Best Card for my System

[v05aau1099]

I have a Dual Core 4gig AMD 64 Athlon 2 Computer. Dell Inspirion 531. Running Windows 7 64bit Home Premium

I have 2 questions.

#1 Currently have a 300 Watt Power Supply. What is the best PCI-E 2.0 x16 Video card I can buy for the current setup.

#2 If I was the upgrade the PS (Power Supply), what would be the max PS my computer can support and the best video card to match the new PS.

 

[sonexpc]

Answer #1 Radeon 6670 will best to fit that range of power supply.... even it say require 400W but for dell's 300W should be OK...

Answer #2 Dependes on how much you wan to spend....
if ~$200 you can get a 6850 Video with 550W- 600W PS.....or
if ~$300 you can get a 560TI with 600W PS

 

[catatafish]

I'm going to have to disagree.

Given that 1) Dell uses the cheapest components on the face of the earth and 2) a PSU degrades over time; I am willing to bet that if you put a card in there that recommends 400w, your PC will probably not boot.

It may work, it may not. Do you really want to go buy a card based on your sub-par PSU, install it, then find out it won't boot? Now you're stuck with a card you didn't really want, you may have to buy another PSU anyway, in which case you could have gotten a better GPU to begin with.

My first question is: What is your budget?

 

[sonexpc]

Is I admit dell you cheap component in the low end series.... But when they say teh power supply have 300W they really have 300W.... not like some OEM PS they label 500W but even 250 is not reach..... and for DELL most they have on site warranty... they understand how high % the power supply will cause fail....so I can only say this is a GOOD 300W power supply.... besides mostly I see Dell's Problem is MB and HD... not much on PS...

By the way if you want to stay with plan #1... then try first .. if not work the worst case is buy a 400W PS..

 

[azeem40]

I'm going to have to disagree.

Given that 1) Dell uses the cheapest components on the face of the earth and 2) a PSU degrades over time; I am willing to bet that if you put a card in there that recommends 400w, your PC will probably not boot.

It may work, it may not. Do you really want to go buy a card based on your sub-par PSU, install it, then find out it won't boot? Now you're stuck with a card you didn't really want, you may have to buy another PSU anyway, in which case you could have gotten a better GPU to begin with.

My first question is: What is your budget?

Dell definitely does NOT use cheap parts for their monitors. That is a fact.

 

[catatafish]

Dell definitely does NOT use cheap parts for their monitors. That is a fact.

Agreed!

I'm just sayin.....I bet he doesn't crack open his PC and find a Corsair Enthusiast series in there.

I had a Gateway once that I bought from Best Buy. It was a pertty slick one and even came with an upgraded Nvidia onboard graphics it advertised. I think it had a 300 or so watt PSU in it. 2 years later I was so excited running home with my Nvidia 9600GT and installed it, not being able to wait to get to my raid and fight Vaj. Only to find out, my PC wouldn't even boot with that card/PSU combination.

Nvidia recommends a 400w PSU for that card (the 9600gt). It didn't work on my Gateway.

So call me crazy, but I follow manufacturers recommendations whenever possible.

 

[sonexpc]

Gateway is way cheaper than Dell.... they don't have much onsite warranty... so they don't care... once the product is sold... that's it... and I really see high power supply fail in gateway than all other brand....

 

[catatafish]

...

 

[v05aau1099]

Budget is roughly $500.00. The PS question was for this reason. This is my 2nd Athlon 2 system. First one had like 250w PS and I threw in a 600 and blew the board. You call dell all they tell you is that replacing the PS will void warranty and don't specify what the max PS you can put in system.

What I'm looking to do is Play the new Star Wars MMO. But I was thinking if I get a Video Card capable of playing Final Fantasy 14 (Which I'm not going to play it sucks) then I should be set pretty good graphics wise. FFXIV video requirements are a lot higher than STar Wars which is why I'm basing of it. Its not to far of a reach.

I just don't want to blow another system board lol.

 

[catatafish]

You can max out SWTOR with $300. $220 for a very nice GPU and $60 for a quality 500W PSU (Antec, Corsair, Seasonic.....).

Edit:
Also, you probably didn't fry your mobo from putting in a more power PSU, but we're all really just guessing here without knowing more about your system specs.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/279228-31-power-supply-powerful
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/181