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What would I have to upgrade?

Tripp0

Tripp0

Tripp0

Associate
Joined
27 Sep 2011
Posts
37
Hey there, I'm wanting to upgrade my graphics card because the one I have at the moment is a bit unreliable. It has quite a few fps drops, some absolutely awful screen tearing and it's just not as powerful a card as I am wanting at the moment.

My specs are:
Case: Antec 300 Gaming Case - Black
CPU: Intel Core i5 2500K 3.30GHz (overclocked to 4.6) Sandybridge
Power Supply: OCZ ZS650w PSU
Motherboard: Gigabyte 277X-D3H Intel 277 (Socket 1155) DDR3
Cooler: OcUK h2 Flo Extreme CPU Cooler
GPU: HIS ATI Radeon HD 6950 2GB
RAM: 8GB DDR3 1600MHz
Hard Drive: 500GB HDD (with external)

I'm was looking at this card: KFA2 GeForce GTX 680 LTD OC V2 2048MB
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-030-KF&tool=3

I am well aware that I would have to upgrade my power supply, which power supply would be a good one to go for?

Also, I am open to suggestions in terms of what card I should go for. I am really just eager to get a card that will run any current game at 60 fps and above and I am aware that it could cost quite a lot of money. My budget for the card itself would be £500, but that would be the maximum (excluding the power supply cost).

I am wanting to run games such as Assassin's Creed 3 when it comes out smoothly as close to top spec as I can at 60fps if that's possible with my budget.

Overall I am wondering what I would have to upgrade in my PC to match the card I linked above, or whichever card you would suggest.

Thank you :)
 
Your PSU seem fines to me. What res are you gaming at? If 1920 then either 7970 or GTX670 should do great, but it will still dip below 60fps at times if you play on ultra settings on the more demanding games.

If however really don't mind spending all of that £500 budget, then I think your best option is probably sell the 6950 and use that money on getting a decent 850W PSU...like the current XFX850 XXX that's on offer at the moment, and then use your £500 on getting a pair of 7950?
 
650W power supply is plenty for any single card solution.

go 7950 sli.

2 X 79580's and a 2500K with 4 sticks of RAM power usage is only 450W reccommended so you should be fine on that 650W with sli on new cards.
 
Just upgrade your GPU as others have said. A quality 650W PSU is more than adequate for any of this gen's single GPUs solutions.

For reference I have an 8 year old Enermax 620W PSU and it's rock solid. Seen me through the original machine and two subsequent upgrades and never missed a beat. Best £140 I've ever spent on PC hardware.
 
Rusty0611 said:
Although 79xx series are slightly more power hungry this should give you food for thought:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18442914
Click to expand...
Yea...let's estimate with max power consumption, a single 7950 max power consumption is around 200W according to techpowerup (not including overclocking), a pair of them could potentially consume up to 400W with two, adding an overclock i5 2500K could use up to 80W-100W, so that's 480-500W max power consumption on the 12v rail on the high estimate. And according to the spec, the OCZ only has a max output of 552W on the 12v rail:
www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/548?vs=660
If the PSU had higher 12V rail, then could probably getting away with using just the 650W, but unfortunately the OCZ ZS650 only has max output of 552W on the 12v rail out of the total 650W.

At 90% load, not only the power efficiency would go down, but also would stress the PSU quite heavily, and not only it would be quite hot, but fanspeed of the PSU could spin up to the speed that the noise level becomes intruding. I would recommend getting at least a decent 750W if going for Crossfire 7950 if budget allows.
 
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You would normally expect efficiencies to increase, not decrease, as the load approaches 100%.

If a PSU is designed for 600W, it will most likely be close to peak efficiency from 400W+ but will still increase in efficiency as it closes on its max.
 
If you are set on a 680, go for the MSI Lightning. If you are open to suggestions the 670/7950 are the cheaper but almost as good alternatives.

What refresh rate is your monitor? Screen tearing is usually associated with the fps being higher than the monitors refresh rate.
 
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