Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: colecampbell666 on August 27, 2009, 08:00:47 pm
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A friend of mine is looking to upgrade his old Dell Dimension 5150 to play newer games. It has a 3Ghz P4, dunno about RAM, and a Radeon X600. Now he doesn't want to spend much, so the logical choice would be one of these spiffy new GPUs, only problem being that the PSU is only rated for 300w, a far cry for the recommended 430+ for most new mid-range GPUs. Is this one of the Dells with the wonky mobos that only use Dell PSUs?
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I don't know if that particular Dell only takes Dell PSUs, but if I recall correctly the only difference between a Dell PSU and an industry standard ATX PSU is the locations of two pins, which could be reversed by an adapter if needed.
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I have a Dell with a Radeon X300 and a power supply that's even a bit less beefy than that. I happened to mention something about it in IRC, and LSD suggested that an HD 4670 should be able to work just fine for me, since it just draws power from the motherboard. Your friend might want to take a look at it.
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Get the model number of the existing power supply and do a search for it. You should be able to find info on it, replacements, and if it's a special one. The biggest thing one some of them is they are odd sizes to fit in the case.
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After your friend finds out the model number he could just contact Dell and ask them about it.
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So I told him to get the 4670 1GB and suggested that he save for a while and get a new PC instead of pouring money into that one.