Old School: X800XT....

[InnocentCriminal]

OK, I've been thinking about this, now my girlfriend has a Compaq with a 250W rated PSU. Now she's gaggin' (HEH HEH HEH) to be able to play CS:S with me so I managed to source an old X800XT free from a friend but her PSU doesn't have a bloody 6pin PCIe connector cable so we've been unable to use it as of yet.

I've been doing the maths with all the components currently in her Crapaq and I reckon it'd be alright running the card within the rig, but out of the interest of my own curiosity, I thought I'd give you lot the question as if it the system would be able to happily run the card.

On to the maths...

Her specification:

Intel Pentium D 930 3.0GHz - I forget the core as I'm work and can't check. According to Xbit-Labs (http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/pentium-d-920-930_2.html) the peak for the CPU would be 100W give or take.

She has 512MB DDR2 533

160GB HDD - 3.5" HDD in fact. I was actually surprised to see that in a desktop to be honest.

... and a DVD burner I forget the make.

According to HotHardware (http://www.hothardware.com/articles/ATi_Radeon_X800_XT__X800_Pro__Heart_Burn_For_The_N V40/?page=2) The XT consumes (roughly) 68W so let's say between 70 and 80W to be on the safe side.

So, we're looking at just over 200W with the card included, but excluding the optical and HDD.

What's your 'professional' opinion then folks?

[0elemental0]

the box on my x800gto says min 400w. yes i kept the box..and yes the card now sits in its box, kicked aside for my 3870

[InnocentCriminal]

Fair play. I must admit the reviews do say that they require at least a 380W.

Hmmm... I could always underclock her CPU, she wouldn't know. ;)

[intel igent]

whats your budget?

id say atleast a 420w

[InnocentCriminal]

I can buy her a replacement PSU, but it's the fact I don't want too. Not unless I have too! She'll lose her warranty if I install the card even without a new PSU, so it's sort of a, lose lose situation. Well, she'll win overall as she'll have a PC capable of playing CS:S.

[Namslas90]

I've had many a Gatewat, HP, and COMPAQ. In fact, im on a Compaq now!!(LOL) The PSU is the first thing to go in those rigs anyways and usually 2 days after the waranty expires. Just keep the old PSU to swap back if anything goes wrong.
Go for it, put in the PSU and get her some more ram while your at it, so she can at least keep up with you in the game.(just to be fair-:D).

[choppy]

you can get a decent branded psu for £30 , either that or spend 100's when the old thing blows and takes half her rig!!

EDIT: £25 actually!

460W Gigabyte PSU 24 PIN ACTIVE PFC LOW NOISE
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=691095

[intel igent]

you can get a decent branded psu for £30 , either that or spend 100's when the old thing blows and takes half her rig!!

you dont need a hella PSU for her rig just a plain trusty PSU ;)

im not shure on the stores in your area but im shure you could find an excellent PSU for her for like $40-$60 which isnt much.......



considering shes gaggin' and all :p

:toast:

[newtekie1]

The PSU would probably run it, but I doubt it would be happy doing it. I would get a decent PSU. I run my x800XL off a 350w Antec and it does just fine. You should be able to pick up a 350w+ PSU for a reasonable price.

[cdawall]

just get an ultra PSU they are dirt cheap and run great

[choppy]

well tbh if you want dirt cheap then just go to ebuyer and buy any of their 'extra value' range, starts at about £1.99 i think..lol

[InnocentCriminal]

Thanks for the input guys, I'll give it a shot in the mouth with the 250W and see how things go. I reckon it'll handle it ok if I downclock a little bit and drop the voltage.

I'll keep you posted.

I'll grab a relatively decent PSU for her just to be safe.

[KainXS]

I am pretty sure you cannot use any psu except compaqs in a compaq pc, they usually have proprietary psu's for those damn things

[InnocentCriminal]

Yeah I was thinking that myself, when looking at the internals I could see that it looked like a mATX PSU. I'll have a butchers this weekend when I go up to hers and see how it goes with the cable and dropping the voltage on her CPU.

I doubt she'll notice 200MHz and some volts.

:)

[Namslas90]

I am pretty sure you cannot use any psu except compaqs in a compaq pc, they usually have proprietary psu's for those damn things

Thats no longer true on newer Compaqs Desktops. I have a Compaq Presario SR2034NX(now 2 years old) and the first thing I did (always do) was threw out the POS Compaq PSU and installed a Enermax 420Watt. The important thing to check is the Mobo if it's a modern knockoff then there should not be compatability issues.

[FR@NK]

I recently bought for my girlfriend; an Acer computer from bestbuy and I was shocked that it only had a 300 watt psu. It has a G31 motherboard, Q6600 processor, HD2400 vid card, 500GB harddrive, and a dvd burner. I added a raid card and 3 raptor drives and soon will add a HD2600xt. I'm interested to see if this psu will hold up or not :/

[Namslas90]

Yeah I was thinking that myself, when looking at the internals I could see that it looked like a mATX PSU. I'll have a butchers this weekend when I go up to hers and see how it goes with the cable and dropping the voltage on her CPU.

I doubt she'll notice 200MHz and some volts.

:)

Also, the BIOS is locked with few options, chances are you cannot lower Vcore or Drop the Freq.

(Sounds like you are more worried aboput facing her in Game on equel terms than you are about her computer:D}.

[cdawall]

(Sounds like you are more worried aboput facing her in Game on equel terms than you are about her computer:D}.

:roll::laugh::laugh::roll:

thats amazing

[InnocentCriminal]

She'll be a little out of practise, but yeah, she kicks my ass.... sometimes. I'm just bored of playing with all the humourless fuckin' assholes that let their under-age kids play and then get pissy when I call someone in my clan a cunt.

PFFT!

My girlfriend makes the game far more enjoyable. It's funny when people hit on her when they see her spray.

:laugh:

[InnocentCriminal]

UPDATE:

Well I managed to install the X800XT and another stick of RAM all on her 250W. So far so good, I've also stress tested it for 24hours and it's been perfectly stable. Weird.

Another oddity was Local Cooling read the total wattage of her rig as 181W - it stated the X800XT to only use 6W. Odd :P

Anyroad, thanks to everyone to who voiced their opinion.

\m/