Hey everyone! This is my first post here but I've been reading and searching for quite a bit now. My experience in computers is minimal at best.
I was given a Dell Optiplex 960 ‘mini tower’ a few months ago as a gift and have been enjoying some more modern games with it (my last PC was a Gateway P6860 FX laptop—which I still have). Some of the games that I play are FIFA 2012, Medieval Total War II, Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142 and I am DEFINITELY going to be buying the new Rome: Total War when it comes out next year.
The computer runs FIFA 12 just fine right now on very low settings, but my goals are to be able to play FIFA 13 and to be able to play the new Total War game, both on medium setting. While I know that the Optiplex is a decent system, I understand that it has limitations (as does my budget) and I’m not looking to make an amazing gaming rig out of it. I just want to be able to boost the graphics considerably.
In light of this, I’m coming to you all for some help with upgrading. I believe the Optiplex currently has:
GPU: ATI Radeon HD 3400
Memory: 4 GB DDR3 (not sure if it’s DDR3, assuming so).
Processor: E8400 @ 3.00 GHz
The PSU is rated at 305W
I’m looking to spend about $200 total.
I know that if I want to upgrade my GPU significantly, I will need the riser that will give me the second PCI slot ( link here: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=430-3344)
The bottom line is that I don’t want to spend $100 on a low profile card and get a marginal upgrade in my playability if I can spend $200 on the riser, PSU and a full video card and DRAMATICALLY increase my satisfaction. I wouldn’t mind spending $200 on a low profile card and a new PSU if the card could do what a midrange full-size card could.
Can an expensive low profile card match the performance of a full-size card?
Thank you all in advance for your help.
I was given a Dell Optiplex 960 ‘mini tower’ a few months ago as a gift and have been enjoying some more modern games with it (my last PC was a Gateway P6860 FX laptop—which I still have). Some of the games that I play are FIFA 2012, Medieval Total War II, Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142 and I am DEFINITELY going to be buying the new Rome: Total War when it comes out next year.
The computer runs FIFA 12 just fine right now on very low settings, but my goals are to be able to play FIFA 13 and to be able to play the new Total War game, both on medium setting. While I know that the Optiplex is a decent system, I understand that it has limitations (as does my budget) and I’m not looking to make an amazing gaming rig out of it. I just want to be able to boost the graphics considerably.
In light of this, I’m coming to you all for some help with upgrading. I believe the Optiplex currently has:
GPU: ATI Radeon HD 3400
Memory: 4 GB DDR3 (not sure if it’s DDR3, assuming so).
Processor: E8400 @ 3.00 GHz
The PSU is rated at 305W
I’m looking to spend about $200 total.
I know that if I want to upgrade my GPU significantly, I will need the riser that will give me the second PCI slot ( link here: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=430-3344)
The bottom line is that I don’t want to spend $100 on a low profile card and get a marginal upgrade in my playability if I can spend $200 on the riser, PSU and a full video card and DRAMATICALLY increase my satisfaction. I wouldn’t mind spending $200 on a low profile card and a new PSU if the card could do what a midrange full-size card could.
Can an expensive low profile card match the performance of a full-size card?
Thank you all in advance for your help.