upgrading to ATI HD4850, Do I need to upgrade anything else?

bloodlust

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Apr 19, 2007
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Hi guys,
After hearing a lot of good reviews about the ATI HD 4850, I thought I would take the plunge and got me one on order. Now here are my current PC specs

ASUS P5k SE
Core 2 Duo e6750 @ 2.66ghz (stock)
2 Gb Apacer PC6400 DDR2 800 Ram
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA2 HDD 500gb
Gigabyte 8600gt 512mb ( to be replaced with new card )
LG 16x DVD-RAM
Auriga 400 watt PSU
Running Both Windows XP Sp2 and and windows vista ultimate 32bit in dual boot mode

Ok, so these probably aren't the best specs out there but is it enough to run my new HD4850, if not where do I need to upgrade without breaking the piggy bank too much. I will be ordering parts from New Zealand if I need to.

I'm only looking at playing my games at 1280 x 1024 res on an old school IBM CRT Monitor with the idea being that all the image quality in my games can be maxed out to an extent without too much of a hit on performance.

The games I'm playing at the moment are :

Crysis
Mass Effect
Medal of honour airborne
Need for Speed Pro Street
Supreme Commander Forged Alliance
Ghost Recon advanced warfighter 2

Any constructive advice are appreciated and thanks in advance.
 

Physicz

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Jun 5, 2008
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all you need a new PSU
a good PSU fomr say crucial or pc power and cooling. or antec.

anything higher then 500 will suffice with headroom.
 

SonDa5

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Jul 7, 2008
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I upgraded to Corsair TX650W and havn't had any problems.
The Corsair TX450W cost less and should power a HD4850 system at stock
power settings too.

If you want to OC or plan on getting a crossfire MB later on you should consider getting a more powerful PSU. I've read that a decent PSU like Corsair TX650 should be able to power a CF HD4850 configuration.


 

bloodlust

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Apr 19, 2007
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Thanks for the reply's. From what I see so far a new PSU is the way to go. What I can get at the moment is a Silverstone Decathlon DA650 650W ATX 12V Modular Power Supply. Im sure this will be enough. As for the hard drive I'll keep it as is for now until I save up enough.
Now I was thinking about doing a mild overclock when I get the new PSU maybe up to 3ghz, can someone tell me if my RAM is up for it?
Anyone have any experience overclocking with an Asus P5k SE ?