ~8 USB devices)?

2) What other attributes should I be paying close attention to?

[Pestalence_XC]

Speaking of new computers, and Dells, I'm going to be in the market shortly for a new machine. I'm not a widespread gamer (the only games I have enough time for and interest in are Civilization IV and SFC:OP), so I'm not in need a of a high end gaming machine.

What I am looking for are recommendations on the key specs to keep an eye on. I bought an GeForce 6600 (I know, I know it's nothing compared to what's available today) about a year ago, but I had to shelve it because my Dell Dimension 4400 didn't have enough power to keep up.

So my two questions are:

1) How can I be sure that the new PC I buy will have enough power for my video card plus other peripherals (I have ~8 USB devices)?

2) What other attributes should I be paying close attention to?

Before buying a machine.. compare the price of the machine to building one yourself..

Dell charges 3 times more for a system than what you can build one for..

I have a tower case computer I built that is almost 8 inches taller and about 6 inches longer than Dell cases... Comparing my specifications (and I do have the top end vid card which Dell doesn't offer).. Their machine custom built, and then modified to match my specifications.. it would cost $3800 + ... I built mine for $1675.. I saved about $2150.. and my machine performs awesomely and it looks cool too. Plus it will out perform any Dell on the market.

Specifications you should look for.. At least a Core 2 Duo processor running around 2.6 Ghz with a front side bus running at least 1068 Mhz ..
Dell wants to charge an extra $289 for a processor running at that speed.. My processor is a 2.66 GHz Core 2 Duo running stock at 1333 Mhz FSB, and the CPU was $198.99 from Newegg.com with a 3 year Intel warranty.

RAM .. memory that can run 4-4-4-12 latency and runs about 800 Mhz FSB .. I got 4 Gb at tiger Direct for $129.99 Lifetime warranty.. Dell wants over $250 for their memory that runs 5-5-5-16 at 800 Mhz and it is still not rated for gaming and only has 1 year warranty.

Your vid card is good, but for that card you need at least a 400 watt PSU .. most Dells built 1 to 2 years ago only have a 350 or 300 watt PSU.. which is underpowered for todays systems.. a good PSU is only about $60 to $90, if your Dell is custom built for gaming (higher end graphics card) then the PSU will be adequate. however if you get a system with Integrated graphics, you will need to upgrade the PSU yourself..

as for extra USB.. you just need to buy a USB PCI card.. they make them in 2, 4, 6 and 8 slot versions and should not cost more than $45 at newegg. Most newer systems come with 6 usb slots ..4 in back, 2 in front.. a memory card reader will give you 1 to 2 more slots for a total of 8.. however I think Dell and Gateway both have 4 in back and 2 in front on the memory card reader.. plus they have a USB 1.0 (1) and a firewire connector (1)...

USB power is only 12 volt shared.. which means that all usb slots have 12 volts so long as there are enough Amps with the 12 volts to power your devices.. most systems even 4 years ago can power up to 12 USB devices without a big draw of power.. the graphics card is what eats the power.. that is where you need to have some guts in your PSU.

Also, since you are running a 6600 vid card.. go for an XP machine.. the card is a DX 9 card and will not handle DX 10 .. If you build one make sure that the components are designed for XP and have XP drivers available online before you buy the component.. a lot of new devices coming out today are Vista and Server 2K8 components only.. and the majority of components are XP / Vista compatible..

[Dracho]

I'd also check newegg, pricewatch, and tigerdirect for the price of a "bare bones" system.  You'll spend a lot less than Dell.  You can also buy 3rd party extended warranties that will cover you as well as Dell would.

[jharvey18]

Great, thanks for the advice everyone.  I'll post back with testimonials if I have a particularly good or bad experience.

[Javora]

power supplies are pretty cheap at NewEgg.com. you can get a 750 watt for about $80 or so, and should still fit into your Dell tower.. that is if your power supply is not capable of putting out 30 amps on 4 of the 4 pin connectors or 30 amps on 2 of the 6 pin connectors (4 x 8A on the 4 pin connectors.. 2 x 15A on the 6 pin connectors) and pushing a total of 600 watts..

