ATI HD 5500 Upgrade time. Please help me choose?

[erinlove]

I want to start by thanking you for reading this, it is cool that you desire to help others for no reason. Keep in mind I don't know what I am doing so I apologize for rambling and/or irrelevant information... like this lol.

Current card purchase details: Bought a few years ago for $70 I think.

USAGE: Gaming (Sims 3 with lots of custom content, Skyrim, RPG's like Dragon Age 2, indie, old, realistic simulation games but no shooters.), Light video editing (Camtasia, I don't expect miracles), Shows and movies (anything can run those fine).

GPU AND PSU: ATI Radeon HD 5570. 550w CoolerMaster.

CPU and other crap (pasted from SIW, not sure if it is all relevant.): Asus P7P55D, Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU 760 @ 2.80GHz, Max CPU Speed 3800 MHz, Installed Memory 8192 MBytes, Available Memory 8191 MBytes. Maximum Memory Module Size 2048 MBytes.

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: Probably Canada Computers, so I may need 2 choices of card to ensure they have the right one. Other places maybe but consider that I can only use PayPal and online banking because I have no credit card and I am Canadian.

PARTS PREFERENCES: Which ever fixes my problems.

OVERCLOCKING: Yes / No / Maybe? Do I need it?
SLI OR CROSSFIRE: No I use a single monitor.

MONITOR RESOLUTION: High and many choices to support all games and make them look nice. Or is that up to my monitor? My monitor's max is 1920x1080. I only have 4 choices for some reason. Probably a monitor thing, I got the cheapest 23" one with a good panel in it.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: I CAN replace my PSU if necessary. My budget is up to $150 (maybe early 200's if there is magic card for my specific needs).

My problem: Sims 3 takes forever to load with my custom content. It also freezes for a few seconds fairly often.. Skyrim played fine on ultra when it first came out but now it chugs like butt if I don't turn everything to medium and low. Dragon Age 2 has frame rate problems until I turn things down to near craptastic levels.
I am not a hardcore gamer but what I DO play I want and improvement.
I researched cards for 3 hours and what I can gather is stats don't mean much and I learned basically nothing.

Ones I considered and compared with no luck:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 2GB GDDR5
- 1071 MHz Clock, 5000 MHz Memory
- PCI-Express 3.0, Dual-link DVI, D-SUB, HDMI
and
Gigabyte (GV-R777OC-1GD REV2.0) AMD Radeon HD 7770 1GB GDDR5
- 1050 MHz Clock, 4500 MHz Memory
- PCI Express 3.0, Mini Display Port, DVI, HDMI

Can my problems even be fixed on my budget? Let me know that too? Thanks again.

 

[AirSKiller]

Welcome to the forum I read it all and you posted very relevant information, very well organised post I might say!
So, to the point xD Both cards you selected are pretty good. Personally I would buy a HD 7770 but the 2 GB version if you are able to find it. If you don't, go with the GTX 650.
Remember, the GTX 650 doesn't support SLI, what does this mean? Even if you have another PCI-E slot you can't buy a second GTX 650 and run both together (which you can with the HD 7770).
Anything else, please ask! Oh, by the way, overclocking is when you take your component and make it work faster than the factory preset forcing it by some kind of program or directly from the BIOS (as I prefer doing). You don't need to do it, it just fun and gives you a little performance boost (temps rise a bit and power consumption too)

 

[erinlove]

Welcome to the forum I read it all and you posted very relevant information, very well organised post I might say!
So, to the point xD Both cards you selected are pretty good. Personally I would buy a HD 7770 but the 2 GB version if you are able to find it. If you don't, go with the GTX 650.
Remember, the GTX 650 doesn't support SLI, what does this mean? Even if you have another PCI-E slot you can't buy a second GTX 650 and run both together (which you can with the HD 7770).
Anything else, please ask! Oh, by the way, overclocking is when you take your component and make it work faster than the factory preset forcing it by some kind of program or directly from the BIOS (as I prefer doing). You don't need to do it, it just fun and gives you a little performance boost (temps rise a bit and power consumption too)

