I got a new computer about 2 years ago, and it is using onboard graphics, while there might have occasionally been a slight lag when playing multiplayer it was very slight and hardly noticeable. I'm now looking to get a graphics card and am considering these.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11...87&sr=8-4&keywords=sapphire+graphics+card+2gb

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11...87&sr=8-6&keywords=sapphire+graphics+card+2gb

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11...87&sr=8-7&keywords=sapphire+graphics+card+2gb

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-DD...87&sr=8-9&keywords=sapphire+graphics+card+2gb

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-Ra...7&sr=8-10&keywords=sapphire+graphics+card+2gb

Which one of these would be best. I dont really do heavy gaming, Total War Arena would probably be the biggest, (and what I need a graphics card for)

Also, I looked in my computer and I couldn't find a power cord for the graphics card, would it have one as it didn't come with a dedicated graphics card.

 

The R7 250 is the only one of those worth the money.

Or you can get a GTX 730 if you wanna keep it cheap.

It's sort of rare for power supplies to come without at least a single pci connector for video cards. Even if it doesn't have one it will have molex plugs check that the card you are buying comes with an adapter. Some people will tell you that you shouldn't do that and buy a new power supply, but it's fine these are low powered cards and should work without a sweat.

 

For graphics cards, notebookcheck.net is your best friend. Just run a google search for the graphics card and click the notebookcheck website, or you can visit the website directly and look for the g-card there.

 

I'd spend a bit more and go for the 750Ti. I'd say it's the best low-cost card that you can get for gaming, and since it doesn't need an extra power plug you also won't have problems there.

 

I bought the graphics card, but when I put it in my computer and turned it on, my monitor shows that it has no signal and keyboard and mouse no longer work when plugged into the usb port. My speakers do work
Is it a power problem?

 

If you connected your monitor to the card after you installed it then it's probably a power issue. Higher end graphics cards sometimes require more power than the PCIe port can provide on its own. There should be a place on the card itself where you connect the computer's power supply.

 

While it could technically be a couple of things, like old video drivers causing trouble or outdated chipset drivers, it's probably the power supply.

Do you know what PSU you have? also some other stats on the pc would be usefull. Like which card did you actually buy, what motherboard you have etc.

 

The 750Ti doesn't, so if he got that I find it quite hard to believe that it would be a power issue, especially since he said he got his PC 2 years ago...you can't rule it out of course, but if a 750Ti really pushes the PSU over the limit then it's probably been running close to it's limits already.

 

Sorry it took so long to reply, I got the 750Ti that Sacro recommended. I have the required power supply that they recommend, so I'm not sure what else I can do, apart from get a more powerful PSU. Is there anything I can do to increase power supply without getting another PSU?

 

Two things:

Just to confirm, you're plugging the monitor into the graphics card, yes? You shouldn't be using the same connector you were using before.

Secondly, did you uninstall the on-board graphics drivers before you put the new card in? If not, do that.

 

I have two questions, one: Nvidia GTX 980Ti or GTX Titan, second one: Two graphics cards makes minimum sense if the computer will only be used for gaming, right?

 

980Ti, or as an alternative the FuryX

SLI/Crossfire makes sense in gaming builds. It's just that there are problems with it, like lack of or not proper support for games, micro stuttering and of course they can scale quite bad (from what was said, DX12 might change that though). In the end you should only go for SLI/Crossfire when you already have the most powerfull GPU in your system and still want more performance.

Anyways, Troy: check what Taure said. Also, if you do have it plugged in correctly, try switching the connector to your onboard GPU after you turned your pc on. If an image appears without a restart, go into BIOS/UEFI and under advanced search for the iGPU setting and set it to off, PCIE first or something like that and try again.

 

Thanks, I was plugging it into the monitor, but I hadn't uninstalled the on board graphics, I was planning on doing that after I had installed the graphics card. I'll try that. Would that be such a power sync that the mouse and keyboard would not work either?

 

Purchasing a New Card

Instead of cluttering the forum with another new thread, I thought I'd necro this one to ask a similar question.

I'm finally getting around to buying a video card. Currently, I have a BFG Tech GTX 280, along with another, smaller card (so I can run multiple monitors. The BFG was for gaming back in the day, but I didn't care for SLI nor had the budget for more than one major card).