Hope that this information helps.

One thing to keep in mind about is that Dell uses non-standard motherboards, power supplies, and case switches.  So be careful about which power supply you buy for your Dell system.  Standard power supplies will not work in a Dell machine and will fry the motherboard and/or new power supply.  So if you do replace the power supply make sure that you find a power supply that is made for Dell systems.  Or in absence of that find a converter cable that runs in between the standard power supply and the Dell motherboard.  I'm not even sure they make converter cables anymore.

Dell just recently announced that they are finally getting away from these non-standard parts soon.  So if you plan on buying a new Dell system wait until this policy goes into effect.  This will avoid the hassles that most Dell owners (myself included) have dealt with over the years.

[Lepton]

I think with all these problems that have been pointed out with the Dell that I have, I may just get the highest end X1X00 series ATI card that I can find and call it good.  So much for DirectX 10.

[E_Look]

Speaking of new computers, and Dells, I'm going to be in the market shortly for a new machine. I'm not a widespread gamer (the only games I have enough time for and interest in are Civilization IV and SFC:OP), so I'm not in need a of a high end gaming machine.

What I am looking for are recommendations on the key specs to keep an eye on. I bought an GeForce 6600 (I know, I know it's nothing compared to what's available today) about a year ago, but I had to shelve it because my Dell Dimension 4400 didn't have enough power to keep up.

So my two questions are:

1) How can I be sure that the new PC I buy will have enough power for my video card plus other peripherals (I have ~8 USB devices)?

2) What other attributes should I be paying close attention to?

Before buying a machine.. compare the price of the machine to building one yourself..

Dell charges 3 times more for a system than what you can build one for..

I have a tower case computer I built that is almost 8 inches taller and about 6 inches longer than Dell cases... Comparing my specifications (and I do have the top end vid card which Dell doesn't offer).. Their machine custom built, and then modified to match my specifications.. it would cost $3800 + ... I built mine for $1675.. I saved about $2150.. and my machine performs awesomely and it looks cool too. Plus it will out perform any Dell on the market.

Specifications you should look for.. At least a Core 2 Duo processor running around 2.6 Ghz with a front side bus running at least 1068 Mhz ..
Dell wants to charge an extra $289 for a processor running at that speed.. My processor is a 2.66 GHz Core 2 Duo running stock at 1333 Mhz FSB, and the CPU was $198.99 from Newegg.com with a 3 year Intel warranty.

RAM .. memory that can run 4-4-4-12 latency and runs about 800 Mhz FSB .. I got 4 Gb at tiger Direct for $129.99 Lifetime warranty.. Dell wants over $250 for their memory that runs 5-5-5-16 at 800 Mhz and it is still not rated for gaming and only has 1 year warranty.

Your vid card is good, but for that card you need at least a 400 watt PSU .. most Dells built 1 to 2 years ago only have a 350 or 300 watt PSU.. which is underpowered for todays systems.. a good PSU is only about $60 to $90, if your Dell is custom built for gaming (higher end graphics card) then the PSU will be adequate. however if you get a system with Integrated graphics, you will need to upgrade the PSU yourself..

as for extra USB.. you just need to buy a USB PCI card.. they make them in 2, 4, 6 and 8 slot versions and should not cost more than $45 at newegg. Most newer systems come with 6 usb slots ..4 in back, 2 in front.. a memory card reader will give you 1 to 2 more slots for a total of 8.. however I think Dell and Gateway both have 4 in back and 2 in front on the memory card reader.. plus they have a USB 1.0 (1) and a firewire connector (1)...

USB power is only 12 volt shared.. which means that all usb slots have 12 volts so long as there are enough Amps with the 12 volts to power your devices.. most systems even 4 years ago can power up to 12 USB devices without a big draw of power.. the graphics card is what eats the power.. that is where you need to have some guts in your PSU.