You are so polite!.. I must tell you though, I am a woman and I went and changed my mind hahah. And I am impatient, I waited for a reply but after about 6 hours I bought a card. I kept looking after I posted this and I found one entry level card on most reviews. It was a bit more than I was willing to pay but I THINK I chose a good card..
Do you like this one for my system/needs?:

Gigabyte (GV-N660OC-2GD) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 2GB GDDR5 | 1098 MHz Clock, 6008 MHz Memory | PCI Express 3.0, DVI-I, DVI-D, DisplayPort, HDMI

You seem to know what you are doing so if you say it's a crap card I will return it and get the much cheaper 7770 (or 78?? one that was comparable to the 660, it was around the same price.)

DisplayPort? What's that thing lol.

One more question.. I could have bought the superclocked version of the 650 only it has the same stats. From what I read that means it is the worse card? Because if you got the normal 650 and clocked it yourself it's stats would be better? That is one of the things that confused me.

Thanks so much for your time. People DO notice when you are nice, even on the internets

 

[renz496]

GTX660 is a good card. it should be able to handle the games you mention with ease even on high. performance wise it should be a lot better than 7770. that display port thing mostly only relevant when you want to hook up three or more monitor with radeon cards.

One more question.. I could have bought the superclocked version of the 650 only it has the same stats. From what I read that means it is the worse card? Because if you got the normal 650 and clocked it yourself it's stats would be better? That is one of the things that confused me.

that super clock card was pre overclock from the factory. means the card core clock has been up from the regular version to provide small boost in performance compared to the regular one. many said you can just OC regular card yourself (which is more cheaper than pre-OC card) but normally the overclock card was guaranteed to operate at such clock at all times. for the regular one often it was hit or miss which means you might be able to hit the same clock as the super clock ones but unstable while fully load. so in short it means that the pre-OC ones should be better than the regular one though in most cases the extra price that comes with the pre-OC card are not really worth it. in this cases some people will pick the regular one and OC the card themselves.

 

[AirSKiller]

You are so polite!.. I must tell you though, I am a woman and I went and changed my mind hahah. And I am impatient, I waited for a reply but after about 6 hours I bought a card. I kept looking after I posted this and I found one entry level card on most reviews. It was a bit more than I was willing to pay but I THINK I chose a good card..
Do you like this one for my system/needs?:

Gigabyte (GV-N660OC-2GD) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 2GB GDDR5 | 1098 MHz Clock, 6008 MHz Memory | PCI Express 3.0, DVI-I, DVI-D, DisplayPort, HDMI

You seem to know what you are doing so if you say it's a crap card I will return it and get the much cheaper 7770 (or 78?? one that was comparable to the 660, it was around the same price.)

DisplayPort? What's that thing lol.

One more question.. I could have bought the superclocked version of the 650 only it has the same stats. From what I read that means it is the worse card? Because if you got the normal 650 and clocked it yourself it's stats would be better? That is one of the things that confused me.

Thanks so much for your time. People DO notice when you are nice, even on the internets

Thanks You made a very good choice, don't worry The GTX 660 is a great card and you bought the 2GB version so you will be alright for years to come
The 7850 is also a good card, you couldn't have gone wrong there also (both GTX 660 and the HD 7850 are better than the HD 7770 or the GTX 650 by the way)

DisplayPort is a kind of connector just like HDMI or DVI (not like a VGA though, VGA is analog while the others are digital (which is 95% of the times better))

About the Superclocked version, it is exactly what renz496 said, just a factory overclocked version of the GTX 650. I will say though the price difference does not appeal to me, it is usually very easy to overclock your "normal" GTX 650 to get to the Superclocked version speeds (the name makes it seem much harder haha). Not everyone is willing to overclock so I respect that it is, as always, a choice

Well, you ended up with an awesome card so don't worry. Sorry for my English I'm actually Portuguese so... well... I speak portuguese xD English is my 2º language

 

[AirSKiller]

You are so polite!.. I must tell you though, I am a woman and I went and changed my mind hahah. And I am impatient, I waited for a reply but after about 6 hours I bought a card. I kept looking after I posted this and I found one entry level card on most reviews. It was a bit more than I was willing to pay but I THINK I chose a good card..
Do you like this one for my system/needs?:

Gigabyte (GV-N660OC-2GD) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 2GB GDDR5 | 1098 MHz Clock, 6008 MHz Memory | PCI Express 3.0, DVI-I, DVI-D, DisplayPort, HDMI

You seem to know what you are doing so if you say it's a crap card I will return it and get the much cheaper 7770 (or 78?? one that was comparable to the 660, it was around the same price.)

