casualsurfer92 said:I need some help deciding which power supply to buy for a GTX 260 or an HD 5670? I was thinking about this Thermaltake 420W. Is that actually a decent unit??? My specs are: 2 gigs of DDR2 RAM, AMD Athlon 64 x2 4000+, and an 8600GT graphics card.
Look, I really don't think you'll see any benefit from grabbing a GTX 260—your processor is just going to bottleneck it, leaving all that extra power sitting completely idle. In my opinion, the most sensible move here is to go with the HD 5670; honestly, you might even find a used HD 4830, which is significantly more powerful than a 9800GT.
Do yourself a favor and check out some benchmarks before you make a call:
It would handle your current setup perfectly fine, and more importantly, it gives you enough breathing room for a much better processor down the road if you decide to upgrade. 😉
It’s been about two weeks since I picked up my Sapphire HD5770 graphics card, and there are a few things I’m trying to wrap my head around:
The jump in performance is night and day—honestly, gaming feels 100% smoother now—but now I’m looking to push my processor further by overclocking it. Some guy actually told me I could just take the CPU down to a service center and they’d overclock it for me free of charge. Right now, I'm running an Intel Core i3, model 530 at 2.93GHz. For cooling, I currently have $333. Can anyone recommend a high-quality cooler that would actually allow me to push this chip up to 4GHz? And if I manage to hit those speeds, what kind of performance boost am I realistically looking at? I'd appreciate some real answers to these questions. And please—keep the vulgar comments to yourselves! 🙂
Alright everyone, so I finally pulled the trigger and picked up an AMD Radeon HD 5770 Hawk from HGspot—they even threw in the installation for free, which was a nice touch—and a buddy of mine helped me get all the drivers squared away... Honestly, I feel like I’ve finally cleared some major hurdles here, and I am genuinely satisfied because the performance is just... well, it's there. Huge thanks to everyone for the help and the effort you put in to get me sorted.
Bryan Evans77 said:If you happen to be hanging around near some local Best Buy, I might be able to lend a hand... 🙂
But honestly, Nathan Reyes59 already laid it all out for you—you can't just shove a graphics card into a slot where it physically doesn't fit. 👍 (I mean, sure, there are those absolute lunatics who try to hack their way in by cutting the chassis, but let’s not even go there; that's pure madness).
Personally, I'd rather just ask the guy working at the local Micro Center if he could actually get it installed for me...
Nathan Reyes59 said:Look, anyone here would gladly take a little cash incentive to 😁
Just kidding—you’re gonna have to figure it out yourself. You can't stay a novice forever, you know? Life moves on. 🙂
We can try to walk you through it using diagrams... just let us know which motherboard you're rocking so we can mock something up in MS Paint for you.
EDIT: Which specific 5770 are we talking about, and what's the asking price? Honestly, you'd be better off grabbing a GTX 650 with 768 MB.
The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-H55M-S2H. I'm leaning toward the Sapphire card, but I'm passing on the GTX 460 because my power supply can't handle the draw.
Hey everyone—so here’s the situation. Once I finally head over to Best Buy and pick up this HD5770, who on earth is actually going to install it in my rig? Look, I’m a complete novice when it comes to PC hardware—I wouldn't even dream of touching the internals myself without making a massive mistake! Who am I supposed to call to get this thing mounted?
Bryan Evans77 said:Actually, I might 😬—I was a bit slow on the uptake today—😁 I read that about 20 minutes ago and then it completely slipped my mind. xD
They’re claiming the power supply efficiency is sitting at roughly 70%
But specifically for a 5850? Honestly, that doesn't sound great to me... It would probably hold up fine under normal use, but I have serious doubts about how it would handle things once you hit a full system load...
So, what kind of high-end GPU could it actually handle while still running games smoothly?
Bryan Evans77 said:but what kind of power supply is it... It doesn't matter if it was working before, or if it wasn't—whether it’s two months old or you picked up some random unit from Micro Center... The only thing that actually matters is the brand and the wattage... 😬
Alright, come here and let me give you a dollar for being a dummy 😁 (just kidding) If you look back a few posts, I already mentioned my PSU is a Thermaltake Master Maxout Power 420W
Casey Long2 said:It’s a possibility... the power supply isn't exactly top-tier, though it isn't complete junk either... How old are we talking here?
I picked up this pre-built rig back on October 6, 2010—so about six months ago—except I’ve been stuck in some legal trouble and haven't even touched the machine for nine months. The whole thing is basically gathering dust at my mom's place because she was pretty unhappy with me regarding the situation.😁
Hey everyone... I'm heading down to Micro Center in six days to pick up a new graphics card. I currently have $500, and I've got a bit of a dilemma. They're suggesting I grab the GTX 460 768MB, but here is my actual setup: Gigabyte GA-H55M-S2H 4GB DDR3 RAM @ 1333MHz Sapphire HD 5450 (absolute junk) Thermaltake MasterMax Outpower 420W Intel Core i3 530 (Dual-core, 2.93GHz)
Is this actually doable? Can my current rig even handle this thing, and more importantly—will my power supply survive the jump? Please, let me know what you think.