I'm looking at the GTX 970, but wondering if it's what I really need (generally). I don't game much on my computer. I do, however, transcode and save movies (a GPU engine would definitely help), work with graphics while designing fliers, handouts, welcoming kits, etc. I have done video editing before, and will be doing more of it soon, probably 5-10 minute clips in 1080p. I'll probably throw back on my computer and enjoy, but that's not the priority (Crysis, for instance).

So, is the 970 overkill for something like that? Should I go down to the 960? I do have a few games

 

From what I understand, if you're doing video encoding, the best single upgrade you can make is upgrading from an i5 to an i7. So it would be better to get an i7 with a slightly cheaper graphics card than an i5 with the 970.

I can't speak to the 970's specific performance, however.

 

Going to need more information on your system and software. A CPU upgrade or overclock could be the better option. For example, modern CPUs come with integrated graphics that can accelerate those things so you don't need a 970 (or other high end graphics card) and the higher IPC/higher frequencies would process everything else a little faster. Obviously this foregoes any improvement in gaming.

 

I was thinking just about the card, but I guess it makes sense since some MOBOs don't have all the channels for cards. So, sorry about that...

Chip: I7 4790K oc'd to 4.6
Ram: 16 GB, 2133 Mhz
MOBO: Asus ROG Maximus VII Hero
Samsung 840 SSD (about to upgrade)
Raid 5 D: drive (4 1TB harddrives @7200 rpm)
AX1200 PSU

 

I don't really know. It depends on if you want to use hardware or software-based transcoding. Hardware seems to be faster, while software is better quality. It's not as cut and dried as that, and you have to consider where you want to be on the scale.

Alright, so try these articles and forum thread:

The Tech Report - A look at hardware video transcoding on the PC - July 2012
Tom's Hardware - Video Transcoding Examined: AMD, Intel, And Nvidia In-Depth - Feb 2011
Extreme Tech - The wretched state of GPU transcoding - May 2012
ars technica's forum - Hardware Video Encoding: Not What It's Cracked Up To Be - Mar 2014
Stack Exchange/Video Production - Why processor is “better” for encoding than GPU? - Jan 2015

I havent' done more than glance at the articles and threads, but it seems that hardware solutions like Intel's Quick Sync might not be the highest quality, but they're awesome at transcoding live video streams. If you need to move video fast, then that's the way to go.

If you want quality, then it'd appears that the CPU is king.

I don't know if you can use your GPU to take on some of the CPU's duties [eg. CUDA] when it comes to transcoding video, but the info is probably in there somewhere.

 

Thanks.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to stay with GPUs because a lot of what I do is ripping and saving blu-rays to a common format so I don't destroy the disks. Then, those get transcoded on the fly for my specific setup on my main tv screen. It's the only way I could get it to work like that, although I wish I didn't have to transcode.

But, in another way, your post helped because I realized if I am dependent on CUDA (and I am for ripping movies), I want the best possible. The question, then, is how much difference is there between the 960 and 970 for those purposes? Guess I'll have to do a little research and find out (unless someone here knows off the top of his-her head.)

---------- Post automerged 10-07-2015 at 01:08 PM ---------- Previous post was 10-06-2015 at 03:39 PM ----------

So, I've narrowed my choice to this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127850

Anyone have any thoughts on it?

I'm also buying a new drive, and have settled on this. Again, anyone have any thoughts on it? It's about $80 out of my budget, but for the speed over a regular SSD, I thought it worth it. I have a PCI-E 2.0 16x slot open that shares a lane with the m.2. Since I'm not using an m.2, there's no problems with my MOBO handling it, or fitting it in with the above card and secondary card I'm keeping for my third and fourth screen.

 

The card is good. The card normally comes in red but that's the limited edition one that MSI produced for having shipped over 100 million products. It comes with a backplate unlike the original version. If you aren't a fan of the colour you can take apart the cooler and spray it as the green and black parts are individual pieces that have been screwed together.

You should be aware that the only 3.5Gb of the 970's memory runs at full speed. The other half gig runs much slower but it is only used when the other 3.5 gigs are unavailable. If you are looking to do any gaming (from your post I don't think you are) you will have to be careful when trying to run at resolutions above your native, or using lots of MSAA. I can't really speak on how this will affect encoding and the like but I imagine it may have an affect.