Also, since you are running a 6600 vid card.. go for an XP machine.. the card is a DX 9 card and will not handle DX 10 .. If you build one make sure that the components are designed for XP and have XP drivers available online before you buy the component.. a lot of new devices coming out today are Vista and Server 2K8 components only.. and the majority of components are XP / Vista compatible..

Pesty, I haven't built a computer in a couple of years, but check component prices every so often.  It seems to me that at most, there is no gain, cost wise, building your won these days, or it might even cost you more... because you KNOW what you want, and it's good, but expensive.  To be cheaper than a manufactured system, one often has to "settle" for a bit less than one might have initially wanted, though the result might still be a superior computer to the prebuilt one.  Of course, as I said, I've been kind of out of it for a while, so my knowledge of prices may be totally off.

But still, the self-built computer has this advantage- it's NOT PROPRIETARY, so you can swap out parts if there is need to do so.  In fact, I have to replace a failing video card and except for the pain of buying one, it's a cinchy thing to do.  This is harder in a name-brand store bought system, which in my experience is usually based on proprietary designs, like onboard graphics and sound, nonstandard motherboard dimensions, and other weird things.  (And I've heard, but have no experience with, it's VERY hard with any Apple system.)

[Dracho]

And even if the price is fairly close, remember that your home built system will typically have higher performing components because you're not trying to achieve any profitability.... you are looking for performance vs. economy.

If you used the same word processor-rated components, you'd probably blow Dell's price away.

[Pestalence_XC]

The information I was giving was a comparison to the Dell XPS - 22 computer, then add in price adjustments in order to achieve the same performance and hardware that my machine is getting.

If the Dell was upgraded to the components that I have, the cost would be $3800.

that would be a savings of $2150 for what I built it for.

My components are mostly lifetime warranty compared to Dell's 1 year.

My memory is faster than anything Dell has to offer currently

My Vid Card is higher than anything Dell has to offer currently.

My CPU runs a faster stock FSB than what Dell offers currently.

My motherboard is designed to overclock where you can not do that to a Dell..

My system retains warranties even if I overclock it, so long as I don't exceed maximum voltage rating of the components.

So given I can overclock my system.. you can price compare any prebuilt computer that can match a CPU speed of 3.86 Ghz @ 1970 Mhz FSB, with 4 Gb Ram running at 4-4-4-12 latency with a memory FSB of 1096 Mhz... that is running a Geforece 8800 GTX factory overclocked to the maximum settings (626 Mhz on the GPUs)... add in a Hauppage HVR 1800 TV Tuner and a 1000 watt power supply..

No one makes a system like that... no one.. You can buy a rebuilt system that may get somewhat close for around $4000 or $5000

but building it myself by comparing products online and ordering them from the lowest bidder (after shipping).. My system only cost $1675

at least a $2100 savings

but people like buying Dells for some reason.. You can hardly upgrade a Dell or a Gateway.. and with Newer Vid Cards.. you can't fit them.. the GeForce 8800 GTX is 10 and 1/2 inches long and takes the space of 2 PCI slots..., plus you have to have a side cooling fan in the case especially for the Vid Card if you intend to game..

These are just things you can't do with a Dell unless you plan on taking out the HDD cage and relocating the HDD to a 3 and 1/2 bay and then drill holes into the side cover and mount a 120 MM cooling fan and replacing the PSU with one that is SLI rated (has the 6 pin connectors for the GeForce and AMD cards) and even then, will the case take the size of a non Dell PSU..

like I said, it is so much easier and cost efficient to build your own system than it is to buy one.
 

[Elvis]

Pesty, I haven't built a computer in a couple of years, but check component prices every so often.  It seems to me that at most, there is no gain, cost wise, building your won these days, or it might even cost you more... because you KNOW what you want, and it's good, but expensive.  To be cheaper than a manufactured system, one often has to "settle" for a bit less than one might have initially wanted, though the result might still be a superior computer to the prebuilt one.  Of course, as I said, I've been kind of out of it for a while, so my knowledge of prices may be totally off.

