8800gt for Dell Dimension 5100

[pencaps]

Hi everyone- this is my first post, and I appreciate your help in advance. I have a Dell Dimension 5100 (P4 3GHz, 2.5 GB RAM (I just added 2 gigs), 305W PSU). I am really hoping to upgrade my crappy Radeon X300 to a GeForce 8800GT , but I am worried that it may not fit in my case. The problem is that it might go back too far and the heat shroud over the processor might be in the way. I plan to put a Rosewill 550W or 600W PSU in so I don't run into power issues with this card.

Has anyone ever put an 8800GT into a Dimension 5100 and could let me know if it worked out? Thanks!

 

[Arkaign]

The Dimension 5100 uses a non-standard PSU, AFAIK. You'd be best off selling the 5100 outright, and building a cheap new box. The cheapest of the cheap C2Ds would vastly outperform the P4 you have, and you can move your new DDR2 over to the new build.

 

[pencaps]

Thanks for your quick response, Arkaign. Ideally, I know you're right about a new build. But this actually is for my brother, and being in school, he doesn't really have the $ to build anything new right now. I just figured a new video card might be a nice b-day present I could get for him, since he got Call of Duty 4 for xmas and can't really play it (really choppy). I did hear about the Dell being proprietary; however, about a year or two ago, I actually put a standard ATX12v in my older Dimension 4500 and it's worked perfectly since. If the 8800gt wouldn't fit, I would maybe look at the 8600gt if it would give respectable performance in COD4.

 

[Arkaign]

Ah. I see what's up

Well, with that P4, a high-end video card will be severely bottlenecked anyway.

Look at the 3850, it will provide an adequate level of performance with that CPU, and with the bottlenecks of the cpu/chipset still in place, will run just as good as a watercooled 8800GTX or 3870x2 with that configuration.

 

[pencaps]

Ahh, gotcha. I was reading a little about how perhaps that P4 would bottleneck a high end video card, so I'm glad someone confirmed that. I will look a little lower then. Thanks for your quick replies!