Would Radeon R7 250 a good buy for my machine specs?

[touchofevil]

Hi,

Recently i have had an issue with my existing graphic card, and probably i will have to get it replaced. I am currently using ATI Radeon HD 4670, bought about 4-5 yrs ago.

The games i usually play are not hugely graphic oriented, but I do sometimes work on Video editing softwares (premiere pro 6).
My games list would be mainly of strategic games out of which possibly the highest graphical game would be,
SIMS 3
SIMCity 2013
Civilization V

My machine specs are (yes they're 4-5 yrs old except SMPS) :
Processor : Intel i-5 760 (2.8Ghz)
Motherboard : Gigabyte H55M-D2H
SMSP : 550 W (this is what is on label, but am not too sure if i should be trusting it)
1 TB seagate baracuda
6 GB DDR3 Ram (4+2, Transcend)
(To add to it whatever graphic card i put in)

So since I have to buy a new card i was zeroing in on Radeon R7 250 1GB. Well my budget at the very most can be stretched to this card's price which is, from what i found online, about (6.5k/$110).
1) Is it a good choice in general?? I mean not just for now, but for say 2-3 yrs down the line would it still be a good card, considering the kind of games that would come out (eg. SIMS4)??

2) On these machine specs would R7 250 work, or do i need to change anything?

3) Do i need an upgrade to entire machine? I would absolutely hate to do that (Money crunch 😛), but recently i have started observing a few issues coming up, which am not entirely sure if they're down to some hardware becoming too old/corrupt/broken. I would hate to end up changing all components one by one except maybe my cabinet and monitor (Simply because it would cost more than a full upgrade).

Thanks in advance

If not, would you able to suggest me a good Graphic card that would go okay with my specs?

 

[rolli59]

The 250 would be an upgrade from your current card, your machine will run it fine and even support stronger cards like R7 265 which will last longer performance wise.
550watt on the label and the other important thing on it is Amperage on +12 volt rail?

 

[touchofevil]

The 250 would be an upgrade from your current card, your machine will run it fine and even support stronger cards like R7 265 which will last longer performance wise.
550watt on the label and the other important thing on it is Amperage on +12 volt rail?

Sorry I don't understand much(anything) in it. But in the stupidest of fashion i checked +12V and it showed 10A underneath.
Not sure if it helps.
Thanks for the reply though. Am glad to know that R7 250 would work

 

[rolli59]

The 250 would be an upgrade from your current card, your machine will run it fine and even support stronger cards like R7 265 which will last longer performance wise.
550watt on the label and the other important thing on it is Amperage on +12 volt rail?

Sorry I don't understand much(anything) in it. But in the stupidest of fashion i checked +12V and it showed 10A underneath.
Not sure if it helps.
Thanks for the reply though. Am glad to know that R7 250 would work

That does not look good unless there are more than 1 rail, typically a modern 550watt PSU has around 40amps on the +12 volts.
Can you get a make model of the PSU?

 

[touchofevil]

That does not look good unless there are more than 1 rail, typically a modern 550watt PSU has around 40amps on the +12 volts.
Can you get a make model of the PSU?

Its something called FUEL. Not entirely sure if its a typical brand or something local.

Also, in DC output on the Label it mentions this (not sure if this is what you mean by rail)
Voltage:
+3.3 V - 12 A
+12V - 10 A
-12 - 0.8 A
Current:
+5 V - 20 A
-5 V - 0.8 A
+5VSB - 2.5 A

Its all alien to me to be honest.. But would this in anyway affect the graphics card support? would that graphic card not run on this now??

 

[rolli59]

That does not look good unless there are more than 1 rail, typically a modern 550watt PSU has around 40amps on the +12 volts.
Can you get a make model of the PSU?

Its something called FUEL. Not entirely sure if its a typical brand or something local.

Also, in DC output on the Label it mentions this (not sure if this is what you mean by rail)
Voltage:
+3.3 V - 12 A
+12V - 10 A
-12 - 0.8 A
Current:
+5 V - 20 A
-5 V - 0.8 A
+5VSB - 2.5 A

Its all alien to me to be honest.. But would this in anyway affect the graphics card support? would that graphic card not run on this now??

There is no way those numbers add up to 550watts.
3.3Volts total 39.6watts
12V = 120w
-12V = 9.6W
5V = 100W
-5V = 4W
+5VSB = 12.5W
Or total of just over 250watts.
May be the reason the old card failed, get a modern unit around 500watts and GPU like R7 265.