But still, the self-built computer has this advantage- it's NOT PROPRIETARY, so you can swap out parts if there is need to do so.  In fact, I have to replace a failing video card and except for the pain of buying one, it's a cinchy thing to do.  This is harder in a name-brand store bought system, which in my experience is usually based on proprietary designs, like onboard graphics and sound, nonstandard motherboard dimensions, and other weird things.  (And I've heard, but have no experience with, it's VERY hard with any Apple system.)

Really the only place you save going with a manufactured machine is at the low end, as long as you want to stay in the Windows universe.

[jharvey18]

I thought I would reply back and summarize what I ended up with and how my experience went, being a first-timer to build it yourself PCs.

I ended up buying everything through NewEgg, although I found that TigerDirect and a few other sites were very useful for comparison shopping and to get additional details on components.  My goal was a computer that has plenty of horsepower for running Office, a few imaging programs (e.g., PhotoShop, AutoCAD), and a couple of recent-ish games (Civilization IV, Lego Star Wars, SFC:OP - of course).  I also wanted a build that I could upgrade over the next 6-8 years so that as software advanced, I could incrementally upgrade.

I put the Dell vs. build argument to the test, and I ended up with slightly better components for a slightly (< $100) better price with NewEgg.  So, my anecdotal conclusion is that if you know what you're doing and you're willing to put the time in, you can save money and get better stuff if you build yourself.  I also did warranty comparison as suggest by Pestalence, and most of the components have solid warrantys on their own, especially if you  bother to register with the manufacturer.

With shipping, rebates, etc., I ended up paying about $775 for everything.  Note that because I was replacing, I didn't buy monitor, keyboard, printer, etc.

Putting this together was surprisingly easy.  I'm not someone who's interested in over-clocking, so I didn't worry myself with extra fans, heat sinks, etc.  Given this, the only nerve-wracking part was putting the CPU into the motherboard, but the Zero Insertion Force model works pretty well.  Everything else was pretty easy as long as you're familiar with the basics of how motherboards get attached to cases, and then how everything else gets attached to the motherboard.

In summary, given the audience of Dynaverse, I'd suggest that most people at least take a look at build it yourself if you're in the market for a new computer. 

Ok, here's the breakout:

    Rosewill R604TBLK-N 120mm Fan ATX Mid Tower Computer Case+450W Power Supply - Retail
    $54.99

    ABIT IX38 Quad GT LGA 775 Intel X38 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
    $219.99

    Intel Core 2 Duo E4500 Allendale 2.2GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80557E4500 - Retail
    $119.99

    G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK - Retail
    $149.99

    PNY VCG84R2SXPB GeForce 8400 GS 256MB 64-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Low Profile Video Card - Retail
    $44.99

    Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
    $109.99

    Sony NEC Optiarc 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black SATA Model AD-7190S - OEM
    $26.99

    SAMSUNG Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive Windows 98SE/ ME/ 2000/ XP - OEM
    $6.99

    Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2B 1 Pack - OEM
    $89.99

[Sirgod]

Outstanding, I'm glad that all worked out for you Jharvey.

Stephen

[Pestalence_XC]

I'm glad the advice I gave panned out.. Congrats on your system.. You should have a fun machine for quite a while.


To Others:

As I stated, you can build a superior machine to anything pre-built for less money when comparing apples to apples..

Warranties don't even compare.. 1 year on the total system pre-built (or pay extra for extended), or having 3 years (basically the minimum warranty) on the basic components already included.. the serious components (Motherboard and cpu excluded due to degradation from heat over the years) like RAM and Video Card and some PCI cards usually have a Lifetime warranty that the Pre-built manufacturers won't honor.. that alone makes it a value, not to mention the savings of not paying for the name brand on the pre-built box.