Right now I'm running two 7950 GT in SLI mode but I REALLY need to take out both cards (because Power Supply is only 500 watts and my computer has a heating issue) and replace it with a single card without losing performance. I've read that the 8800 GT OC is a great card, but I don't want to purchase it only to find my performace stays the same, or whose yet, I lose performance. What about an 8800 GTS? My budge is around $400. Any Ideas would be very much appreciated! By the way... I REALLY would like to stay with NVIDIA cards.

Also, do ALL PCI-E slots, on motherboards, handle PCI-Express 2.0 x16 the same way (in reference to performance) the new motherboards do?

Thanks so VERY much!!!

Andrew

I would recommend just upgrading your PSU. That setup should be pretty good. You will notice an increase but not HUGE. That's my vote.

The 8800GTS is a great card. I went from an OCed x1900xtx and notice a good performance increase. What kind of PSU do you have?

PSU = Power Supply Unit? Just 500 Watts.

yes, he ment what make psu

Ah okies... it's simply the factory Dell PSU that came with my box I purchased about 1.5 years ago. Really all I know is it's 500 watts.

Really, the nuts and bolts of what I'm needing to know is if I take about my two 7950 cards (running in SLI mode) what single card should I be looking at to give me better performance. I'd like to spend no more than $300 or so.

Thanks again so much!

Andrew

A Dell stock PSU is probably iffy even running any new graphics card. I would almost evaluate your current PSU and get a Brand name PSU that can handle the 2 7950's.

Look at the PSU you have, does it give any specs like how many Amps it supports on the 12volt rails.

Cheapest solution is to buy a good manufacturer (Seasonic/Antec/PC Power & Cooling) PSU at 650W-750W. This will solve your current problem. You will then have room later on to upgrade your card/cards.

FYI (1) 8800GTS G92 > (1) 8800GT > (2) 7950GTs.

So you can simply drop like $150 on a new, good 750W PSU. Probably get slightly better performance just from having a good stable PSU.

You can spend your remaining $250 on an 8800GTS and see a nice increase in performance. Later on you may consider picking up another 8800GTS and going SLI with them for a little more boost. Of course I almost never encourage SLI, personally I think its a waste unless you're building a high end money eating computer.

That's a good question... all I can tell you, since I'm not sitting in front of my computer (i'm at work) is that I've been using the 7950's (in SLI mode) for around 10 months now, and it has been running fine (just hot and loud). I'm just now starting to get concerned about how much heat, and sound, is being generated. I've added a few extra fans inside, but those are really loud... so I figured that if I could cut my video cards down to 1, without losing (and hopefully gaining) performance, that would be a great place to start.

I plan on salvaging this computer, for parts, in a year or so anyway... so it's not like it has to last me forever.

What do y'all think?

Thanks so much!

Andrew

If you get a better PSU it will be more efficient and create less heat as it puts less stress on the PSU. That stock unit is probably SCREAMING right now. Also those cards might be working hard because of the lack of power and giving off some heat. You will be suprised with the number of issues you can fix by going from a crap PSU to a good one.

What does the rest of your system look like? spec wise?

The thermaltake Toughpower PSU's are a good PSU to buy too they have them up to 1000W. I'm sure one 8800GT is better than 2 7950's any day.to vut down on noice try to find a GPU that used heat pipes or liquid cooled built in

Dont forget to clean your rig. Clean out all your dustbunnys, and get a can of compressed air and blow out your video cards, thru the cooling fins

Hi Jay-

Here are the other components:

XP Home SP 2
Pentium (R) D CPU 3.20 GHZ (My computer REALLY didn't like it when I upgraded to a duo-core processor) - uprade
two 7950 GT video cards (running in SLI mode) - upgrade
2 Gig RAM - stock
80 Gig 10000 RPM Hard Drive- stock
DVD Drive - stock
CD-RW Drive - stock
SyncMaster 226CW (22 inch) - upgrade
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 - stock
2 extra internal cooling fans - upgrade

This help ya?

Thanks much!

Andrew

OK, heres what I have http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine Go there, see for yourself if I did everything right, which I believe I did. With a GOOD psu, youre cutting it close. With what you have, youre taking chances. If you can, get a new psu. Take your time to make sure your DELL will fit it tho. This would be better addressed in the psu section. As for the cards, I only see maybe a 25 to 30% increase with a GTS and maybe 20% with a GT. What Id do? Id check the power requirements for these 2 cards (GTS and GT) and see how they stack up against your current cards power usage. If its alot less, then maybe you CAN get by with buying just the card. The GTS is just a hair slower than the GTX, so heres somewhat of a comparison http://www23.tomshardware.com/grap [...] &chart=278

That is really good stuff Jay!!! Thanks for taking the time to write that out... I'm looking it over now as we speak! Just to make sure, you are saying the a single GTS should might be around a 25-30% increase over my exsting 7950s running in SLI? And likewise for the GT, about only a 20%?

Thank you so very much!

Andrew
aka, learning a lot today!!!

I still think you won't see a HUGE difference going to a single 8800GTS. You will see a difference but not HUGE. If you want you can go that route, it would most likely work, but I would rather get a better PSU and keep your setup until the next gen cards come out.

PS. what happened that your pc didne like a core2? I know some of the older 775 mobo's only accept the 800MHZ core2's which one did you try? what mobo is in that thing?

Thanks so much for your response Jay... when I put the Core 2 into my Dell, it sounded like a 747 taking off . I learned to kind of live with the extra noise (I think from all the fans kicking in)... but I'm just starting to get concerned about the longevity of letting it go with that.

I hear you about the next Gen cards and I may try to make it another month or two to see what NVIDIA has instore for us.


I've learned a lot today... so thank you to everyone who took the time to help educate me... I REALLY appreciate it!!!

Have a great day!!!

Andrew

Here's my question...since you have SLI'd 7950GT cards, you're using an XPS system, yes? Does anyone know if Dell uses their own proprietary setups on the older XPS models? If they do, you won't be able to get a regular power supply, and you'll have to look specifically for Dell upgrade models from a place like PC Power and Cooling.

@OP: Like every one else said get a BETTER PSU. I would recomend a Corsair or PP&C.
See:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forum [...] p?t=108088
for PSU tire listing.

I expect his PSU to be standard..the last few dells i have looked at from about a two years ago use standard PSU's.
I also agree on the PSU idea...you might even see a performance increase just changing it to a new one.
You might want to give Dell a call on that PSU proprietary issue, though, just to be safe.

But definitely, you're stretching your luck with any 500w PSU on a system like that, let alone one made by dell.

I think you'll find that an 8800gt will serve you well, witha good amount of a performance increase.

I recently put my 7950Gt into my friends computer so he could SLI it with his 7950GT and it upped his 3dmark06 score from around 5000 to 8500. He and I both have a e4300 Oc'd to around 2.7Ghz. My scores in 3dMark06 with my 7950GT were slightly higher at 5200. Anyways to make a long story short I just got the Pallit 8800GT and my 3dMark06 score went to 11500 which to me is a pretty significant improvement. I know this is synthetic, but I tested out some games as well(Oblivion and I would say I am still getting 3x the frame rates vs the 2x that I observed with Oblivion going the 7950Gt SLI route). Not to mention the fact that my 8800Gt runs 20C cooler then my 7950GT used to. I guess I am trying to say that I am quite happy with the performance gains of the 8800GT over SLI'd 7950Gts.

This is a bad time to buy any GPU. We are waiting for the new ATI and the rest of the 9 series. I think alot of us are hoping Nvidia will pull out a dx10.1 model and supprise us.