I currently have a system that is going on 6 years old and has been running flawlessly all that time under Window XP Home. Here's a list of the pertinent hardware:
OCZ GameXStream OCZ600GXSSLI 600 W PS
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3L Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 CPU
Sapphire 100226L Radeon HD 3950 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card
2 GB (2x1gb) ddr2 Ram
I recently added a 1 TB HD and installed Windows 7 64 Bit.
It all works fairly well though it's no speed demon compared to newer systems, I'm hoping to get another year or 2 before a new build.
The problem or challenge is that the fan on the video card has started groaning and making some pretty bad loud noises. I took the card out and cleaned it but I don't think that helped much. I'm going to see if I can access the fan and lube it next. I am seeing multiple error reports in the error log that the video is shutting down due to overheating, though I don't notice the shutdowns.
Yesterday I called Sapphire Tech Support and was told that in order for me to use a modern video card my motherboard needs to have true PCIe-2.0 rather than supports 2.0. I have tried to determine if my MB meets this require and can't find that info anywhere.
I guess my question would be: Does anyone have a sugestion as to which as good or better card I could replace this video card with. Please let me know if you need more info.
OCZ GameXStream OCZ600GXSSLI 600 W PS
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3L Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 CPU
Sapphire 100226L Radeon HD 3950 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card
2 GB (2x1gb) ddr2 Ram
I recently added a 1 TB HD and installed Windows 7 64 Bit.
It all works fairly well though it's no speed demon compared to newer systems, I'm hoping to get another year or 2 before a new build.
The problem or challenge is that the fan on the video card has started groaning and making some pretty bad loud noises. I took the card out and cleaned it but I don't think that helped much. I'm going to see if I can access the fan and lube it next. I am seeing multiple error reports in the error log that the video is shutting down due to overheating, though I don't notice the shutdowns.
Yesterday I called Sapphire Tech Support and was told that in order for me to use a modern video card my motherboard needs to have true PCIe-2.0 rather than supports 2.0. I have tried to determine if my MB meets this require and can't find that info anywhere.
I guess my question would be: Does anyone have a sugestion as to which as good or better card I could replace this video card with. Please let me know if you need more info.
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