Looking for midrange video card

[noxnoctum]

I'm looking to upgrade my Geforce 7900 GS to something that can better handle today's games on medium settings. Probably the most demanding game I will be playing is Battlefield Bad Company 2. My monitor is limited 1280 res though so I won't be going above that.

What are the best options out there? Really don't want to break the bank.

My computer is the standard Dell XPS 410 with all the original components. I have 2 gigs of RAM and an Intel Core Duo 6400 @ 2.13 Ghz

I was thinking of going with 4850, this one's quite cheap:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131163&cm_re=4850-_-14-131-163-_-Product

Is this a good enough card to handle most games of today on medium settings? (at 1280x1024 res)

Will my older CPU or lower RAM bottleneck the card?Should I focus more on improving those to get a gain in performance or will they perform well enough with this card?

Is the stock Dell PSU good enough?

Thanks guys, not really a hardware guy so appreciate the help.

 

[haydox]

Looking around the PSU specs seem to be:
Dell 375W
1 x 24-pin ATX; 1 x ATX12V
1 x 4-pin mini Molex
6 x SATA

I also found these requirements for a 4850 (not specifically the Powercolor one, but I couldn't find those, and these should be very similar if not the same.

"450 Watt or greater power supply with 75 Watt 6-pin PCI Express® power connector recommended".

Two things here, the wattage of your PSU appears to be too low, and the plugs available to you don't include the 6-pin PCI Express connector needed and I'm not sure you could even use a converter.

Fortunately your PC doesn't use a Dell proprietary PSU so you can easily replace it. Check on this site here (http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=108088) and look at their tiered rankings for PSUs, it's highly recommended that you get a tier 1 or 2, not purely for wattage but for build quality (I made the mistake once of getting an ebuyer value one and it blew up, frying my mobo, ram and graphics card!).

As for the card being any good, these charts here (http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/gaming-graphics-charts-2009/benchmarks,51.html) are quite useful, they sadly don't test at your resolution in any games but they have run 3D mark at it so you can compare that card to others that are out.

 

[noxnoctum]

So would this one work?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139008&cm_re=psu-_-17-139-008-_-Product

I'm a little confused cause it says the main connector is 4 pin but also mentions 6 pin the description.

I quite like the price

 

[haydox]

Can't find that on the tier list, http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=108088, and the wattage is still a little low as it's only 400W where the 4850 is recommended at 450W. It may still work (I can't be certain), however from experience I've found it best not to go for the cheapest PSU possible! It also says it has the PCI Express power connector (so that should be fine), and a lot of cards come with converters in case you have the wrong one (my PSU itself, a Hiper 680W, came with loads).

 

[mfarrukh]

Go for 4650 or 4670
My brother has 4650. It plays every game to date at highest settings on your required resolution
4670 will require 450+ Watts of PSU but will slightly perform better

 

[noxnoctum]

Hey sorry meant to post this one, thought I edited it but I guess not:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139003&cm_re=psu-_-17-139-003-_-Product

 

[haydox]

That one should work fine, it has a PCI Express connector and has a high enough wattage.

Could you find it on the tier list? If not I'd recommend finding one with a similar wattage that is tiered 1 or 2, it will probably cost more but as I said earlier it's a lot safer as if it decides to break it can surge through the rest of your system. It's not really necessary as chances of it breaking are quite low, so it's up to your budget!

 

[noxnoctum]

Cool thanks for all the great advice guys.

One last thing... is there any chance prices could drop in the next 4-5 months and the 4850 ends up being more in the $75-80 range? (or the Nvidia equivalent)?

I know graphics card prices can fall dramatically but do they ever get below $100?

 

[haydox]

Depends if something new comes out. The large price drops generally occur when either nvidia or ati release a card in direct competition with one of their rivals.

Personally I don't know if anything new is due from either company (nvidia will be working on a DX11 capable card but that will mainly affect prices of the 5k series ati).

 

[noxnoctum]

Ok guys well Newegg was having an incredible deal so I ended up getting this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161287

4670 for $75!!

Are the power and 6pin thing requirements the same?

 

[haydox]

That one only needs 400W or greater. Will still need a PCI Express plug though, I don't know if it's 4 or 6 pin but my current card (a dieing HIS 3870X2!) came with an adaptor I think, either that did or my PSU did!

Still, getting a 450W can't hurt, especially if it's a good brand too as it will last a long time and will survive another upgrade or two before becoming obsolete!

 

[jyjjy]

The HD4670 does not need a power connector and your current PSU should handle it just fine.