Advice re RAM and GPU?

[mattdanielc]

Hello,

My current PC from PCS is about 4 years old now. no money to replace it properly as we have recently had a baby who is nicking all of my money

but...my PC makes a racket when I play Total War: Rome 2 on it - I suspect the GPU really struggles as she is getting old and struggles with the new games.

So I want to buy a new (or used) GPU - that can compare to the GTX 460 but I don't want to pay more than £50 - is that realistic? Also, I want to double my RAM to help it out - does this one look ok?

Would appreciate any help - no idea what graphics card to buy??

My spec:
Processor (CPU)
AMD PHENOM II X4 965 (3.40GHz/8MB CACHE/AM3) - BLACK EDITION
Motherboard
ASUS® M4A78LT-M: mATX MAINBOARD, DDR3, USB 2.0, SATA 3.0Gb/s
Memory (RAM)
4GB SAMSUNG DDR3 DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 2GB)
Graphics Card
1GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX460 GDDR5 PCI EXPRESS - DirectX® 11
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
640GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD6402AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
Power Supply
600W Quiet 80 PLUS Quad Rail PSU + 120mm Case Fan (£59)
Processor Cooling
Super Quiet 22dBA Triple Copper Heatpipe Intel CPU Cooler

 

[keynes]

that can compare to the GTX 460 but I don't want to pay more than £50 - is that realistic?

Not possible with £50

 

[mantadog]

You could grab a used 560ti on ebay for about £60 its about 30% faster than the GTX 460. Nothing else really in budget and faster. As far as RAM goes it is probably ok for now, are you notching it bottlenecking? have a look in the task manager while gaming and see how much you are using.

 

[mattdanielc]

You could grab a used 560ti on ebay for about £60 its about 30% faster than the GTX 460. Nothing else really in budget and faster. As far as RAM goes it is probably ok for now, are you notching it bottlenecking? have a look in the task manager while gaming and see how much you are using.

I can get the 460 (same card) for a bit less I think - will try that then! Thanks

As for RAM - if I minimise the game and check the task manager, will that be accurate - or does the game have to be up and running so to speak?

Thanks!

 

[mantadog]

I can get the 460 (same card) for a bit less I think - will try that then! Thanks

As for RAM - if I minimise the game and check the task manager, will that be accurate - or does the game have to be up and running so to speak?

Thanks!

You say the 460? isn't that the card you already run?

if you minimise it you will get a representative usage, so yes that will be fine.

 

[mattdanielc]

You say the 460? isn't that the card you already run?

if you minimise it you will get a representative usage, so yes that will be fine.

Yeah it's the card I've already got - but I know it's a good card (for my old spec) and mine is on the way out - if I can get a 'newer' one off ebay that is in better nick then I'm laughing.

Also, you mention representative usage. How do I get the task manager up whilst in the game? surely it will always minimise it?

Thanks

 

[mantadog]

Unless your 460 is throttling because of a temperature issue then a newer 460 isn't going to do you any good at all. You need to upgrade the hardware as a 460 is fairly antiquated now.

As far as getting task manager up while gaming, just Alt tab out of your game and load up task manager, record the RAM usage and then get back to playing. You don't need to get it loaded up while your gaming, what im saying it you will get exactly the same results by minimising the game and looking at task manager back on the desktop.