ranoth Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Hello all! I have been rebuilding my Oblivion on a Dell Dimension E521.I know the computer is older but, I am upgrading from a Sony Vaio PCV-RX830 The Dell had 2g or ram and I added two more for the max of 4GB.It currently is running onboard Nvidia integrated video. I want to put a new graphics card in. The power supply is 305W, so I am limited in that I do not want to upgrade the power supply. So far the card I am looking at is: EVGA GeForce GT 430 I would like to see how far I can push the graphics on this. Does anyone know if this card works well with Oblivion? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lanceor Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 I don't actually have the answer for your specific question nor am I an expert on graphics cards, but maybe this will be helpful. Oblivion's documentation recommends an NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series or higher. According to Tom's Hardware, the GT430 is a few rungs above the 6800, so your new graphics card should comfortably handle Oblivion without resorting to ultra low settings. I'd also be concerned about the processor though - Oblivion is very dependent on processor clock speed. A quick look for the E521 on Google shows processor speeds from 1.8 GHz to 2.6 GHz and I don't know which you have. Just for the record, Oblivion was fairly playable on my old 2.8 GHz Pentium D (older architecture but higher clock speed) as long as there weren't more than 3 or 4 monsters in the vicinity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nephenee13 Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 I want to put a new graphics card in. The power supply is 305W, so I am limited in that I do not want to upgrade the power supply. It would really, really be worth your while to invest in a better power supply. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ranoth Posted June 8, 2012 Author Share Posted June 8, 2012 Thanks for the info.I will keep looking around at new cards.Would I benefit from upgrading the power supply other than being able to use a bigger card? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Striker879 Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 The benefit of a more powerful power supply would be felt after your graphics upgrade. Once your system peak loads start to be greater than what your power supply can stand you'll begin getting data corruption (if the peak happens during a write operation for example), more frequent crashing during taxing operations (e.g. middle of a fight with a bunch of bandits) and you'll shorten the remaining life of your existing power supply (and hopefully when it dies it doesn't cause irreparable damage to the rest of your machine). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rennn Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 (edited) The thing to consider is that most decent graphics cards have no trouble at all running Oblivion on good settings anymore. It's the cpu you have to worry about. Any pc with a decent graphics card will be limited by their cpu instead of their graphics card. You want as fast of a cpu as possible for Oblivion. Multiple Cores won't help at all, since Oblivion is made to run on mostly a single core, whereas modern cpus rely on having multiple cores to speed things up. My 3.2Ghz cpu can run vanilla Oblivion on ultra pretty well, and it's the limiting factor, not my graphics card. Once I start to add graphics mods, my cpu starts to choke and I have to lower the settings. The rest of my specs are in my signature. As for the psu, you should be able to get a solid 550w or thereabouts for less than $100. My modular 750w cpu cost $130, and it exceeds what my pc requires. It's up to you whether you want to upgrade your psu, but if you don't upgrade make sure your current psu has the connectors required for a GT 430. Also keep in mind that if your psu is overtaxed it can damage the rest of your pc. I'm not trying to scare you, but you might want to look for a psu calculator online, that lets you set what parts you have and then tells you what wattage your psu should be. Here's one:http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine It recommended 482w for my rig, which is about what I expected. I guessed your specs based on the model of pc and a GT 430, and you might be alright with a 305w psu depending on age. You'll want to check that yourself though, because like I said I guesstimated on some of your specs. Edited June 9, 2012 by Rennn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ranoth Posted June 13, 2012 Author Share Posted June 13, 2012 Thanks guys! I will check up in my power supply. It may be worth the upgrade after all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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