DisplayPort? What's that thing lol.

One more question.. I could have bought the superclocked version of the 650 only it has the same stats. From what I read that means it is the worse card? Because if you got the normal 650 and clocked it yourself it's stats would be better? That is one of the things that confused me.

Thanks so much for your time. People DO notice when you are nice, even on the internets

I just forgot to say something... Sorry :s
Your computer seems pretty good and I hope it will fit your needs (I'm sure it will ) and it is cool to have a girl between us, I mean, people usually see us as fat guys sitting in front of the computer all day but even if we were (which I actually am not xD I go to school and I enjoy and I do sports) we are also nice people, mostly x)

You should visit the forum sometimes, you can learn alot here, promise Wish you all the best D

 

[erinlove]

I just forgot to say something... Sorry :s
Your computer seems pretty good and I hope it will fit your needs (I'm sure it will ) and it is cool to have a girl between us, I mean, people usually see us as fat guys sitting in front of the computer all day but even if we were (which I actually am not xD I go to school and I enjoy and I do sports) we are also nice people, mostly x)

You should visit the forum sometimes, you can learn alot here, promise Wish you all the best D

Don't worry there are fat girls sitting in front of their computers too xD.. I actually have a couple more important questions that came up when I was reading these forums. They are still on topic:
If I change my card will I need more than 550w?
I have 2 HD, one inside and 1 USB.
I have about 8 USB devices, your typical things, mouse, cam, keyboard, PS controller jack.. ect
I have speakers and mic... Nothing fancy or silly (like USB mini fridges lol), just your bare-bones good time.

Also will my CPU be strong enough not to bottle neck my GPU if I do not upgrade to a higher i5 or a i7? Mine i5 is 790 or 760, can't remember. It would suck if I seen little difference because of my CPU. Basically what I am asking is if my rig needs anything else, especially with the new card, to fix my game lag and/or poor frame rate in those RPG type games?

You speak very good English. I understand you perfectly.

 

[AirSKiller]

Don't worry there are fat girls sitting in front of their computers too xD.. I actually have a couple more important questions that came up when I was reading these forums. They are still on topic:
If I change my card will I need more than 550w?
I have 2 HD, one inside and 1 USB.
I have about 8 USB devices, your typical things, mouse, cam, keyboard, PS controller jack.. ect
I have speakers and mic... Nothing fancy or silly (like USB mini fridges lol), just your bare-bones good time.

Also will my CPU be strong enough not to bottle neck my GPU if I do not upgrade to a higher i5 or a i7? Mine i5 is 790 or 760, can't remember. It would suck if I seen little difference because of my CPU. Basically what I am asking is if my rig needs anything else, especially with the new card, to fix my game lag and/or poor frame rate in those RPG type games?

You speak very good English. I understand you perfectly.

I bet you PSU will be fine, 550W is more than enough for that card

About your CPU (my brother's is exactly the same (i5 760) and the graphics card is on pair (HD 7850) so I can easly say you will be alright. It is quite powerful and won't limit your graphics card

Maybe your next upgrade will be a motherboard, CPU, RAM upgrade when you want do add the second GTX 660 in xD

 

[erinlove]

I bet you PSU will be fine, 550W is more than enough for that card

About your CPU (my brother's is exactly the same (i5 760) and the graphics card is on pair (HD 7850) so I can easly say you will be alright. It is quite powerful and won't limit your graphics card

Maybe your next upgrade will be a motherboard, CPU, RAM upgrade when you want do add the second GTX 660 in xD

What doesn't having two graphics cards do?
Yoeah my MB isn't the greatest. I put this computer together buying one part at a time when I had the money. It's a work in progress

 

[erinlove]

Best answer selected by erinlove.