Enough room for another graphics card?

josh91

josh91

josh91

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So guys I just brought this: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-101-OE

With the GTX 460 768MB graphics card option, though now I feel a bit silly because I've been told & read that soon there'll be games that will easily fill up a 1GB graphics card and I don't even have that, so I was maybe gonna buy another GTX 460 768MB or just bung a GTX 470 1GB in there too.

Thing is I'm a massive hardware noob and can't tell if there's enough room in there. Looked inside the beast and it doesn't really look like it'd fit.

I put a network card in the PCI slot available and underneath that there's a slot that looks similar to the one the graphics card is in although there's other wires & stuff in there that would prevent a graphics card fitting in there.

Well enough waffling on I was just wondering if anyone knew if there was enough room to slot another graphics card in there or will I just need to plump for a whole new 1.5GB~ graphics card?
 
When I said that in the other thread, what I meant was that as a long-term strategy for high-res gaming, the 1GB is the better option.

The 768 is still *plenty* enough for modern gaming. My advice to you would be to save that money and buy a new graphics card when your 768 starts struggling- you'll get far better value out of your money.

Even if you play a game that requires 1GB of VRAM, and your 768 is struggling, tweaking down the resolution or graphics settings from max AA or 1900x1200 to something a little less demanding should do the trick. I'd recommend the 1GB to any new buyers, but trust me, don't fret over it :)
 
Okay cool, that's reassuring.

For future reference you don't happen to know if I can fit 2 graphics cards on my monitor do you?
 
the gtx 460 will be fine for a while yet.
what resolution (screen size) are you using.
its a ddr5 gpu. which is faster than a 1gb ddr3 gpu. (correct me if i am wrong guys)
its the best card for the money out now and you should have no problems with it, running games

yes your mobo does support sli, so you could stick another card in there, but that would be a waste of money.
 
j.col said:
the gtx 460 will be fine for a while yet.
what resolution (screen size) are you using.
its a ddr5 gpu. which is faster than a 1gb ddr3 gpu. (correct me if i am wrong guys)
its the best card for the money out now and you should have no problems with it, running games

yes your mobo does support sli, so you could stick another card in there, but that would be a waste of money.
Click to expand...

You're bang on that the GDDR5 is fast as hell- considerably faster than the DDR3. The 768 460 will likely outperform many of the 1GB cards for a long time because of this.

1920x1080 is a breeze for the 460 on either model, try racking up the settings in your favourite games and feel the power. I'm sure you could do max settings on most games. This guy's absolutely right on both counts for SLI- your mobo would support it and I'm sure you could fit it in there with some moving wires about, but also SLI isn't really worth the money (and doesn't offer any real performance gains) at the moment, unless you're running at 2560x1600.
 
Ah this is good news, all is good in the world again ;D
Gonna hook up the TV which is a 64" beast, reckon I'd notice too much fuzziness? Or am I just getting silly now?
 
460 768MB will just about cope with most modern games at 1080p on high settings. i5 and better GPU would have been my choice for gaming ;). Save up for the new AMD 69xx cards for a decent upgrade in future, or whatever Nvidia bring to the table. 2x 460s will not solve any memory limitations you may run into, as it's still 768MB per GPU - you dont double your VRAM with SLI! Will get a decent performance gain though (dunno what hybrid572 is talking about really - 2x 460 spank a single 480 in games that support SLI well, which is pretty much all of them nowadays).

For your mobo, to get full 16x/16x SLI you'd need to use the 1st and third slots (i.e. GPUs right next to each other). This would mean ditching your PCI card, but you can get a PCIe one instead. You could use the bottom slot, but you'll be limited to x16/x8 or x8/x8 SLI (not sure). Not really much performance difference there (couple of %) - biggest problem is the wires in the way if you're using floppy/IDE/front USB etc, but it'll probably squeeze in.

You have a decent rig - enjoy :).
 
Liampope said:
dunno what hybrid572 is talking about really - 2x 460 spank a single 480 in games that support SLI well, which is pretty much all of them nowadays
Click to expand...

To clarify, I completely agree that two 460s in SLI will beat the hell out of a 480. However, my meaning was that you can play on 1920x1080 at high settings- albeit not max- in the most demanding games with a single 460. Spending an extra ~£150 for a slightly higher quality gaming experience in a few super-demanding games seems like overkill to me, particularly when an average user wants to play Fallout: New Vegas or similar.

You are right in that 2 460s in SLI will perform better of course- I'm just questioning whether it's noticeable for the cost.
 
Ah I see - it was when you said SLI 'doesn't offer any real performance gains' I thought huh?? I see your point - where a single card can do 60 FPS, 2x cards doing 100 FPS isn't a noticable improvement. There are a lot of situations though nowadays where a single 460 wont manage anywhere near 60 FPS without settings reduced - hell my very OC'd 5850 drops to 30ish in maxed out Crysis:( (but what doesn't :)). All depends what/how you want to play I guess.
 
I apologise for the confusing language, you were right to correct me in what I originally said, but I'm glad you'll agree on my true point. A super-OC'd 5850 sounds pretty uber actually, how would you compare it to a 460 or 5770?
 
I've been lucky and got a good reference one that does 975/1275 comfortably and 1GHz if I let it get rather toasty. A fair bit faster than a 460 and certainly a 5770. Even a more moderately OC'd 5870. So quite uber, yeah:). A new 5850 is a ridiculous proposition now, though, as they seem to have frozen at their old high prices dispite the tumbling of 460 and 470 prices and release of the 68xx cards. And that wont be a reference one. Still if you can pick up a ref 5850 second hand and it clocks well, it would be a good buy imho. I'd like to be lucky enough to find a matching one cheap and x-fire mine some day. I can wait patiently though as this one is fine for now.
 
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Ah not being able to max crysis sucks, I bought this thing to be able to max the living hell out of everything, my friends told me I could max everything with just a 460.

Looks like I'll be getting a 68xx card sooner or later ^^

Thanks a lot guys.
 
Minimum frame rate for Crysis

You'd have to spend at *least* £300 to get playable performance on Gamer Quality + Enthusiast Shaders - 4xAA at 1900x1080 for Crysis. It's a ridiculously demanding game on graphics performance and you really shouldn't fret about it.

Check out Hawx and Battleforge on super-duper settings at your resolution on the same website for an idea of how it plays typical top-rate games.
 
hybrid572 said:
Minimum frame rate for Crysis

You'd have to spend at *least* £300 to get playable performance on Gamer Quality + Enthusiast Shaders - 4xAA at 1900x1080 for Crysis. It's a ridiculously demanding game on graphics performance and you really shouldn't fret about it.
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Actually what you quoted is Crysis Warhead, which itself is already less demanding than the original Crysis. To play Crysis with decent frame rate at highest quality at 1920 with x2/x4 AA, one would need at least a 5970 or overclocked GTX480 or SLI GTX460 or xfire 6850/5850.
 
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