 

[touchofevil]

There is no way those numbers add up to 550watts.
3.3Volts total 39.6watts
12V = 120w
-12V = 9.6W
5V = 100W
-5V = 4W
+5VSB = 12.5W
Or total of just over 250watts.
May be the reason the old card failed, get a modern unit around 500watts and GPU like R7 265.

Hi Rolli59,
Thanks a lot for all the help you are providing. After considering what you have said, may i ask what is the minimum wattage i would need (i searched on net and it said min of 350W is required while R7 250 says minimum of 400W required) and what would be a good PSU (wattage as well as brand) for my above mentioned specs with R7 250 1GB DDR5 (sorry, 265 is really going out of budget, speciall now with new PSU coming in)? Also is there a better GPU in the same range as of R7 250? am open to the other products as long as they fit in budget.
Also would it be better to buy a 1GB DDR5, or 2GB of DDR3 of the same model??

If 500-550W is the answer, then would this be a good product? or is there something better than this?
http://www.corsair.com/en/vs-seriestm-vs550-550-watt-power-supply

Again I have not much idea on PSUs, so any suggestions are welcome.

 

[rolli59]

1 GB DDR5 is always going to be faster regardless of memory size, really the card is hardly powerful enough for more. The card will run on a modern 300watt PSU without problems. The Corsair VS is their budget line and the 450watt version would be plenty for you.

 

[touchofevil]

1 GB DDR5 is always going to be faster regardless of memory size, really the card is hardly powerful enough for more. The card will run on a modern 300watt PSU without problems. The Corsair VS is their budget line and the 450watt version would be plenty for you.

So finally i have managed to get R7 250X in my budget price from one of the online retailers. Checked all the requirements and it looks much better than my original choice of 250. Thank you rolli59 for the advice

Also to go along with it I have bought Corsair VS 550. Now there are couple of issues/questions I have regarding it.

I put all of it together. My PSU area is top left of a cabinet so i have kept it fan down, below it, comes the mother board, and the bottom most stack would have my graphic card, if you look from above. Also I keep my case opened (mainly as previously i was worried it was not getting enough air flow and also it is easier for me to check if something is wrong, so yes it has clearly visible dust). But when I noticed yesterday, the PSU fan is not spinning. I came to know from some online sites that it only spins when the temp rises too much. If thats the case am okay with it, but can you please confirm on the same?

Also, when I started a game (SIMS 4), after about 5 odd minutes the PC restarted on its own. This is a similar phenomenon to what i was facing earlier before all started falling apart. I thought it was due to overheating, so i downloaded RealTemp and checked core temperatures were on idle around 45-50 C. Room temp is ususally 30 C. I found similar results in BIOS as well. The same restart behavior occured while trying to refresh the windows experience ranking as well. Similar behavior was seen when trying to download and install windows updates, so I do not think it is related to gaming or high load stuff as such. But now am worried that if i try pushing it the new system might break as well.

On checking in the Even viewer I noticed a critical error something like Kernel lost power (I think error 41). All the parameters of the log for the same were 0 (or its representation, but 0, nothing in hex). I do believe that similar sort of events were happening before all started breaking, though I vaguely remember seeing the same error log with some hex values back then. Which brings my suspicion to only remaining unchanged part, Motherboard.

So before I go gung ho on my machine and as good as build a new one (which is my very last resort, since am still not out of tight budget crunch, which has almost been exhausted by these recent purchases), can you please let me know in your opinion do you think its the problem with motherboard? I can't seem to pinpoint the issue as apparently I have had to change almost every single part except MoBo, Processor.

Also if it is of any importance then for almost a week I have been running the same with only change in graphic card which was, i believe NVidia GEForce 7300 SE/7200 GS which was i think DDR3(or maybe 2, not sure. its almost 8-9 years old card) 256 MB card. This worked fine, and the pc never rebooted like it is doing now. The PSU I was using was the above mentioned 250W one.

Oh, And yesterday I also got a warning/notification that the Device driver had crashed and recovered. Not entirely sure why and if its related, but my previous graphic card had gone haywire after getting that notification like about thrice. So just not sure if i should attach new card or not, as i don't want it to go the same way as well?

