upgrading to gtx 460

[fewfe3]

im looking at upgrading my whole system, the first thing i am looking to get is a gtx460
been away from PC gaming but am getting back into it.

currantly running a rig that is 5 years old so i think it is all due an upgrade

pentiumD 950 @ 3.8ghz
2gb ram
2 x 7300GT
gtx light 480 PSU
p6n sli platinum motherboard

Dont have a lot of money to spend atm, will my PSU handle a GTX460, or should i upgrade it.
Or is my CPU to much of a bottleneck, and i should spend my money elsewhere first

 

[Liquiduk]

Im not so hot on whether this PSU is a branded decent PSU, but if it has worked for two 7300GT's IT may well be sufficient for a GTX 460 although if it were me I would save an extra £60-80 for a 600w branded power supply.

 

[fewfe3]

I think that the PSU is made by X-power. What sort of branded PSU would you suggest

 

[Emphacy]

The PSU may need an upgrade. The efficiency may not be upto the job, but I would upgrade anyways.
If upgrading i'd reccomend a corsair PSU or similar, possibly 600-800W.

Your CPU is definitely a bottleneck. I'd upgrade right away, IIRC it's a socket 775. A nice E6300 or Q6600 would go nicely with a GTX 460.

 

[SouthEastBlue]

A decent 500w PSU is fine for a GTX 460, although with such and old processor and only 2GB of ram the gaming performance will be held back.

Probably not what you want to hear but a cheap AM3 based quad/tri core system would be much better and you could probably get the lot for around £100 or not much more if you bought a 2nd hand processor, cheap MATX mobo and 4GB DDR3 ram.

 

[fewfe3]

Thought that might be the case. How much are Q6600 nowadays. and how would they compare if i was to upgrade to an i3/i5 system

 

[Marine-RX179]

How much are Q6600 nowadays. and how would they compare if i was to upgrade to an i3/i5 system

2nd hand should be around £60-£80, and a Q6600 overclock to 3.6GHz is around as fast as a i5 750 at stock speed 2.66GHz, and miles behind SandyBridge.

I used to run my current Q6600 on a P6N SLI board, and it struggle to overclock stable beyond 3.0GHz...also not to mention the board itself is rather sluggish as well.

If you got the money, I would strongly suggest you go straight for a SandyBridge build. Also, I wouldn't recommend getting GTX460 before you upgrade your CPU, as you won't even be getting half the performance out of it with your current CPU, and graphic card's value/price would only drop, not rise...so it's definitely best get the graphic card, WHEN you upgrade your CPU/platform.

 

[fewfe3]

I think i am going to hold off for a while then, eager to wait untill Bulldozer is realeased, to see if it will make a difference. although i dont think i can wait that long

 

[opethdisciple]

Yea I was going to say the same thing. A pentium class cpu cant game any more, and it would be a waste of money pairing a Pentium D with a GTX 460.

I think if you cant do a complete upgrade at the moment, then you basically need to save up and get something like this (or better):

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BU-189-OK&groupid=43&catid=339&subcat=1804

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BU-189-OK&groupid=43&catid=339&subcat=1804

Obviously once you get something like this, you can add your gpu afterwords.

Lets put it this way, if you where to get one of the cheap 5850 cards currently on offer, your looking at about £330 for a complete system upgrade.

I was shocked to see how cheap thet 6 core AMD build is. But it is a little cheaper than the i3 becuase it only comes with a stock heatsink.

Edit*

Look at this even cheaper!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BU-188-OK&groupid=43&catid=339&subcat=1804

Add a 460 to the equation or a 5850 (one of these or one of these) which is a bit more powerful, and you are sorted!

 

[fewfe3]

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...39&subcat=1804

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...39&subcat=1804

saw these systems before, and i couldnt believe how cheap they were. never really thought about going AMD before, but this could be a start.