The following article, edited here to address the general audience rather than a particular person, includes my thoughts given to someone at another forum seeking a new video card, but it is probably just as much about power supplies. Of course, it is nowhere near thorough and balanced, and there are definitely members here more qualified and informed (this is just my account, rather than a general guide, after all), but I think there is some useful information from my own experience to be gleamed by someone thinking of updating his system to at least the budget gamer level in order to play
the latest games. That said, if you've got your own account, guide, tips, or useful links to add, or wish to rebut certain points, by all means.
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What gaming card should you get? I have one suggestion, but I will explain how I came to choose it.
When I bought my new system, it had 4GB of memory, an AMD Athlon X2 7750 (2.7GHz) processor, Windows Vista Home Premium x64, and an ATI Radeon HD 4550 512MB PCI Express Video Card.
The first thing I had to do was replace my power supply, a 580watt XION, which is considered "fifth tier," or the worst kind of PSU you can get, by those computer enthusiasts at EggXpert. (You can find their list of "first tier" to "fifth tier" power supplies
here). According to the EggXpert forum moderator I spoke to when inquiring about whether my computer would support the video card I was planning to upgrade to,
he said "There is more of a problem with the PSU that the PC came with not the motherboard. You need to upgrade the PSU to a tier 1 - 3 first." The reason, as explained in the page on power supply ratings I linked to, is that you want quality and stability. Tier two is recommended for people who want that quality and stability, but are not
hardcore gamers and are on a budget.
As I was searching for a power supply, I noticed that Corsair was one of the companies with power supplies listed at tier two, which was significant since the researching I did at Newegg lead me to a Corsair power supply that I bookmarked for possible purchase since it seemed impressive but was just $100: the
550watt VX model.
Before I decided to purchase this brand, however, there were other things I learned that influenced my decision. For example, I initially sought a model with
750watts, but as I searched Google I came across several forum posts where someone expressed the same concern as me (i.e., how to choose a power supply for a powerful but budget video card). Apparently, if you were going to be playing the latest games, but did not expect to go SLI and were not in need of the most
hardcore performance, 550watts would be
more than enough. What matters more than the actual wattage is the quality of the power supply, and that it at least comes close to the minimum wattage requirements and has enough amps on its 12V rail (easily checked on the specifications page of wherever you are purchasing the video card from).
Now, I am not an expert in computers, but I easily installed the power supply myself. It may seem daunting at first because there are so many power supply plugs to deal with, but as long as you label the plugs and take note of the number of pins and the look of each of them to determine where they belong, as long as you prepare by reading a good guide or two on how to properly prepare and install, and as long as you keep some information on the installation process handy while you perform the actual work, you should be fine.
(As an aside, I do not know about wrist straps, but besides "grounding" yourself by touching the power supply or other metal parts before messing with the insides of your computer, I also remember from my time repairing computers in a high school ROTC computer repair class, that you can use one hand to rub the top of your computer case with one hand as you work on your computer with another, and as long as you do that often you can use the two hands whenever you need to.)
Also worth noting that those power supplies of good quality but for the guy with a budget have one downside: they are not "modular," which means that you do not get to just use the power supply plugs you want and keep the rest inside the box you got the power supply in. That said, you will have to take some time to hide the ones you don't need (a problem for those of you with older, smaller, and less shiny computer towers that don't have much room).
Now, equipped with my new power supply, but otherwise with all the same specs on my budget computer, here is the video card I chose:
EVGA GTX260 896MB 448-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16. It is designed for optimal performance on a PCI 2.0, but it will work just fine on a PCI Express x16 (a fact I can attest to since I have that card working fine on a PCI Express x16).
(If I had done better research, I would have realized that there is a better GTX 260 model that doesn't cost too much more: the
Core 216 "Superclocked Edition." It is not much of an excuse, but at the time of my purchase I had free shipping and a 15$ off code (not including the rebate). In normal circumstances, the difference in price between my card and the Core 216 would be about $10. Although the difference is modest, at the price it is worth it.)
Yeah, this card is not 1GB, but as any computer expert may tell you, the amount of memory is not everything. For example, I looked at the brand, memory interface, the customer choice awards given at Newegg,-- and yes, it is under $200.
It was all the more easy to figure out which power supply plugs to put on the video card, because the power supply labels the plugs "PCI-E". Installation was kind of annoying, and the following from my review of the video card explains why:
Worked right out of the box. I have never even installed a video card before this one, but it did not require much know-how. In my case, I just unscrewed the bracket from the expansion bay, held up the PCI-E slot clip, and pulled out my Radeon card. Afterwards, I placed my old card into the plastic container that held my new card, clicked open a second expansion bay slot below where the bracket would actually place (to allow the card to align), removed the bracket cover (to allow the video card to vent), and held up the slot clip with one hand while using the other to push the card into the slot. There was a little hassle with getting PSU wiring out of the way, and fitting the card between the expansion bay and hard drive cage, but I got the card in in a minute or two.
What's more, here is what I added about the size of the card:
There has been a lot of talk about the enormous size of the graphics card (it is at least twice the length of the Radeon HD 4550 512MB video card that once powered my system), but not much information to help readers decide if it will fit their system. The EVGA website puts this card at 4.376in height x 10.5in length. To give you some perspective, this card just fit my Raidmax Sagitta II Gaming Case; i.e., one or two more inches and it would have come into conflict with the hard drive cage.
For further perspective, I have a GIGABYTE GA-MA74GM-S2 AM2+/AM2 AMD 740G Micro ATX AMD motherboard. My new video card completely covered the first PCI slot below it, and is touching the top (but is not over) the second PCI slot. The PCI-E x1 slot above it remains uncovered, too, obviously, as it is above the PCI-E x16 slot.
Another problem you may have with the video card is heat; modern cards produce it like a power plant (OK, maybe slight exaggeration). Fortunately, my case came equipped with sufficient cooling (two standard 120mm fans). Yeah, I know, pretty wild cooling set up.
Finally, all of the computer parts, including the video card, are running at normal to cool temperatures, and the video card gets to about 65-70C* when playing the latest games, which is normal. I do not play much, but for the last few weeks I have had this set up (I bought my computer last month), I have already played
Supreme Commander and
C&C: Generals, which look really pretty.
* There are many programs you can use to check your video card's temperature. For example, if you're using an EVGA card like I am, there is a program called Precision, which can be downloaded at the EVGA website. A more general program that does this is the popular
SpeedFan.
Picking out a video card and power supply
Linear Mode