Is there anything at all I can do to stop all this and get my machine working?

To save you all trouble just re mentioning my machine specs with the updates :
My machine specs are :
Processor : Intel i-5 760 (2.8Ghz)
Motherboard : Gigabyte H55M-D2H
SMSP : Corsair VS 550
1 TB seagate baracuda
6 GB DDR3 Ram (4+2, Transcend)
Sapphire Radeon R7 250X - 1GB DDR5

 

[Conster]

Hmm, are you sure everything is seated and connected properly? You have plenty of power, so that shouldn't be the issue. Make sure all of your drivers are up to date. Are you running the latest driver for your GPU?
EDIT: Nevermind, scratch all that. I just noticed you said your fan wasn't spinning on the PSU. That is your problem. The VS series PSU's don't have a fan controller, so the fan should be on at all times. If I were you, I'd return it.

 

[touchofevil]

Hmm, are you sure everything is seated and connected properly? You have plenty of power, so that shouldn't be the issue. Make sure all of your drivers are up to date. Are you running the latest driver for your GPU?
EDIT: Nevermind, scratch all that. I just noticed you said your fan wasn't spinning on the PSU. That is your problem. The VS series PSU's don't have a fan controller, so the fan should be on at all times. If I were you, I'd return it.

Pretty sure all of it is seated correctly, and i would like to hope that all is connected properly as well. Drivers as well as BIOS is up to date.
Will try detaching PSU from my machine and try to see if the fan runs on some other machine, that would let me know if its something with my machine or the PSU. But I still fail to understand why the older one failed along with a lot of other hardware.

 

[Conster]

Hmm, are you sure everything is seated and connected properly? You have plenty of power, so that shouldn't be the issue. Make sure all of your drivers are up to date. Are you running the latest driver for your GPU?
EDIT: Nevermind, scratch all that. I just noticed you said your fan wasn't spinning on the PSU. That is your problem. The VS series PSU's don't have a fan controller, so the fan should be on at all times. If I were you, I'd return it.

Pretty sure all of it is seated correctly, and i would like to hope that all is connected properly as well. Drivers as well as BIOS is up to date.
Will try detaching PSU from my machine and try to see if the fan runs on some other machine, that would let me know if its something with my machine or the PSU. But I still fail to understand why the older one failed along with a lot of other hardware.

The older PSU was severely lacking, and was probably under stress. 10A on the 12v rail is minuscule. Also, before sending the PSU back, try nudging the centre of the fan with a pencil. (Rubber side, and very softly) it could have slightly dropped during transit. I took that little trick from corsairs website. "One quick thing you can do before returning the PSU.... Take a pencil, and with the eraser side push down on the center hub of the fan to make sure it's fully seated.
I've see a few PSUs that, when they get dropped, the fan blade body will become detached from the spindle side of the fan and the fan won't spin. But 9 out of 10 times the fan can be popped back into place.
The PSUs are all burned in for a few hours before they ship, so you know the PSU didn't leave the factory that way. So I bet it was dropped somewhere in transit."

 

[rolli59]

Agree if the fan is not spinning it is faulty. Whether it can be popped back in place I do not know but needs to be replaced if no easy fix.

 

[touchofevil]

The older PSU was severely lacking, and was probably under stress. 10A on the 12v rail is minuscule. Also, before sending the PSU back, try nudging the centre of the fan with a pencil. (Rubber side, and very softly) it could have slightly dropped during transit. I took that little trick from corsairs website. "One quick thing you can do before returning the PSU.... Take a pencil, and with the eraser side push down on the center hub of the fan to make sure it's fully seated.
I've see a few PSUs that, when they get dropped, the fan blade body will become detached from the spindle side of the fan and the fan won't spin. But 9 out of 10 times the fan can be popped back into place.
The PSUs are all burned in for a few hours before they ship, so you know the PSU didn't leave the factory that way. So I bet it was dropped somewhere in transit."

Just tried that method but to no avail. Also when i blow the fan with some air the fan spins. Its spinning seems heavy and makes noise as if brushing against something, similar to that of old mixers. But since the fan moves when blown, i think it would be safe to rule out that it has been detached from spindle.
Guess i will have to RMA it. Tough luck 🙁

 

[touchofevil]

Thank you Rolli59 for all the help you have provided. Also thanks to Conster for the help with SMPS.

 

[rolli59]

You are welcome.