Terrible fps...advice on my rig?

[woodtortiose]

Hi there

I'm not too computer savvy, and I was hoping for some advice. I'm running

 

Intel core i7-4770 cpu @3.40ghz
64 bit win 7
8 gigs RAM
NVidia GeForce GT 635

 

and I'm getting a max of 38 fps, usually much less. I think the weak link is the video card. Anyone familiar with Nvidia cards that can suggest an upgrade? Something that can also handle Dragon Age 3 and the Witcher 3 without costing a fortune? Thanks!

[JimmyRJump]

GT635 suggests you're talking about a laptop? If so, then first you need to find out if that GPU is of the kind that can be swapped (a lot of laptops have specimen that can not be swapped) and secondly how many amps/watts you have on the power supply because a heftier GPU would mean more power and most PSUs in laptops (as in most brand pre-built desktops) have a power supply that has just enough juice to keep the boat floating; add something that needs power and you also need a morepowerful PSU...

 

*EDIT*

 

You also have to know a thing or two about the numbering of video cards: the digits from left to right mean

- family (in your case a six. Now we're at ten, so your card is a bit older).

- power within that family (in your case a three, which means you're way below gaming capability. Middle digit should be a six, at least, with eight being the top tier in whatever family).

- nothing when it's a zero. A five is usually reserved for laptop GPUs or an in-between card. In power your card is between a regular GT630 and GT640.

 

Lettering has also a meaning, with GTX being the most powerful and GS being the least powerful. GT and GTS are in-between with GTS a touch more powerful than GS but less powerful than GT.

Edited August 22, 2016 by JimmyRJump

[woodtortiose]

Thanks Jimmy! That was extremely helpful. I actually have a desktop, not sure why it came with a gt635. How do I determine what my towers power supply is, and what range would it need to be? And regarding the video cards, I'm assuming the higher the family number, the newer that line of cards are. How important is that? What I mean is, would a 860 be better than a 780 (just an example, dont know if these numbers actually exist)? Again, thanks for your advice.

[JimmyRJump]

Thanks Jimmy! That was extremely helpful. I actually have a desktop, not sure why it came with a gt635. How do I determine what my towers power supply is, and what range would it need to be? And regarding the video cards, I'm assuming the higher the family number, the newer that line of cards are. How important is that? What I mean is, would a 860 be better than a 780 (just an example, dont know if these numbers actually exist)? Again, thanks for your advice.

The power a PSU can deliver is usually on a sticker on the supply itself. Generic power supplies in mid-range desktops are usually in the 350- to 400 Watt range.

 

What you need to know about graphic cards and their consumption:

- A motherboard's PCIe slot can deliver a theoretical maximum of 75 Watt

- A 6-pins PCIe connector (the plug that runs from the power supply to the card to feed it) also has a max of 75 Watt per plug

- An 8-pins PCIe connector gives a max of 150 Watt per plug

 

So, worst case scenario (so to speak) when getting a GPU with two 8-pin PCIe connectors, you have a theoretical maximum usage of 2x150 + 1x75 = 375 Watt.

 

Add to that around a hundred Watt for the CPU and another hundred for hard drives, RAM and other peripheral stuff like USB connections, fans and whatnot

 

That totals more or less 575 Watt, so, a power supply between 550 and 600 watt should be able to pull the cart.

 

What concerns GPUs: the more recent is the better, not especially in graphical power delivery (although recent releases like the NVidia 9xx and 1xxx series have some extreme power under the hood) bit also in support (DirectX 12) and power consumption. A 1080 card consumes half -or even less- than what older cards gobbled up

 

An NVidia 860 would be seriously less powerfull than a 780 but still powerfull enough to cope with a game like FO4. Only letdown would be V-RAM as FO4 has become a hungry beast when it comes to V-RAM use. Peaks of over 8GB are common, but will hopefully be ironed out once the final DLC has been released and an all-in-one game will pop-up, or a decent patch to make the game more stable.

 

So, depênding on budget, you'll have to compromise somewhere. I recently (last Saturday) bought an AMD MSI RX470 GamongX GPU, because it has 8GB of V-RAM. I had a five year old MSI R7970 Lightning before that, which is as powerful as the new card, but has only 3GB of V-RAM. That 8GB made all the difference to me as I now run the game practically glitch-free...

