HD 4670 on a 305W Dell PSU.

N

nerr

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 19, 2008
Messages
216
The system is a Dell Dimension 4700. I bought an HD 4670 for my brothers as a Christmas present, as their current Radeon X300 SE just doesn't do the job anymore.

The system's specs include:
Pentium 4 HT @ 2.8GHz
3GB DDR2 RAM
1x 80GB SATA HDD
2x SATA ODD

17350.png


For me, Anandtech's chart is convincing enough. The card doesn't need a PCI-E connector (which said PSU doesn't have), is fairly powerful, and was a cheap enough upgrade. I believe it'll run fine, but AMD apparently recommends a 400W PSU for it. This being a Dell power supply though, and having that photographic proof... I should be okay though, right?
 
yes you will be fine with the 4670 on that power supply. the 4670 will be nice improvement over the x300 but you wont come close to matching the benchmarks you have seen on the web. that P4 will bottleneck any modern card in newer games. by the way I speak from experience because even my 5000 X2 held the 4670 back in pretty much every game. putting that 4670 with a modern Core 2 cpu was a massive improvement.
 
They're not terribly picky, don't worry. I just wanted to get them something that can actually run modern games, even with a Pentium 4.
 
I would aim for another 100w. Your P4 sucks the juice out of your psu. You will be cutting it really close.
 
nerr said:
They're not terribly picky, don't worry. I just wanted to get them something that can actually run modern games, even with a Pentium 4.
Click to expand...
well using the 4670 with my 5000 X2 I got no better minimum framerates than I did with the 8600gt in the same system that should give you an idea of how bad some newer games will struggle with a single core P4 cpu. going with something like a 8600gt probably would have given them the same playable results. anyway sorry to ramble on but yeah you should have no issues powering that card.
 
8600GT isn't a whole lot cheaper anyway, plus I'm only paying $40 for this, so hey, works for me.

Damned Pentium 4 though. I hate that thing with a passion. As far as I can figure though, even with a Pentium 4, everything at FULL LOAD is only about 250W. There's still 50W headroom.

I suppose I'll give it a shot. If the system suddenly becomes buggy or unstable with the HD 4670... hehe, maybe I'll try out Crossfire HD 4870+4670. :p
 
nerr said:
They're not terribly picky, don't worry. I just wanted to get them something that can actually run modern games, even with a Pentium 4.
Click to expand...
he will be fine. the system I used the 4670 in had with an 5000 X2 which has about the same TDP as a 3.0 P4 never used more than 172 watts at the wall. It had a 300watt psu and I never had any issues even running a 9600gt in that system.
 
nerr said:
8600GT isn't a whole lot cheaper anyway, plus I'm only paying $40 for this, so hey, works for me.

Damned Pentium 4 though. I hate that thing with a passion. As far as I can figure though, even with a Pentium 4, everything at FULL LOAD is only about 250W. There's still 50W headroom.

I suppose I'll give it a shot. If the system suddenly becomes buggy or unstable with the HD 4670... hehe, maybe I'll try out Crossfire HD 4870+4670. :p
Click to expand...
it will be under 200 watts for sure.

oh and please dont try and crossfire those two cards. :eek: :p
 
My brother has a 4670 on a 300 watt psu with a PD clocked @ 2.8Ghz. His has been fine for about 3 months now. You should be in the clear.
 
Will do then, thanks for the help!

And c'monnnn, I was almost tempted to do it today when it arrived. Perhaps I'll try tomorrow and see if I get an FPS boost in L4D. :D
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top