HTPC Upgrade - Replacement for GTX 580

[JoseWalrus]

Hi everyone, currently my HTPC have these specs:

- ASUS Z97I-PLUS miniITX
- Corsair Obsidian 250D
- EVGA GTX 580
- Thermaltake Purepower 550W
- LG Bluray drive
- Core i3 4370
- 8 GB Kingston Hyperblue 1600Mhz
- Samsung 320 2.5" HDD

I use this little puppy to watch movies, stream content and play games at 1080p, but when I change the htpc to the mini-itx platform I already had the GTX 580 and I keep it, however as you may know that card is hot, I want to change it to a different card to avoid temperature issues inside the little case but I don't want to sacrifice performance, could you please recommend some cards to purchase? Maybe the GTX 750TI or an AMD card... but don't know if I'll lose to much performance with that, thanks in advance for your answers.

 

[Charlie98]

Depends on what kind of games you are playing...

I have a passively-cooled HD6450 in my HTPC... but I don't game on it, streaming only.

I think the GTX750Ti would be a decent HTPC card, or even something like this GTX760 if you are gaming a little harder. In HTPC duty it would be quiet and you could adjust the fan curve via software to ramp up only when it got hot from gaming.

 

[JoseWalrus]

Thanks for the answer, currently I'm playing Shadow of Mordor and The evil within, for now I'll use my desktop to play them, I think I will get something like the 760 as you told me, thanks for your reply, in the AMD counter part I think the R9 270 will do the job for me or maybe I'll wait to get an 960 or 950, right now im using my htpc without the graphic card only to watch game of thrones (Good series btw).

 

[Aikouka]

Is the issue with the 580 just that it's a bit hot or do you also want quiet? Do you also want something cheaper than the 580 was (e.g. like the 750 Ti) or something that's a little more expensive and more powerful (e.g. the GTX 970). If I wanted to build a gaming HTPC that could play newer, fancier games at 1080p with good settings, I'd probably go with the ASUS STRIX GTX 970. It's main draw is that it only turns the fans on when it needs them, which only your heavy gaming should cause. I think there are some other OEMs that are doing similar things as well. I believe ASUS also has a STRIX model of the 750 Ti.

 

[Charlie98]

It's main draw is that it only turns the fans on when it needs them, which only your heavy gaming should cause. I think there are some other OEMs that are doing similar things as well. I believe ASUS also has a STRIX model of the 750 Ti.

That would be a sweet option for the HTPC user! It's a shame they couldn't do that with older cards like my GTX760 with software...

 

[SolMiester]

Perhaps Gigabytes new GTX970 ITX gaming card?
http://www.gigabyte.co.nz/products/product-page.aspx?pid=5252#ov

 

[JoseWalrus]

That is a nice little card! Wow, such a card will be perfect for the build, I'll take that into consideration, it will depend of the budget at the end, thanks for all the answers.

 

[Aikouka]

That is a nice little card! Wow, such a card will be perfect for the build, I'll take that into consideration, it will depend of the budget at the end, thanks for all the answers.

Given that the Corsair 250D can fit larger cards, I would consider waiting to hear whether the smaller card has a noisier profile. The last thing you want in a HTPC is excess noise, and since you can easily get a larger (and most likely, quieter) card for about the same amount, it's worth considering. Although, if you wanted a small case with a good GPU, that mini card is definitely a good option.

 

[JoseWalrus]

Yes, I think I'll wait and I'll go with something quieter for the htpc since I don't want a loud box on my living room, I think I saw a little 750TI fanless somewhere but don't know if that type of cards work fine in a case like mine. BTW if you know about that kind of cards or maybe even a cooler for the cpu recommend please.