I’d personally lean toward the Dell too—mostly because it features an IPS panel. Now, what does that actually mean for you? It basically means you get much better viewing angles, so the colors and image stay consistent no matter how you're sitting in front of it. How much are you looking to spend, though? If I knew your budget, I might be able to suggest something else entirely... Dell tends to be on the pricier side in general.
fadedorca66 said:Honestly, your power supply just isn't up to the task—you really need to swap that out before you even think about touching other components. What you're running right now is pretty low-quality and unreliable. Plus, pairing a 1070 with that specific processor? It’s probably not worth the investment.
Yeah, it's still a 2nd gen i5 after all—if it were a 3rd or 4th gen, I might say otherwise...
Noah Hall said:Ran a few more MemTests and everything looks solid. Hit it with a Sandra Lite benchmark too—this config sits in the top 7% overall, and based on the numbers, this GPU is performing right up there with a 980 Ti or a 1070. Uninstalled The Witcher 3 to test things out—cranked everything to Ultra, just turned off the motion blur. Played for about an hour or so and had zero issues. No stutters, just smooth gameplay...
to be continued...
Have you tried testing each RAM stick individually? You know, pulling one 8GB stick out to run MemTest, then swapping it for the next one to see if the issue persists... it's worth the extra effort. While we're at it, maybe check on the hard drive too? Just grab CrystalDiskInfo—it’s a standard tool—and take a look at the health status. If you could grab a screenshot and post it here, that would be great. You can find the regular .exe version right here: http://crystalmark.info/download/index-e.html
It’s probably better to just say how much you’re looking to spend first—then we can actually give you some solid recommendations based on your budget..
Your CPU can definitely handle an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 without any issues—and honestly, if we're looking at things this way, think of a GTX 1060 as being more for 1080p gaming rather than anything else. An NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 is solid for 144p gaming, and you could even push it toward 4K, though you’ll probably need to drop most of your settings to low to make it smooth enough.
In my opinion, picking up an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 is absolutely worth it. However—and here's the catch—if you find yourself needing to swap out your power supply, it's not necessarily because the card itself is a massive power hog. It's more likely just because that current power supply isn't actually delivering the wattage it claims to on the label...
neonhawk24 said:I could really use some advice. I have an older Dell Inspiron laptop where the graphics card was recently swapped out, and it's running Windows 7 Ultimate. It only has 2 GB of RAM, though, which makes it feel incredibly slow. I mostly just use it for browsing the web, downloading stuff, and doing work in Microsoft Office. Would switching to Windows 7 32 bit help at all? I don't think I've ever actually installed Windows myself, so I'm not sure how to go about it—or if it's even a good idea. Should I wipe everything first? And if I do, will I need to hunt down specific drivers?
First things first, you’ll need to get a copy of whichever Windows 7 version you want. If you aren't doing anything super intense, honestly, the Home version is perfectly fine. As for the architecture—go with 64 bit. It doesn't make much difference for basic tasks, but having 64 bit might save you some headaches later if you ever need a specific program that only runs on 64 bit systems. Plus, if you decide to upgrade your RAM to 4 GB down the road, you'll be glad you did, since x32 can only handle up to about 3.5 GB of RAM. To actually get Windows installed, you'll need to burn the installer onto a blank DVD or create a bootable USB stick. Once you've got that, you can install Windows 7 from the USB. After the installation is done, you'll need to grab the right drivers—you can usually find those on the motherboard manufacturer's website, and for the graphics card, you'll want to head straight to the manufacturer's site (whether that's AMD or NVIDIA, depending on what you have). The main thing is getting Windows itself set up; once that's done, finding the drivers is pretty straightforward. Just remember, before you start the installation, you'll need to jump into the BIOS and set your first boot device to either the CD/DVD drive or your USB stick, depending on which method you choose...
Here's a video tutorial on how to install Windows 7, but just make sure you check your BIOS settings first to ensure the boot order is correct.
EDIT: I just realized we're talking about a laptop! In that case, once Windows is installed, you should head over to the laptop manufacturer's official website to download the necessary drivers for things like your Wi-Fi, sound, and so on. If this all sounds a little too complicated, maybe just ask a neighbor or a friend to help you out—maybe buy them a beer for their trouble?
From what I can tell looking at your description, it seems like you're running into some trouble with your AMD drivers. My suggestion? Use this tool to do a completely clean uninstall of your current AMD drivers—it really helps clear out any leftover junk—then give your PC a quick restart and install the latest, freshest drivers available. If that doesn't do the trick, or if the issue persists, maybe try rolling back to an older version of the drivers? But honestly, if neither of those options works, it might be time to take that graphics card into a repair shop for a professional look.
Hey, could you drop your PC specs here? Just a heads-up—when you mention using "genuine" versions, it sounds like you might not actually have a legitimate product key, which means you’ll probably have to go through some extra trouble to try and "activate" macOS yourself...
That first HP you mentioned comes with integrated graphics, just like it says 😁. It’s very likely there's a PCIe slot on the motherboard, too—though it's a bit of a bummer they didn't list the specific motherboard model or all those extra specs... Just a heads-up, though: you'll probably need to hunt for a low-profile graphics card. Since the case is on the smaller side, a standard-sized card likely won't fit inside
I'd suggest using this removal tool to wipe those Nvidia drivers out completely. Honestly, it's way more effective than just doing a standard uninstall through Windows—it actually scrubs all those leftover traces from your registry and wherever else they might be hiding on the partition. Once you've given the PC a quick restart, just grab the latest drivers straight from the official Nvidia website and see if that smooths things out.
Honestly, you’re going to notice a massive difference 🙂 The gap between an SSD and a traditional hard drive is night and day—it's like night and day—but if you're planning on picking up an SSD down the road anyway, you might be better off putting that extra cash toward a stronger graphics card. After all, when it comes to gaming, the GPU is really the heavy lifter, isn't it?
It looks like you might have accidentally toggled on silent/gaming mode. To fix that—just head down to your system tray by the clock, right-click the Avast icon, and uncheck the silent/gaming mode option there.
The thing about this little program is that it pulls the files directly from Microsoft servers—so you don't have to worry about whether it's some sketchy torrent or something similar... right? Once you've got it, you just plug your product key or license straight into the computer.
It really depends on which game you're playing—as a general rule of thumb, a NVIDIA GTX 1070 is decent for 1440p while a NVIDIA GTX 1080 can handle 2160p
But honestly, everything boils down to the specific title, the settings you choose, and how much FPS you're chasing. To be truthful, I think even an NVIDIA GTX 1080 might struggle or stutter a bit at 4K resolution in certain games...