vid card to put with i3 530

[hodgenutts]

Hello, what is the largest video card I could pair with an intel i3 530 without it bottlenecking the vid card? Curious to know what the highest video card I could use without the cpu bottlenecking it at both the stock 2.93 ghz and at an O.C. of say 3.4 ghz, or would O.C. even change the factor. Thank you very much in advance for your help.

[willomz]

It will depend from game to game. I have an i3 530 and a GTX 660 and they seem to work lovely together. However I'm sure in a large numbers of titles you could support a much faster card.

Any particular games you have in mind?

[hodgenutts]

W.O.W., Starcraft 2, diablo 3, Star Wars the Old Republic. I alos have Assassin's creed 3, Hitman Absolution, Sleeping dogs... usually play at 1080p and I like my eye candy lol

I usually play the blizzard games. This will be going into a seperate rig I'm building asisde from my main rig. I have an old i3 530 laying around that I decided to put in a micro ATX rig to take with me to my buddies house to game, or when I go on trips for military duty. Will be hooking it up to a TV.

[daveybrat]

For an older i3 i'd probably choose this card:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130838

EVGA 01G-P4-3650-KR GeForce GTX 650 Ti 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card

It's powerful enough to play almost any game you mentioned and it's extremely small yet barely sips power. Would be great for a small case.

[willomz]

Well SC2 is quite CPU dependent, but doesn't need much GPU power anyway.

Hitman is probably the most demanding game there, the i3 will probably cap you slightly below 40 fps, so a 7870 or 660 like I have would seem ideal.

A 650 Ti isn't really suitable for 1080p on challenging titles like Hitman, a cheap 7850 would be the better budget option.

I'd pick the GTX 660 as being not only a good match for your i3, but also very good value for money and will provide good performance in all games you mention.

[SPBHM]

it really depends more on how much you intend to pay...
I'd say something like a 7770/650ti/7850 is a good deal, perhaps even more with the i3 there is no point in going higher than the 7850 (but this is not always true, if you like playing with really high details and res in some games even a gtx 680/7970 would be the main limiting factor)

[hodgenutts]

Yea I was hoping a 660 or 7850 would be do-able...

It's going in this case with a 400 watt psu because I got it for $29 with free shipping...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811237028

Then if that cheap PSU isn't sufficient for the graphics card because of amps and so forth, thought about putting this in it instead of an optical drive to power the vid card because its only $20...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...&Tpk=visiontek


Heck, it may even power the card and the CPU, but Idk....

[willomz]

Umm ewww, I have no idea about these weird no-name PSUs.

A decent brand 400W supply can feed a 7850/660 no problem, but yours that was essentially free with a case.. I dunno..

[hodgenutts]

That's why I was getting the dedicated GPU visiontek psu. It's not a no name brand.

[MrK6]

Originally Posted by hodgenutts

That's why I was getting the dedicated GPU visiontek psu. It's not a no name brand.

Just get a decent Seasonic/Antec/Corsair PSU to power your whole rig instead of Mickey Mousing all this generic/rando junk into your case and putting your hardware at risk.

[hodgenutts]

Finding a psu in the sfx form factor can be difficult. It just an extra rig that's a budget build. Using older and inexpensive gear. Just trying to decide on the vid card. Lmao the visiontek GPU isn't cheap junk. It's designed just for somethink like this.

[hodgenutts]

And you shouldn't judge a piece of equipment if you have not tried it or have no experience with it.

I get the case tomorrow and will see if it can hold a different sized psu than sfx.

[willomz]

OK, but neither should you recommend something you have no experience with. I wouldn't risk my hardware with it and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else either. If you think it's a good idea then go for it, but it's your risk.

If you want a budget build choose something more mainstream. SFF stuff is going to incur extra costs like specialist PSUs, etc. Buying cheap items usually doesn't you save you money in the long run.

[hodgenutts]

For the THIRD TIME its not a cheap psu, its a dedicated name brand GPU psu with good review that is,on sale. The only few negative reviews i saw were people who had never even owned the item and were simply giving it negative reviews "because their opinion was to get a more expensive ATX psu". Thats an opinion and not a legitimate review.if you've owned the product and had negative experience then its a legitimate review, but giving blind opinions is not "good advice"

And besides, we've digressed from the original topic, which is my fault, so my apologies.

