Graphics card compatibility

[Theboat]

My motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-MA785G-UD3H and I was wondering if this card (http://www.msy.com.au/product.jsp?productId=9475) is compatible with it?

[ShyguyXPC]

PCI Express x16 slot 2.0 spec, and video card is PCIe, so yes.



But whether your CPU is fast enough to fully utilize that card, is a whole other story.



Add in you would need to make sure your Power Supply is enough as well.

[Theboat]

My CPU is an amd phenom ii x4 810 processor 2.60ghz and I'm going to get a better power supply, if that isn't fast enough to run it, what cards are good for me? Also just wondering if I need something that high end because I play wow, borderlands 2, heroes of newerth and black ops 2 when it comes out. Any suggestions would be appreciated

Thanks

[ShyguyXPC]

CPU clock speed is a little low, so might be a bit of a bottleneck, but shouldn't be too bad.

As to the games, its overkill for wow, not sure on newerth, have heard if the game but not familiar with it.

Should be more than enough for borderlands 2, black ops 2, no way to tell for sure until the game is out, but I suspect it will be more than enough as well.

A bit cheaper standard gtx 660 might be enough for those other games as well.

[Theboat]

ok I'll probably look for a cheaper card, I live in Australia and I'm using msy.com.au to choose a card. Since the GTX660TI is a little overkill I looked at the 660 and then thought maybe that the 650 would be enough. My current card is a 9800GT and I'm it plays the games fairly well so I'm looking for a major upgrade.

650:http://www.msy.com.au/product.jsp?productId=9577
660:http://www.msy.com.au/product.jsp?productId=9579

Thank you for the help!

[ShyguyXPC]

here's another well known aussie site: PC Case Gear

650 would be a good jump up, but I think the "older" GTX 560 would be a better card.



GeForce GTX 650 MSI Power edition review - DX11: Battlefield 3

GeForce GTX 650 MSI Power edition review - DX9: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

just some examples. It would be a sizable jump from a 9800GT.


But a GTX 560 would be better, or AMD Radeon 6870. Either card would be fine, and not much if any bottleneck on the cards.

The GTX 660 Ti, is in the older GTX 580 range, and the plain 660 isn't far behind, which is why the CPU might bottleneck a bit. It is a Quad core, and should be fine, but it is a lower speed Quad and not the higher 3GHz Range models which wouldn't be much of a problem.

If you were able to OC your Quad to 3GHz range, or a bit higher (3.2 to 3.6GHz) which shouldn't be too hard, but not as easy as doing it on a Black Edition CPU, but should still be possible, then you could probably get away with a 660.

Otherwise like I mentioned a 560 or 6870 would be a worth while investment.

But even the Radeon 7850's, at least in the US, has dropped to the $170-180 range, and though would be overkill for most of your uses, its only 2nd to the 660, and can match or compete with the older GTX 570. But for the price, the 7850 1GB model cards can go for $180 or so, 2GB models usually 10-15 bucks more, and the GTX 660 goes for $230 right now, so it is a better deal, and only slightly lesser in performance. Even if it is overkill, its still a good deal.

[ShyguyXPC]

if your friend has the GTX 560 Ti and has Overclocked it, he should have some OCing knowledge and might be able to get you help with OCing your CPU to something more faster, so you could maybe warrant dropping the money on something like a 7850 or 660 2GB Card.

either of those will be GTX 560 Ti 448 core or GTX 570 range performance out of the box with no OCing at all.

[Theboat]

ok I'm going to buy the 560 from PC case Gear just wondering what PSU I will need because the current one is only 390W and the card needs 500W do you suggest anything? Hopefully the cheapest :P Also is it still compatible with my motherboard and such?

[ShyguyXPC]

actually I know for a fact that Card will run on less than 500W. If you get a good brand PSU, like an Antec, Corsair or similar brand, of 400W or more, it would be enough to run that card, your CPU, and whatever else.


Quality internal components on those brands, and their +12V Rail Amp ratings are much higher than the cheap crap brand units out on the market. the +12v Rail is the critical one in modern systems, as almost all components run off it, especially Video cards.



(oh, on PC Case Gear, avoid the 560 SE, its a reduced spec 560, and not really worth it, its less than a Radeon 7750, and costs more, not to mention uses about twice the power a 7750 uses).

you might be able to run a 7850 2GB (the extra RAM will help with games like Battlefield 3 and such, as that game and others with higher resolutions, and what not can benefit from the extra Memory, helps reduce Micro Stutter and what not).

Even games like Skyrim could benefit from that, I run 2 GTX 560 Ti FPB's Overclocked to SuperClock specs, in SLI, both 1GB cards, and with everything on max settings, with the HiRes Packs, my cards use nearly all their memory, and I still get stuttering every so often, even with 60-150fps rates.

But even if the 7850 was overkill, it would be better suited to hold you off for upgrades longer than the 560 would be.


Only reason I'm pointing that out, is there really is no other decent choice between the GTX 560 and Raden 6870 to the Radeon 7850 and GTX 660 Range. And PC Case Gear only has that Gigabyte 560 in stock which isn't much to choose from.

560 Ti like your friend has, used to be the best deal, but its been surpassed by the Radeon 7850.

I picked up my 560 Ti's used, I got one Recertified Directly from EVGA, and bought the other one from someone on another forums, I paid $180 for the 1st, and $150 for the 2nd, so got them for bargain bin prices, and quite happy with the SLI setup, but my CPU I have also is powerful enough not to bottleneck the cards either (Intel Core i7 940, 2.93GHz Quad)


But for PSU's...

