Sign in with
Sign up | Sign in
Your question
Solved

Replacing an ancient ati x850 in an ancient machine

Tags:
  • Graphics Cards
  • Dell Studio Xps
  • ATI
  • Graphics
  • Product
Last response: in Graphics & Displays
Share
June 9, 2012 11:04:35 PM

I have an old dell xps gen 4 (from 2005) that until today was running fine for the uses it gets. The video card in it, an at the time impressive ATI x850, died. I'm looking for something that will replace it and not be too expensive. My son does play some not state of the art games on it, so I don't want something so stripped down that it wont work well. The monitor attached is a 1900x1200 monitor that came with the system. I'd think that just about anything on the market day would outperform an 7 year old card, wouldn't it? I don't want to spend more than $100 on a card for this box if I don't have to as it's not worth it. I was looking at the ATI 5450 and Nvidia 440. The slot it's going into is from 2005, and obviously isn't x16 like these cards are. What performance loss from the card specs would i expect to see because of that? And is there some other sort of card I should consider?

Thanks

More about : replacing ancient ati x850 ancient machine

Best solution

a c 99 U Graphics card
June 9, 2012 11:19:51 PM

When you open your case, it should roughly look like this



And it's a silver color case, correct?

Your computer supports a PCI-E x16 slot from researching your computer.

There are a couple of cards that doesn't use power cords. In fact the PCI-E x16 slot will be enough to supply the power.

HIS 7750 1GB PCI-E 3.0 ($109.99)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Zotac GT 440 2GB PCI-E 2.0 ($64.99)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Don't worry about PCI-E 3.0, 2.0, or 1.0. All PCI-E slots are backwards compatible. Also you won't max out the bandwidth or have lower performance because these cards won't max it out anyways, neither do some of today's mid range cards.

Make sure you have a x16 slot (which you already do)



Overall, I'd suggest a 7750 since it has lower power consumption than the 6670. But if price is a concern then the GT 440 is a good value too.
Share
Related resources
a c 1430 U Graphics card
June 9, 2012 11:22:27 PM

Except for the known no video issue in ver1.x slot with a ver2.1 card (pretty much any AMD/ATI after HD5xxx series) unless manufacturer of the motherboard came with a BIOS update.
m
0
l
a c 99 U Graphics card
June 9, 2012 11:25:28 PM

+1^

I forgot to mention about 2.1 cards not working 1.0 slots issue.
m
0
l
a c 173 U Graphics card
June 9, 2012 11:29:34 PM

If all else go for a cheap Radeon 4k series or a cheap Geforce 8800/9800gt as they are a sure thing to work with older boards while still being able to manage modern games on reduced settings. However they do run hot and draw plenty of power.
m
0
l
June 10, 2012 4:53:05 AM

Best answer selected by icebox.
m
0
l
June 10, 2012 4:54:19 AM

thanks for all the help guys. I'm going to get a 7750. not too powerful, but looks like it'll get the job done for the next couple of years until this box gets replaced.
m
0
l
a b U Graphics card
June 10, 2012 5:31:42 AM

What is the CPU, the 7750 could be bottlenecked by the CPU.
m
0
l
June 10, 2012 7:33:46 AM

It's a Pentium 4 3.2 ghz. This was one of the best at the time.
m
0
l
June 10, 2012 2:55:13 PM

Pyree said:
You will have major bottleneck. Probably something like a 4670, 5570, 6570 PCIe 2.0 would be a better choice.

When you say bottleneck do you mean loads of artifacts or the screen freezes, or just that its going to run slower than advertised?
m
0
l
a c 1430 U Graphics card
June 10, 2012 3:10:36 PM

Slower than capable of since the CPU can not keep up with it.
m
0
l
a b U Graphics card
June 11, 2012 12:45:22 AM

^+1

So you will be wasting money buying a gpu any faster than 3850/4670 level of performance e.g. 7750 is overkill.
m
0
l
June 11, 2012 3:15:43 AM

Yeah I'm not planning on wasting money on a 7700 series card anymore. I'll probably grab a 5500 series card now. Learned my forum lesson about jumping on best answer too quickly. Live and learn. Thanks all.
m
0
l
a b U Graphics card
June 11, 2012 3:20:21 AM

No problem. You are welcome.
m
0
l
!