Graphics watt questions....

[donald45610703]

Alright so...... I'm gonna try and summarize my situation to the best of my ability, so bear with me.

About a year and a half ago my dad bought a new dell inspiron computer.....its a pretty good pc......so i'm a hug sims 3 player.....i have just about everyone of them. I was originally using the integrated graphics cards that came on the system.....it was AWESOME! the game ran super super fast, then it said it needed an update, so i updated it and after that, my game was outrageously slow, and lagged so much that i couldnt play it any longer. I could play it, i just don't have patience to deal with something that lags that much.

So me and my dad took a trip up to bestbuy....explained our situation to them, they of course told us we needed an actual graphics card, so they showed us some. They asked what W our computer was, i didn't even know what this meant......but luckily i had printed a sheet of all our computers tech specs....if i can still remember my computer is a 300W. Could someone explain what W means??? so after he looked at our computers info he said that a 400W graphics card wouldn't work on a 300W machine....which most of the really good graphics cards were 400W, so we bougt the GeForce GT 520.....he explained that this would work.

I was completely confused, the people up at my bestbuy told me that if we bought a 400W graphic card our machine would heat up, or blacken out. Shut down and do all this crap, because our computer was 300W and 300W and 400W weren't compatable.....

Well the graphics card we bought is ok....the graphics are good but, the game doesn't run the best. If you have ever played sims you know that, you need to fast forward in the game, well when i try and fast forward it lags, freezes for a second or two. It doesn't run fast.....and lately (within the past month) it has been running super slow! I have always had the thing get updates......so before anyone asks it is 100% updated.

Christmas is approaching and i would like to ask for a graphics card or go and buy one with my Christmas money.....but i have no idea what i'm doing.....WOuld yall please help me? i really want an amazing card to run sims.

 

[jaguarskx]

W = Watts = voltage * amps = 12v * however many amps the graphic card draws.

The best card for a 300w PSU (power supply) is the Radeon HD 7750. You should be able to fine one on sale for $90 at Newegg.com. Otherwise it will be about $100 - $105.

Installing a graphic card that draws more power than the PSU can deliver under the best scenario would cause the PC to freeze or reboot. In a not so good scenario you blow your PSU. In a worse scenario the blown PSU causes a power surge that destroys another component of your PC. The absolute worse scenario is the power surge is so great that every single component in your PC is destroyed.

 

[donald45610703]

WOW yeah we don't want any of that happening, or even take a chance of that happening, my dad would kill me....now this Radeon Hd 7750 is a 300W graphics card? Will it run the sims 3 Really good, no lag, above moderate graphics? I just want to know before i purchase or ask for it....

if its not a 300w graphics card, cause i went on newegg and looked and it said minimum of 400w......i need a great card that is 300w that will run amazing on my system......