Alright folks, I'm heading out today to pick up a new graphics card at Micro Center... quick question for the group—which one of these is going to be more of a power hog? I'm looking at the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 768MB versus the Sapphire AMD Radeon HD 5770. My current PSU is a Thermaltake MaxPower 420W, so I need to know if I'm walking into a potential meltdown here.
Alright folks, let me lay out my current situation. I'm running a Thermaltake Maxout Power 420W unit, paired with an Intel Core i3 530 processor on an ASUS Ga-H55M-S2H motherboard, along with 4GB of DDR3 RAM. I’ve decided it’s finally time to swap out my graphics card. My budget is sitting right around a thousand bucks—give or take a hundred in either direction. So, what am I looking at here? Please, give me some solid recommendations. Just to be clear, I’m playing everything at 1920x1080 resolution—standard Full HD.
But let's get down to brass tacks here—what kind of power draw are we talking about? How much juice is that HD 5770 pulling versus the GTX 460 with 768MB?
Is that "Super Overclocked" model really going to squeeze out a few extra frames per second? I mean—is it even worth dropping an extra hundred bucks or so just to get the factory-overclocked version? How much of a difference am I actually going to notice in real-world usage? Give me a concrete example, like what kind of FPS jump would I see in something like Crysis.
ironsurfer8 said:Honestly, you’re just lying to yourself at this point—if you’re lighting up regularly (even if it's just a couple of sticks here and there), you’re a smoker and you’ve got the habit. Consistency is what defines an addict, plain and simple.
But look, if you’re dead set on smoking: yeah, rolling your own tobacco is a better move. Not because it magically lacks tar—don't be naive—but because it generally has fewer of those nasty artificial preservatives and additives you find in commercial brands. I actually know some long-term smokers who made the switch to roll-your-own and realized they didn't deal with that hacking morning cough anymore; they just felt better overall. So, if you absolutely insist on doing this, go with the loose tobacco, but for heaven's sake, grab some filters too.
Those tiny little filters are basically useless,🙂 Thanks for the input, everyone... if anyone else happens to be hanging around and feels like weighing in, I'd really appreciate it.🙂
Look, I’m asking the "experts" here to hold their tongues and not jump down my throat immediately... I'm 14 years old—and yeah, I smoke—but I wouldn't call myself a heavy user. It’s just maybe three cigarettes every couple of days... nothing where I feel like I've actually become an addict yet. But here's the thing: a friend of mine was telling me that rolling your own tobacco is somehow better because it doesn't have all that tar and those nasty additives found in factory stuff... So, what am I looking at? Carbon monoxide? I am fully aware that smoking is incredibly bad for you—and believe me, I know I could quit if I wanted to... The problem is, I don't want to. Whether it's standard cigarettes or the hand-rolled kind, we all know both are terrible for the lungs... My question is this: between those two specific options, which one is actually more damaging?
Bryan Evans77 said:honestly, these guys are going to go broke just trying to keep up with all our advice 🙏
So, I finally popped the case open to actually check out my PSU It’s labeled something like a Thermaltake Master—close enough, I guess xD And it claims a max output of 420W Is that actually going to cut it for an overclocked Nvidia GeForce GTX 460?
Hey everyone... I've finally reached my breaking point. I've decided it's time to pick up a budget-friendly graphics card because, frankly, I can't stand being locked out of my games anymore due to my current setup. Here’s what I’m running right now: Intel Core i3 530 2.93Ghz Gigabyte 460 GTX 4GB RAM I'm looking to drop about $333 on a new GPU. My goal is to play at a resolution of 1900x1000—and please, I need some solid advice here. I want something that actually has enough backbone to run things on max settings without choking. My absolute limit for this upgrade is $110... help me out! 🙂🙂🙂
crimsonstag84 said:I’ve been looking over the specs for this unit on the ADM site—specifically that item listed under ID 8241—and frankly, I have some thoughts. It’s one of those situations where you look at the listing and wonder if the person who put it together actually understands modern hardware requirements, or if they're just throwing parts into a bucket and hoping for the best. When you dig into the details, it feels like we're looking at a machine built for a different era entirely. It’s reminiscent of those old builds from years ago when you could get away with much lower power draws and less demanding software environments. But today? In an era where even basic multitasking can push a system to its limits, seeing configurations like this makes me want to pull my hair out. You have to ask yourself: is this a functional workstation, or is it just a collection of components masquerading as a computer? It's like buying a vintage muscle car thinking it'll handle a cross-country trek in a modern SUV—sure, it looks cool on paper, but once you hit the highway, you realize you're severely lacking the necessary horsepower and stability to keep up with the rest of the world. We aren't living in the past anymore. If you're planning to run anything remotely intensive, you need to be looking at contemporary standards, not leftovers from a decade ago. Honestly, it's frustrating to see these types of listings still circulating as "options" when anyone with a modicum of technical sense knows better.
👍
Since you already pointed me toward that motherboard—which was an absolute steal and fully supports Crros Fire—now I’m looking for the next logical step. Give me a recommendation for an SLi-capable motherboard that’s also a total bargain. Specifically, can I find an 1156 socket board that handles SLi and holds its own in terms of value? $333Look, I'm not even asking because I'm looking to pull the trigger on a purchase right now—I’m asking out of pure necessity and genuine curiosity.