On the recommendation of a tec support chap I've bought an MSI N460GTC Cyclone graphics card. I'm a bit concerned as reading through the leaflet that came in the packaging it says that I should have at least 450w power supply. I have a Cosair cx400 and I told the tec support chap this before buying and he said that it would have no problems. Before I plug the card in I just wanted some reassurance. As you may be able to tell, I'm new to this upgrading PC's thing!!!
mother board is Asus P5LD2-VM/S PSU Corsair CX400 Processor is Intel Core Duo E6420 Chipset Intel i945P/PL/G/GZ Graphic interface - PCI-Express Link width X16 Memory DDR2 2048MB Graphics card NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT proposed upgrading to 460GTX My screen res is 1440 x 900
The Corsair CX400W is a quality PSU made by Seasonic, and it will handle up to 480W according to reviews. Putting that aside, a MSI GTX460 Cyclone 1GB max power consumption is only 153W: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GeForce_GTX_460_Cyclone_OC_1_GB/29.html I seriously doubt the rest of your system will draw up to anywhere close to 250W (I bet it won't even draw beyond 120W as it is only a dual-core system). Also, considering your res, as well as the CPU (Core2Duo at just 2.13GHz) would be a limitation, you should just get a 768MB instead of 1GB version to save yourself about £30~£40, as there's most likely won't be any difference in frame rate with your CPU at stock speed, as well as the res you are on. In games like BFBC2 and COD: Black OPs, the GTX460 will be heavily bottlenecked due to the limitation of the slow dual-core. To be honest, with just a Core2Duo at just 2.13GHz, the GTX460 would barely be faster than a 4850/GTS250 level card...so I really think unless you gonna upgrade your CPU to a Quad, you should just save yourself some money, and get a 2nd hand 9800GT/GTS250/HD4850 for £35-£40. Majority of the games would need at least a dual-core at 3.0GHz.
is it overclocked ? your PSU is a good one so should be ok as it has a single 30A 12V rail which is enough for the 460. nvidia rate the 460 max power draw as 160W wiht 2x 6-pin required. your PSU only has 1 so you would need a molex to 6-pin adapter. i think your cutting it close with a 400W but it should work providing your system isnt overclocked and you dont have lots of HDDs.
Thanks Marine-RX179, I was looking at the 768MB. The next upgrade will be the dual core processor then probably a monitor.
thanks adam. I've certainly not done any over clocking and the only HDD is the one that came installed. Damn! Thought I might need an adapter, should have just ordered one with the card.
the 450w minimum is to cover for less optimal PSU's that might not give you their rated power, You should have no problem, The maximum I've seen my computer draw when playing games is about 380w from the wall (320w from the PSU) and that's with 2 9800gtx+'s, each one can potentially draw the same amount of power as a 460. Your power draw will also be limited by your resolution as your graphics card won't have to work as hard to display the images. having VSync enabled also cuts power usage. The only time you may have a problem is if you want to stress your CPU and GPU's at the same time, for instance with Prime95 and Furmark, or maybe when folding.
Thanks guys. PC World on the way home to pick up an adapter then home to wonder at the visual reality my new card will doubtless provide!!!
Just out of interest... What would be a sensible upgrade for my CPU? I only really game (and the kids do their homework) WOW and hopefully Black Ops.
Looking at your current system, even the motherboard is VERY old and according to Asus's site, the board don't support the more recent 775 CPUs...not even the Q6600: http://uk.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=orjq7G3HX3F0tRrN So you gonna have to be looking at a platform upgrade. A i5 760 upgrade would cost around £300 (CPU: £130-£140, motherboard: £80-£100, 2x2GB 1,600MHz DDR3 RAM: £50-£60). But if you can wait till January 2011, you might be able to get i5 750/i5 760 and P55 chipset 1156 motherboard for cheap off people that are ugrading to Sandybridge (1156's replacement). May be able to pick up 2nd hand i5 750 for around £100, and motherboard for around £40~£70
Jeez louise! I'l have practically rebuilt my PC by the time I get to play again! Easy for a newb to swap?
Well, you could try overclocking your E6420. The CPU itself seems like an ok overclocker, but I'm not too sure if your motherboard is capable, and you gonna have to do the homework on how to overclock if you don't know how to, plus you would still need to get a decent CPU cooler. Something to get you started for the E6420 overclocking: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1183692
He he! I only just got my head around swapping the psu and graphics card. overclocking and cooling can wait. Who knows what santa might bring...
You don't need to upgrade your PSU...the one you have is perfectly fine and sufficent. Most system (even with overclock) with a graphic card that draws less than 200W would only draw low to high 300W ish. As long as you don't have a graphic card that draws like 250-300W, your PSU will be fine.
