How bad would it be to upgrade only the GFX Card and not other parts?

[ionosphere]

I am using a desktop computer with the following spec:

MB: Asrock 939N (?) I couldn't recall the proper name.
CPU: 2.0 GHz Athlon64 X2
HD: RAID 0
RAM: 2GB RAM DDR1
GFX: ATI X1600 EAX
PS: Enermax 350W

This computer is 4 years old, uses only 120W at 100% peak and I am thinking of upgrading the GFX because the computer is having trouble with decent framerate. I am thinking of only changing the GFX, but other old components would be bottlenecks. I am wondering how bad will it get? For instance, if I replace X1600 with 5850, I won't get 100% performance. The question is how severe will the bottleneck be? Will I only get half the performance of 5850 or even worse? Does it even worth it to upgrade?

(To be honest, I wanna play Crysis on High setting)

 

[Helltech]

What resolution will you be playing at? Playing Crysis at high settings is kind of something you won't be doing unless you upgrade everything.

 

[ionosphere]

I only want 1280 x 1024 on High Setting.

 

[jyjjy]

Forget about the HD5850. It is entirely unsuited to your processor, power supply and monitor. An HD5670 would be a good choice. It will work on your power supply and while it will still be limited some by your processor in a lot of games it is still a much better match. It will allow you to play all but a few current games well with high settings at your resolution. For reference the HD5670 is approximately 4 times as powerful as your x1600.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102870

 

[ionosphere]

Actually, I noticed that it says "400 Watt or greater power supply recommended" in Newegg. But exactly, how much power does HD5670 require?

 

[Helltech]

It says 400W recommended, but you dont need that. They are just trying to save their asses in case something does go bad/get more money of you.

A card that only gets power from the motherboard will not take more then 75 wats of power, ever.

You are safe with that choice.

BTW, what the hell, Neweggs new layout is crap.

 

[jyjjy]

Yeah, Enermax is an alright brand and a 350w by them should easily handle the HD5670.
What new layout? Looks the same to me.

 

[Helltech]

Yeah, Enermax is an alright brand and a 350w by them should easily handle the HD5670.
What new layout? Looks the same to me.

What, yeah they had a new layout and they even gave me a questionair as to if I liked it or not... after saying I didn't and click all the "bad" options, it went back to normal.. Thats odd, carry on.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/NewProduct.aspx?Item=N82E16814102870&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-RSSDailyDeals-_-na-_-na&AID=10521304&PID=3463938&SID=

Had a different layout.. shrug.

 

[jyjjy]

lol
They haven't sprung that on me yet. I hate when sites that are already great at what they do decide to change their layout for no apparent reason.

 

[Helltech]

lol
They haven't sprung that on me yet. I hate when sites that are already great at what they do decide to change their layout for no apparent reason.

Yeah, it must be in testing or something now. If you click the link in my previous post it might show up for you.

 

[jyjjy]

Actually that link does have a new layout for me.
Apparently the difference is "NewProduct.aspx" vs "Product.aspx" in the URL. You can change it for any item and get the new layout.
I dunno if I like it either.

 

[Helltech]

Actually that link does have a new layout for me.
Apparently the difference is "NewProduct.aspx" vs "Product.aspx" in the URL. You can change it for any item and get the new layout.
I dunno if I like it either.

Yeah I realized it was a URL difference after looking at the link you sent earlier in the thread.

So it seems just closing out of Firefox and reopening "fixed" everything from defaulting to the new layout for me and had nothing to do with that survey thing I filled out.

Either way I hope that doesn't go mainstream, its poorly designed in my opinion.

 

[geofelt]

To get some idea of your options, run these two tests:

1) Run your games, but reduce the resolution and eye candy to a minimum. This will simulate what will happen if you upgrade to a stronger graphics card. If your FPS improves, it indicates that your cpu is capable of driving a stronger graphics card to higher levels of FPS.

2) Keeping your graphics resolution and settings the same, reduce your cpu power. Do this by removing the overclock, or by using windows power management to set a maximum cpu% of perhaps 70%. If your FPS drops significantly, it indicates that your current cpu is a limiting factor, and that a faster cpu would help.

There is no way you can run Crysis at high settings without a very strong graphics card.

 

[jyjjy]

1) Run your games, but reduce the resolution and eye candy to a minimum. This will simulate what will happen if you upgrade to a stronger graphics card. If your FPS improves, it indicates that your cpu is capable of driving a stronger graphics card to higher levels of FPS.

His CPU is obviously better than his card. There is no need to test such. However that doesn't mean his CPU is particularly good for current games. Also both of the tests you suggest are overly simplistic and could give radically different and misleading results based on what game is used for the testing.

 

[ionosphere]

Best answer selected by ionosphere.

 

[ionosphere]

unfortunately, the 5670 uses PCIe 2.1, which is incompatible to my ASRock 939NF4G-SATA2. BIOS will not post. Tried with newer motherboards, and they do work. In this case, I changed to GT240. 20% weaker, but it also does not require extra power connector just like the 5670.