New to upgrading, Need card for my 250W supply....

doodledog

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Jul 16, 2007
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I am sooooo new to any upgrading. I searched your threads and am still a bit overwhelmed at the responses. I have an HP Pavilion a6157c desktop .

SPECS:
Windows home premium
250W power supply
2GB memory
320HArd drive
Intel integrated accelerator 950 "card" (chip onboard)
Intel E4400, 2.0GHz processor.

I want o upgrade to a dedicated card. My needs are gaming, but no high-end games like Oblivion. Mostly your average low-end to mid-end games. I love HD videos, and need a card to do that well too.

What are my options w/ my low power supply? Can I get away with NOT upgrading the power????
Just tell me ANY cards that'll work, w/o regards to price at this point.
 
Hmmm, that's a PCI Express. A 7600GT doesn't need an auxilliary power connector, but I'm still not sure that PSU has enough juice for it. I dug around, and that PSU may only have 13A on its +12V rail.
 

uberman

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Apr 29, 2007
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250watts doesn't give you much wiggle room.I say 500 watt PSU from antec,thermaltake,enermax or the like.60 to 100$ price range probably.The rest of your specs are decent so any 1950 series ATI card,esp PRO or XT(149$ after mir at newegg)is the best price/perfomance.I imagine some will recommend 2600 ATI card or 8600 Nvidia card but to be honest I haven't seen too much to impress me when a DX9 card can whip them handily for less money.8800 series would be my other choice.
 

foz

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Feb 10, 2005
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17-153-037-07.jpg
 

foz

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I think his system probably uses one of those short mATX PSUs and a better replacement would be hard to find. If a regular PSU would fit then yes, that would be a better option.