[lavaheadache]

I may get one of those juice boxes for a project. At $25 that's a steal.


I love my PC Power and Cooling 750. I out it back in 08 and has been through a lot with me. The most power hungry setups it has run have been Overclocked i7 with 480 sli and Overclocked Q6600 with 4870 trifire. I know have it running an overclocked Ivy with 2 7970 Lightnings at stock.

I'm afraid to try and overclock the Lightnings because one of the requires a lot of voltage to get the good clocks. I've read many reviews showing Lightning's consuming watts like my Daughter with m&m's.

This little juice box would be perfect to hook up to one card and be all set. I'm not really wanting to buy another large PSU because I'm typically not a dual gpu card user and will jump on the next gens most powerful card making my PC power and cooler viable again.

lets see $25 shipped for the Juice Box and let my rig fly or $200 1000 watt brand name that will go to waste when I move back to single gpu..... No brainer in my eyes


edit......

Pulled the trigger. $25.99 out the door. Expect me to either praise or shred this thing. It saved me from spending lots of money for a temporary reason.

[Termie]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...ming,2588.html

Look at Dirt 2 and Far Cry 2 above for examples of performance with modern game engines. A stock i3 530 bottlenecks a 5850.

I'd go for the 650ti at $125AR or better yet buy something used like a gtx460, 5850, or 6870.

[poohbear]

Lol wow im surprised how many ppl here dont have a clue. OP, get the best card u can afford. @ 1080p the cpu isnt a major factor, with the exception of strategy games. But even then once u turn on all the quality settings & AA, its all GPU territory at that point. An i3 is fine for all the modern cards, its more than enough juice to feed all of em. Cheers.

[willomz]

The CPU is the same factor at any resolution.

http://www.techspot.com/review/608-h...rks/page6.html

Where do you think the i3 530 would come in this list?
I reckon slightly above the A10-5800k so maybe around 38 fps.
So why buy a high end GPU capable of 50-60fps?

I mean you could turn on some ludicrous AA setting to bring frame rates down, but you wouldn't do that with a high end CPU, so why would you do that with a low end CPU?

[coffeejunkee]

Originally Posted by Termie

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...ming,2588.html

Look at Dirt 2 and Far Cry 2 above for examples of performance with modern game engines. A stock i3 530 bottlenecks a 5850.

I'd go for the 650ti at $125AR or better yet buy something used like a gtx460, 5850, or 6870.

Those are actually classic gpu bottlenecks. Overclocking the cpu does nothing. And an i7 870 is actually slightly slower than an i3 530. When the AA is turned on it's even clearer that the gpu is the bottleneck.

Originally Posted by willomz

The CPU is the same factor at any resolution.

http://www.techspot.com/review/608-h...rks/page6.html

Where do you think the i3 530 would come in this list?
I reckon slightly above the A10-5800k so maybe around 38 fps.
So why buy a high end GPU capable of 50-60fps?

I mean you could turn on some ludicrous AA setting to bring frame rates down, but you wouldn't do that with a high end CPU, so why would you do that with a low end CPU?

That game sure likes a fast cpu. But with some overclocking you could get i3 530 at least as fast as i3 3220.

I would get a GTX 660 or 7850 for a system like that. They're just best bang for buck cards anyway.

[hodgenutts]

I have an EVGA superclocked reference design 660ti I got for 6 months Same as Cash for $327 from Best Buy. prob take it back to bestbuy and get something more modest.

[willomz]

How much is the card worth if you take it back?
TBH I'd keep it, in many games the CPU won't be the bottleneck, and when it is, hey something has to be.

[dragantoe]

do not get the visiontek psu, it got atrocious ratings and will be unstable

[hodgenutts]

I get a full refund if I take it back, just thought $327 at 6 months interest free was nice for a 660ti as I could have it for $54.50 a month for 6 months....

However they currently have two 660 gtx superclocked (non-ti) EVGA cards on sale for $209 before tax. Thought about taking the 660ti back and getting 660 gtx cause it only be $37.97 a month for 6 months for the non-ti flavor.

[FalseChristian]

I like the GTX 650 Ti. It's as fast as a GTX 460 1GB and runs even cooler. The only drawback is that it doesn't support SLI.