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Video Card Upgrade Question
redshirt78410
Member Posts: 16 Arc User
I have been out of the technology loop for a bit thanks to the recession, and paying child support. I recently bought a new system, and the onboard graphics chipset is really nice, much better than my budget card on my old system. Thing is, I would like to upgrade to be able to get rid of the video lag present only in a couple of episodes, and every instance of Crystalline Entity (ELITE) I have ever run. No video lag in the normal version, just the elite.
I won't bore you with all the specs on my system, but the motherboard is limited to a pci-e 2.0 slot, and the onboard graphics chip is a Radeon 7660. I'm looking at spending less than $150 if possible, otherwise I will have to get a second job for a few months lol. I am also looking at upgrading not only to more RAM, but much faster, as mine is only 1600 at 8GB. Any links to cards that will play the game on near full settings with no lag in the few places I get it, would be appreciated. My own searches only found cards that aren't as good as my onboard.
I won't bore you with all the specs on my system, but the motherboard is limited to a pci-e 2.0 slot, and the onboard graphics chip is a Radeon 7660. I'm looking at spending less than $150 if possible, otherwise I will have to get a second job for a few months lol. I am also looking at upgrading not only to more RAM, but much faster, as mine is only 1600 at 8GB. Any links to cards that will play the game on near full settings with no lag in the few places I get it, would be appreciated. My own searches only found cards that aren't as good as my onboard.
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system Lord Baal is dead
system Lord Baal is dead
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Or a 7850 brand new.
Or a R7 260X
Three fans, will my tower hover? hehe
http://www.amazon.com/Galaxy-GeForce-Mini-HDMI-Graphics-56NGH6HS4IXZ/dp/B004J68FFI
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814162084 (My exact card, but good luck finding any).
I myself prefer non-OC gpu's.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
I would say that your 8 gigs of RAM is more than enough to run STO, adding more will give only a minimal increase in performance.
You'll get a bigger bang for your buck by upgrading the video card but you're limited by the pci-e 2.0 slot. I did a quick search on New Egg and didn't find much at your price point that is better than your internal graphics.
My advice to you is to take your current PC to computer repair shop or to the Geek Squad to see if you can upgrade your motherboard to one that supports the latest pci-e slots. Hopefully they can help you find one that will allow you to use your CPU, RAM, and other components. If they can't help you upgrade then you may want to consider a new computer.
Until you can upgrade or buy a new PC there are a few things you can do to improve performance.
First turn off any other programs running in the background, antivirus programs are examples of programs that run in the background that can really slow performance. I use a game booster from Razer that will automatically turn off background programs until your done playing.
Second putz around with STO's settings and experiment with some settings to see what might increase performance. Go back and listen to the last couple Priority One Podcasts they discussed tweaks that may be helpful to you.
Third check for updated drivers for your current graphics, sometimes updating the drivers will help with stability.
Good luck!
Co-Leader of Serenity's Grasp
Based on what you have stated you got an AMD Trinity generation A10 APU like the A10-5700 or A10-5800k (overclockable). They have the integrated AMD Radeon HD 7660D GPU core. When it was released the HD 7660D was basically the most powerful iGPU (integrated GPU). However, being an iGPU it pretty weak compared to any $150 GPU.
There are $70 GPUs that are more powerful than the Radeon HD 7660D so I am assuming you have been mis-interpreting what you have been reviewing. At best the HD 7760D is as powerful as the Radeon HD 5670 DDR3 that was released for around $75 towards the end of 2009. And that is assuming you are using DDR3-2133 RAM in your PC which you are not.
The following link is to a review of a nVidia GTX 750 OC GPU. However, what's important is that the review includes GPU with MRSPs of between $100 and $260. The GTX 750 OC 1GB itself is $140... or at least that was the price back in Feb 2014.
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_750_OC/
At this point in time, for $150 you should be able to get a GTX 750 2GB or Radeon R9 270 2GB GPU (a slightly slower version of R9 270X). In the performance summary section of in the following review, on average benchmarks indicates that the R9 270X only provides 5% higher performance than the R9 270.
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/R9_270_Direct_Cu_II_OC/
If you go back to the link above and look at the performance summary of the GTX 750 OC. Comparing the R9 270X to the GTX 750 OC shows that the R9 270X performs 59% better on average vs. the nVidia card. Since the R9 270 is only slightly less powerful than the R9 270X, it too will be more powerful than the GTX 750 OC.
The following link is to a Radeon R9 270 selling for $160 @ newegg.com. You need to add it to your cart to see the price. The $30 rebate brings the cost of the card down to $130, but you must wait for the rebate. The least expensive GTX 750 OC @ newegg.com after rebate is $150.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131545&ignorebbr=1
Do not worry about only having a PCI-e 2.0 slot. Only very high end GPUs ($600+) will be limited by the older PCI-e slot and based on benchmark results that I have reviewed, there is so far only a 5% performance penalty. For lower performance GPUs the performance is non-existent.
About the RAM. Upgrading it will be a waste of money. By simply using a dedicated graphics card you will free up more RAM for the system to use. 8GB of RAM is more than enough for any game. Getting faster RAM like DDR3-2133 only makes sense if you are overclocking your CPU. Since it seems you did not build your own PC, it is extremely unlikely you have an AMD A10 APU that will allow you to overclock.
All you need to do is simply purchase the Radeon R9 270 that I recommended about and you are basically done.
- make sure you either buy a card that fits your current power level OR be willing to buy a new power supply alongside the new card. MANY cards require a LOT of power.
Also, IMHO, when making the final cut, a slightly weaker processor model with more memory is better than the "cheap" version of a "better" card that has cut down the memory. You need both, of course, just try to balance the two rather than focus on raw horsepower.
I missed this post.
It seems you do have an A10-5800k which means you can overclock your APU. For the moment though adding a graphics card is more important than overclocking your APU so you can buy faster RAM later.
As the poster above has mentioned you need to take the power consumption of the GPU into consideration. The reviews I linked to shows that the nVidia GTX 750 OC consumes 76w of peak power while the Radeon R9 270 consumes 121w of peak power. This generally means for the GTX 750 a 450w PSU (power supply) should be suffcient while the R9 270 would need a 500w PSU.
Not all PSUs are of equal quality though. This can be a rather lengthy and complex topic, but suffice it to say that a very good quality 450w PSU can provide more actual usable power than a 500w average PSU.
The link you provided to the PC you have do not have any information about the PSU. That means you need to pop the side panel open and look at the sticker on the PSU which lists the important information. If possible take a picture of it with your cellphone's camera and post it. Chances are it is an average generic 500w PSU which should be able to handle the R9 270.
I will be holding off at least a couple months to do this upgrade. Have to take a cross country trip for my kid's high school graduation, and then she is coming back to visit here for about two weeks. Have to fly her back up, so any PC upgrades are backburnered for now. I will definitely bookmark this thread so I can make sure I make the most informed decision.