How Do I Know If My New Gpu Will Support My Current PC

[danielm175]

Hello,

This is my question, how do I know if a brand new GPU something like the GeForce GTX 1050 will support my current build? Like does it matter what GPU i buy or does it matter if so what does it matter about like the mother board or cpu or all of it?

As i am planing to buy a brand new GPU for my set up and I am not sure how i can tell if the new GPU (Dont have a GPU in mind yet) will support my build or any build.
Like is their a number which has to match with the GPU or something? Does it matter if its intel or amd?

Basic question: How do you know what GPU will support your build?

 

[ko888]

What are you using the PC for? Is it gaming, video editing, cryptocurrency mining, office productivity applications, web browsing, ... etc.? What display resolution will be used?

 

[zyh1987]

general speaking,
3 things as far as support goes.
1. length of the card, some things the case is too small to house the card, or sometimes the mobo has a really terrible layout and will prevent you to install a very long card. prebuild (oem) pc tends to have these types of issues. some case is also require a low profile version of the card to be installed. very common with slim pc designs.

2.power supply, a card will some time need extra power from the power supply, lower end cards tends to be fine with just the mobo powering it. where as the more power cards need additional 6/8 pin pcie power. the card will say if extra power connector are needed. and you need to make sure that your power supply supports it as well.

3. for GPU, the connector used to connect the gfx card and mobois called PCI-Express x16 slot, you need a pci-e rev 2.0 or higher to run most recent graphic cards. for this, you have to check the motherboard spec.

general rule of thumb, as long as the mobo and gfx card are made in the past 5 years, pcie slots are compatible..

for nvidia xx30,xx50 (eg 730,1030) usually runs off the motherboard without extra power connector, and low profile are widely available.
xx50ti or xx60 (eg 750ti,1050ti)usually need a 6pin connector, rare but has low profile version available.
xx70 and (eg 770, 1070) higher needs a 8pin or more power connector, generally no low profile version.

for amd cards,

x50 (rx 550)usually works off mobo. similar to xx30 from nvidia. low profile available.
x60 ( rx 560)usually needs a 6pin power connector, similar to xx50 from nvidia. low profile available.
x70/x80 (rx 470, rx 580)usually needs a 8 pin. no low profiles.

vega cards (2x8 pins)

 

[zyh1987]

Hello,

This is my question, how do I know if a brand new GPU something like the GeForce GTX 1050 will support my current build? Like does it matter what GPU i buy or does it matter if so what does it matter about like the mother board or cpu or all of it?

As i am planing to buy a brand new GPU for my set up and I am not sure how i can tell if the new GPU (Dont have a GPU in mind yet) will support my build or any build.
Like is their a number which has to match with the GPU or something? Does it matter if its intel or amd?

Basic question: How do you know what GPU will support your build?

on 2nd thought, use pcpartpicker.com as a sanity check first, it will automatically check if the motherboard and graphics are compatible,

if website says they are not compatible, likely they are not, if it says it's fine, let us have a second look as sometime the website doesn't cover all possible scenarios.

 

[kraelic]

The 1050 are usually safe bets. Some things to keep in mind 1050 has 2 GB and 3 GB versions, 1050 TI has 4 GB. Does your PSU have a 6 pin connector? If not you need to avoid the overclocked cards with the 6 pin connector. If you have an older board with PCI express 2.0 the 1050 will still work. Some really cheap OEM PC may have a 35W slot limit which a 1030 GT is the no fuss solution. A GPU with the 6 pin getting external power would work, but the kind of PC with a 35W limit would not have the 6 pin cable on the PSU either.

https://c1.neweggimages.com/productimage/14-500-411-01.jpg?ex=2 No 6 pin

https://c1.neweggimages.com/NeweggImage/ProductImageCompressAll1280/14-487-294-V03.jpg Has 6 pin under the 1050 in the label.

https://i.gyazo.com/297d230456572b5ad4954c5793ece7d6.jpg a 35W limited slot