Oppinions on PNY Verto GeForce 6600?

[Chris_F]

I'm upgrading my humble computer and adding a gig of memory and a new video card.

[ctjoyce]

PNY = Crap
6600 = Crap

You need the 6600GT as a minimum. If you go for nVidia look at eVGA, and BFG Tech. Also newegg.com will beat out anyones prices. I mean anyones. However I would suggets a ATi Radeon X800XT from sapphire, or the 6800GS from eVGA over the 6600GT

Cheers
Cameron

[Chris_F]

PNY = Crap
6600 = Crap

You need the 6600GT as a minimum. If you go for nVidia look at eVGA, and BFG Tech. Also newegg.com will beat out anyones prices. I mean anyones. However I would suggets a ATi Radeon X800XT from sapphire, or the 6800GS from eVGA over the 6600GT

Cheers
Cameron

Thanks.  I checked out newegg and now I'm eyeing the eVGA 6800 card.  My concern now is whether or not it will fit in my case (I read an internet posting that the eVGA card was long and may not fit some cases).  I plan on cracking my case open tonight to measure.  Then I hope I can find some card dimensions posted on the web so that I can make sure things 'll fit.  If not then I'll have to find something physically smaller, but hopefully still a 6800.

I'm kinda sold on nVidia.  I'm sure the ATI cards are great and for the money I could probably get more horsepower from an ATI, but I like to stick with what works and nVidia hasn't done me wrong yet.  Perhaps if I can't find a 6800 card at a good price that fits my box I'll check the ATI's as a second option.

[ctjoyce]

Well unless you have a low profile system, or a shuttle (frag box) then it will fit. I think those people were talking about how some of their cards are dule slot because of the cooling

Cheers
Cameron

[Chris_F]

Any advice on power supplies?  My current is a 250W, which I'd think would be enough but the CompUSA page (not exactly a reliable source IMO) says I need a 350W to run a 6800 card.  I can't imagine a card consuming 100 watts!  But there is a big heat sink on that sucker and that heat's gotta come from somewhere...

[ctjoyce]

Chris you need atleast 350 to run a P4. A 450Watt PSU for a gameing system is about where you should start looking. I personally have a Hiper Type R http://www.frozencpu.com/psu-164.html?id=E4t8dqcq which is suppost to be one of the most stable PSU's on the market, and as far as I can tell it is. OCZ and ThermalTake are good too. Just rember you get what you pay for, so paying $80~100+ for a PSU shouldnt shock you.

Cheers
Cameron

EDIT: I just read your post again, what kind of memory are you getting?

[Chris_F]

350W is what I should be using for a P4?  Meaning a Pentium 4?  According to my manual my Dell 4600 (P4 2.8G) came with a 250W.  I'll have to crack it open again to take a look at what really came with the computer.  I opened it up today just to verify what I had for room for the card (and that I had open RAM slots).  Plenty of room for a big video card and two empty RAM slots.  And the power supply looks like one of them standard, off the shelf type things, no big deal to find a replacement if I need it.

As for power stability, what do I really need?  What does it buy me?  I'm only planning on keeping this thing for another three years at most and then it's off to the boneyard and I have no interest in overclocking this thing.  I've got two other PCs in my basement (early Pentiums) and have passing fantisies of stealing one of the power supplies from them, mounting it externally and using it to feed only the graphics card.  At least it'd be free (but I wonder if there'd be a problem keeping power to the graphics card when the rest of the system is shut off).  Hmmm, I wonder if I could rig it up on a relay...

The memory is a DELL brand.  Not sure what kind.  It's just a bigger version of what I've already got in my PC.  Went with it because I know it works.

[ctjoyce]

Okay so heres the rundown. Dell puts the bare minimum into their systems, so something like a good PSU or high end RAM isnt on their to do list. I know that they use Roswewll RAM in their systems, so shoveing a second pair of that stuff in should help, but I would rip it all out and get a 1GB PC3200 Corsair XMS kit. Much better, and faster RAM. As for the PSU I would buy a ThermalTake or OCZ 450Watt one. Read around and find out who has the best for above 400Watts.

As far as getting a second PSU rigged up for your GFX card, I dont know if that'll work.

Cheers
Cameron

[congo]

Definitely go for a minimum 450w PSU, maybe you'll get away with 400w continuos rating in a quality PSU.

Make sure you don't buy a PNY or a PNY by any other name, I think they have 2 or 3 market names.

A 6600 is not a 6600GT, nothing like it, be extremely careful of buying the WRONG card, they model numbers are very misleading, Post you intended card here when you decide so we can check it out so you don't get a dud.

[Chris_F]

So far the top contender is the eVGA 256-A8-N387-TX.  It's a GeForce 6800GS AGP card.  It's a shade slower than the similarly spec'd eVGA 256-A8-N397-TX, but at $20 cheaper I need to save the money for the power supply.  

The only other option I see that I like is the BFG Tech BFGR68256GSOC, a GF6800GS card that seems about middle of the road between the two eVGA cards.  Although I don't know what the difference between a 6800 and 6800GS is (nVidia's page isn't too informative on the matter).

As for power supply, I can't afford $100 for a PS.  If I need to spend that much then I'm pretty much not going to upgrade the PC.  I see some cheapies for $30 or so and still can't understand what I'm actually buying if I get a higher end power supply.  Don't get me wrong, I know the importance of a good power supply (I work in defense electronics and we use some really high end power supplies).  I just don't understand what it buys me in terms of computer performance.  Better reliability?  How much better?

This will be the end of the road for this PC.  After this upgrade becomes obsolete it goes to the boneyard.  So I don't need to build in space for future upgrades here, no need to buy more power supply than I really need.  I'm tempted to try the card with my lowly 250W supply to see if it'll work and only upgrade if I run in to problems.  I'm also tempted to buy the cheapest thing that'll get me by.  Do I really need 400W?  450W?  So far the only "official" word I have is from the eVGA spec sheet saying 350W minimum.  And considering I'm not running anything else in this PC that's a real power drain (other than CDRW, HD, and moboard the only thing in the PC is a sound card) I'm inclined to think I can get by with a 350W.  Although I'll bow to the greater experience of people on this board if they've been in my shoes before.

[congo]

The reason is because on the cheaper PSU's, the 12volt rail doesnt supply enough continuous amps, this doesn't apply to all of them, but it's common.

[Chris_F]

With Video cards, I like to look at the specification on the RAM chips to determine the cards potential speed/quality. The card's clocks can all be user set, but if the ram quality isnt there, you got nothing to work with.

eVGA only lists their ram clock speed and type, they don't give a chipset maker or anything like that.  For the card I'm looking at they say it's 256bit 2ns GDDR3 memory running at 1GHz.  The three cards I'm considering (the two eVGAs and one BFG) all list slightly different clock speeds for the memory with the cheapest at 1G and most expensive at 1.1G.

Point taken on the PSU.  I'll give it a shot with my 250W but won't hold much hope.  If (when) it doesn't work I'll plunk a much bigger unit in there.  What's a good budget for this item?  $50?  I don't need a fancy anodized aluminum case with big wires and nice stickers, nor the accompanying $100 price tag.  Like I said, if I need to spend too much money on a PSU I'm not going to upgrade the vid card.

[congo]

$20-$30 USD for a budget PSU.

[Chris_F]

[quote]$20-$30 USD for a budget PSU.

[ctjoyce]

Perfect, cant complain at all.

Cheers
Cameron