Time to get a new video card...

[Bob Schroeck]

Welp.  The fan on my decade-old Nvidia GeForce GTS 450 has finally given up the ghost, making me subject to spontaneous reboots if I play something like Sims 4 or City of Heroes for more than an hour or so.  So I guess I ought to buy a new one.

I want to spend under $100-$150, and I've generally been pleased with Nvidia's products over the years, but honestly, I haven't paid attention to what video cards are up to these days.  The GeForce GT 710 is Amazon Choice at $55 -- but is there anything at a better price/performance point?

Best as I can recall, I have a 300W power supply, and otherwise don't put a lot of load on it.

Any suggestions?

[LynnInDenver]

You might look at the GT 1030, comes with faster RAM (1600 MHz vs 6000 MHz), two video ports (DVI and HDMI) and should be under support for a little longer (the design is s a year or two newer than the 710), they're around $90 on Amazon.

https://www.game-debate.com/gpu/index.ph...are=Nvidia

[nemonowan]

The GT 710 is a rather old card, I'd stay away from it.

For Nvidia under a $100, the GT 1030 is a better deal, it offers decent performance, and maybe more importantly it is compatible with older systems and consumes little power.

[GethN7]

I'd second going with at LEAST the 1030. If you want cheap yet sturdy for your needs while easily handling the games you mentioned, that should be more than enough.

[Jinx999]

When I got my new computer earlier this year, I got a GTX 1660 super.

[classicdrogn]

When I got my new computer earlier this year, I got a GTX 1660 super.

And I didn't, but really think I should have.

[Bob Schroeck]

Thanks! Guess I'll poke around on Amazon and compare the 1030 and the 1660 tonight after work.

The GT 710 is a rather old card, I'd stay away from it.

Well, that explains why it was only $55 then. Probably on a virtual clearance shelf.

[LynnInDenver]

Yeah, generally speaking, when they're that low, it's because they're now considered "low end" cards. Heck, the GTX 10x0 types like the 1030 are technically all previous generation now, current gen is RTX 20x0 (I'm personally running a 2060, but that's because I'm doing iRay rendering and the more horsepower, the better).

[Bob Schroeck]

Yeah, my needs aren't quite that extreme.

So I took a look... the 1660 is well out of my budget but the 1030 looks... well, it's a lot better than what I have now, and not just because it'll have a working fan. <grin>

So now comes the second-order question -- manufacturer. Looking at Amazon tonight, I see cards made by Gigabyte, Asus, MSI, Zotac... they're all within a few dollars of each other, not so much that I need to quibble. So, anyone to stay away from?

I've had good experiences with Asus hardware in the past -- and the fact that the Asus card i'm looking at appears to be 80% freaking huge heat sink with no fan to burn out a decade from now has a certain appeal... But I'm still soliciting opinions before I decide on anything.

[classicdrogn]

Fanless is also good for (lack of) noise, which I find myself caring about a lot more than I used to before working solely with handheld devices and laptops for over a decade. Just make sure you've got enough space between the card slot and the next thing or the side of your case for it to fit.

[Bob Schroeck]

My current card is already a double-wide and is the only thing I have in a slot at all, IIRC. I think I can make it fit. <grin>

[Bob Schroeck]

So, I just realized I left this topic hanging. I ended up ordering the Asus card which was mostly heatsink. It just arrived today. Because we're having a guest over for the first time in a while I won't be installing it tonight, but sometime in the next few days.

[Bob Schroeck]

Well. So, yesterday I opened up the case for the first time in years, vacuumed everything out, removed the old card, put the new card in.... and the system refused to boot with a "B2" error in the lower right of the screen.

Crap. Did I screw up the mobo somehow? Let's check.

Replaced the old card. System boots.

Okay, I must have not seated the new card properly. Put the new card back in, being especially careful. No boot, B2.

Replaced old card again. Boot. Checked the website for my mobo's manufacturer, confirmed my BIOS was out of date. Got the latest version of the BIOS and flashed it.

Put the new card back in. No boot, B2.

Replaced the old card. Boot. Began a web search. Well, joy. Lots of new video cards with B2 errors on my motherboard, and no two solutions are the same. A few -- like flashing the BIOS -- I've already done.

So... I'm going to be a while trying to figure out what I have to do to make this work.

[classicdrogn]

Well that's a pisser. I'd say that's why you should alwayts look up compatibility before you buy a new part, but I doubt it would occur to me to have checked if I was buying it myself any more than it did to remind you to.

[Rajvik]

good luck, i just had to replace my laptop this weekend due to a boot sequence loop prior to the password screen