I have a very old PC from early 2012 (2500k, Radeon 7970). I primarily play older and indie games, and it meets my needs just fine, so I'm not looking to do a new build right now unless I absolutely have to. I just realized that my GPU fans are dead. Is it possible for me to buy a new cheap GPU (>$200US) that's (1) at least as good as my current 7970 and (2) compatible with my old motherboard? It's a Biostar TZ77XE3, and I seem to have a "2 x PCI-E 3.0 x16 Slot".
https://www.biostar.com.tw/app/en/eol/introduction.php?S_ID=581#specification
I was looking at the RX 580 for $150, but I'm completely open to other suggestions. Thanks!
I would say buying new for $200 or less you are left with only a 8 GB RX 6600. The only problem is that it is a pci-e x8 interface however your CPU will be a bottleneck long before it saturates a pci-e 3 x8 interface so I’d honestly say get the RX 6600 and eventually, when you get a cpu upgrade, it’ll be a sweet setup. (IE the rx 6600 with a 2500k cpu will be a good upgrade and, since your 2500k will be holding it back some, if you ever get a new cpu, the rx 6600 will deliver a free performance boost due to not being held back anymore. Which is always nice!)
You can also get a GTX 1650 / 1660, or an Intel A380 but they are too limited in VRAM to be of use today. The RX 6600 will provide the longest lifetime relevance of all the less than $200 new cards.
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www.microcenter.com
Get it now! Based on AMD RDNA 2 architecture, the PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6600 graphics card features 28 Compute Units, 32 MB of all new AMD Infinity Cache and 8 GB of dedicated GDDR6 memory, is engineered to deliver ultra-high frame rates and ultimate 1080p gaming experience.
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Used I would say a RX 5700 xt is a good price, 8GB vram, with a full pci-e x16 interface. Or an RX 580-90 if the price is right (rx 5700 xt is better than RX 580-90 so only get 580-90 if price reflects the delta in performance).
Another used thought is the 8GB GTX 1070 / 1070 Ti / 1080 depending on price.
All pci-e interfaces are compatible with the previous generations. So if you are buying new they will all be pci-e gen 4 but work seamlessly with pci-e gen 3 motherboards.
Hope this helps!