Corsair CX-430 V2 Power Supply [CMPSU-430CXV2] - $59.00 : PC Case Gear

Corsair CX-500 V2 Power Supply [CMPSU-500CXV2] - $69.00 : PC Case Gear

Antec VP450P 450W Power Supply [VP-450P] - $52.00 : PC Case Gear

Antec Neo Eco 450C 450W Power Supply [NEO-ECO-450C] - $59.00 : PC Case Gear

Have a 400W model of that one above, and it ran a 65W Celeron Dual Core, 2GB RAM, HDD, DVD drive and a 192W GTX 260 card just fine.

but any of those units should be able to run your system just fine with some power to spare.

[Theboat]

Thank you so much, I went with the Corsair CX-430 V2 Power Supply [CMPSU-430CXV2] - $59.00 : PC Case Gear so I'll be ordering them now. The help was greatly appreciated

oh and one more thing will it fit in my current case both the PSU and Card? my current case is Elite 335U - Cooler Master - Leading Provider of Computer Case, Cooler, Power Supply, Laptop Cooling, Gaming Peripherals

Also with the 2 6 pin connectors, does the PSU have them or does it just need the one connector??

[ShyguyXPC]

The case will fit it just fine, One of my spare cases is an older version of yours, the 560 and 560 Ti cards aren't that big, if you can fit a 9800GT in it now, the 560 and all the other cards mentioned will fit just fine.

Your motherboard is a full Size ATX mobo like mine,




Pic only has one of my 2 560 Ti's in it.

So it will fit just fine.

PSU is about the same size as well (had a 400W model, predecessor to that 430W Corsair, and gave it to one of the other members here a few years ago, also have a 750W Corsair PSU as well, same size, PSU in my case in my pic above is a 850W NZXT Hale82, which is just a rebadged Seasonic M12 II Series, and the newer Corsair v2 PSU's are also made by seasonic)

If I remember right, the Corsair 430W only has a single 6 Pin PCIe, but you will need to use a Dual 4 Pin Molex to single 6 Pin PCIe adapter, that should come with the card (most come with 2 adapters), then you'll need to free up and use Two Molex 4 pin plugs on the PSU.

Most PSU's in the 500W range or below, even a lot of 600W range units, usually only have a single 6 Pin, or a 6+2 pin, though some of dual, but a lot of the PSU manufacturers haven't caught up with the GPU tech, in the fact that many cards are getting more powerful, and yet use less power, just look at the progression of the Geforce GTX 400 to the current 600 series, they have gotten more and more powerful, and keep using less and less power.

Another example... AMD Radeon HD 7750 vs the old ATI Radeon HD 4870... the former is more powerful, and uses about 1/3 the power consumption.

the lower powered cards, allow for lower powered Dual GPU systems, and the PSU manufacturers, at least the quality brand ones, haven't kept up really, and still mostly offer units with single 6 pin connectors on them.




but you will need Dual 6 pin connectors on the GTX 560, even the Radeon 7850 needs 2.





The 430W Corsair will be enough for the system. But I should also mention, if you plan on doing any overclocking, and depending on how far you take that CPU if you did, or plan on tossing in quite a few Hard drives, and such, that the power supply will be maxed.

I used an Online PSU Calculator, and its recommended wattage for your system (I guesstimated on your HDD and Optical Drive, as well as case fans), using a GTX 560 Ti as the card in the system (no standard 560 in the list), and showed recommended PSU Wattage was about 387W, which is well under the 430W rating of that unit.

But it wouldn't take much in OCing, with any sort of Voltage increases if you needed to do that, to bring that up to 430W total.


500W would be more forgiving, but if your not going to be doing any agressive OCing (just mild to moderate), then the 430W should still be fine.

[Theboat]

ok awesome, well it looks like I'm all set, Thanks for the help!! You're very knowledgeable about this stuff Hopefully everything comes in the next few days and I'll be sweet.

[ShyguyXPC]

cool, post back and let us know how its working out, or if you run into any problems with getting it to work right (as most new users tend to forget some little bit somewhere, be it uninstalling the old drivers and installing new, or a power connector or some other thing).

in the meantime, might as well download the latest Nvidia Display drivers, which just came out a couple weeks ago, so they're still brand new. save them somewhere or on desktop or where ever, for the new card (or if you got the 7850, the latest AMD Catalyst Display drivers).



Also if your not using one already, I'd recommend downloading and running either MSI Afterburner tool or EVGA's Precision, to run the fan speeds on the cards. Can help with keeping fan down to minimum speeds when Idle and maintain fan speeds while at load. I usually never go above 70-75% fan speed at full load on mine.

MSI Afterburner will support Nvidia or AMD GPU's, EVGA's only Supports Nvidia Cards. But both are based on Riva Tuner software.

[Theboat]

They arrived today yay! Everything is in and running smoothly,playing everything on high or ultra settings and getting decent fps The card is awesome! Thank you for the help and suggestions, much appreciated!

[ShyguyXPC]

just to clarify, which card did you get the 560 or the 7850?

[Theboat]

I got the 560

[ShyguyXPC]

OK, cool, yeah should still be a good "lower" mid range GPU for another year. But I suspect in a year the 560's performance range will be in the upper budget rang graphics segment (Radeon 7700 series range, as far as pricing and performance go)