 

If I were you, I'd look at NVidia's GTX960ti version, or a ti version in the 8xx or 7xx family. AMD's R9 280X/290X and R9 380X /390/390X or their latest RX releases are also an excellent option because way cheaper than what NVidia make us pay...

 

Power supplies come in a lot of good brands like Antec, Corsair, CoolerMaster... only thing you need to keep an eye on is their effectiveness (going from lowest Bronze to highest Platinum): don't go below Silver; Gold if you can, Platinum for most efficient and stable supplies. And don't go for El-Cheapo no-name supplies. Don't let your expensive rig depend on something that can light up like a christmas tree in an instant...

[parrotheada1a]

Good solid advice Jimmy. One other thing you might consider is adding another 8 Gig of Ram to your PC. I put 16 Gb in my rig, and I'm not sorry I did. The stuff is dirt cheep these days, especially if it's of the DDR3 variety. An 8 gig kit online will probably run you about 40 bones give or take. I say online, because if you go to a big box store like say.... Best Buy, you can expect to pay double that. GSkill, Corsair, Mushkin and Crucial are all decent brands worthy of consideration.

[JimmyRJump]

Good solid advice Jimmy. One other thing you might consider is adding another 8 Gig of Ram to your PC. I put 16 Gb in my rig, and I'm not sorry I did. The stuff is dirt cheep these days, especially if it's of the DDR3 variety. An 8 gig kit online will probably run you about 40 bones give or take. I say online, because if you go to a big box store like say.... Best Buy, you can expect to pay double that. GSkill, Corsair, Mushkin and Crucial are all decent brands worthy of consideration.

I've been using Kingston HyperX RAM since 2001 for the simple reason they were the only ones at the time who made their own chips for the HX series. Nowadays they also use a lot of Infineon chips and even Samsung ones for their ValueRam series. The 4 sticks of KHX Genesis Grey (4GB each @1600MHz) I use in my current machine all have Infineon chips while the regular (blue) KHX (4x2GB @1333MHz OCd @1814MHz) I have in another PC has chips manufactured by Kingston themselves...

 

With my older i7 2600K (which I ran and still run on air @4.9GHz on an AsRock P67 Fatal1ty Pro mainboard with an Arctic Cooling Freezer Xtreme rev.2 CPU cooler) this Genesis Grey runs stable @2042MHz/1.55V for weeks on end without shutting down the PC. However, if I go 1 miserable MHz higher, I get a freak-show on my PC for a couple of minutes and then a shutdown...

[woodtortiose]

Hey, both you guys, thanks so much for the advice. Seriously, this answered half a dozen questions I forgot to ask. I've always had NVidia, not out of brand loyalty, maybe just brand familiarity. I'll look into the AMD cards if I find I cant swing a decent NVidia. Thanks again guys

[JimmyRJump]

Hey, both you guys, thanks so much for the advice. Seriously, this answered half a dozen questions I forgot to ask. I've always had NVidia, not out of brand loyalty, maybe just brand familiarity. I'll look into the AMD cards if I find I cant swing a decent NVidia. Thanks again guys

I've never mixed in the debate between pro-NVidia or pro-ATI/AMD. I've had both over the years.

 

Yes, NVidia's cards are often slightly faster than what AMD offers, but me, I'm on a shoe-string budget most of the time and the last couple of years NVidia has gone bonkers with their prices...

 

Two more things to consider when getting a new GPU (besides price):

 

1) Don't let yourself be fooled by bothcamps claiming the other have bad drivers. Fact of the matter is, they both had their fair share of nightmarish software released upon us mere mortals, but both have reasonably stable drivers most of the time.

2) Don't stare yourself blind on benchmarks. Often, the difference between cards of both brands is but a few frames per second between the two. Normally, anything above 60fps can be considered a waste of power, though some will claim that more is better, be aware there's limits to what our eyes and brain can handle.

2-bis) Also -not important but useful- don't (as so many do) confuse a monitor's refresh rate and fps. They are two absolutely different things. The latter is the amount of frames a GPU can render in a second, the former is the amount of times your screen refreshes itself within a second, and does so independently of how many fps a GPU sends through. A monitor will keep on refreshing its picture at the set rate even when the GPU is disconnected...

 

Good luck and have fun, Woody ;)