I'm looking at a Radeon 9550 and a Radeon 9600PRO to buy for a newer graphics card for the computer I use, but I can't find the power supply that they need. Could anyone help me out?
Any modern ATX power supply could power either or both of those cards. They'll get their juice from the motherboard so really you just need to make sure what power supply you need for that and you're all set. Less than 500watts is probably not a good idea at this point, I'll say that.
As MSP stated both of those cards get their power directly from the motherboard. Both cards draw a very small amount of power. If your current power supply can power your system, I don't see why it can't power your system plus this card. IE: You don't need a new one. If you have the choice between a 9550 and a 9600, get the 9600. The 9550 is essentially an overclocked 9200 which was a much weaker card. The 9600pro (mine at least) was able to take decent core overclocks too.
As far as I know, the case has a 200 watt power supply, and it runs the 2 20 gig harddrives and 1 ghz processor and stuff fine, theres virtually no heat if you unplug it and open it up and feel stuff. I had originally wanted a GeForce FX 5500, but then I read that the Radeon 9600 was as good as the FX 5900. Thanks for the help.
You might run into trouble with a 200 watt. 300 watt would be enough. The 5900 performs like a 9800pro. I have both a 9800pro and a 5900. What kind of 1Ghz processor and what brand computer?
It's an Intel Pentium 3 and a Gateway computer, as far as I know, everything is stock except for the 512 meg ram, harddrives, and ATI 3D RagePRO card thats in there currently. I can't afford at the moment to buy a new power supply.
You might be limited as to what you could install in that case anyway. Dell for sure uses some proprietary power supply stuff, so you can't just put in anything after-market. Given it's age I would suggest you start saving for a new computer. The $300 entry level computers would crush what you're using now.
I usually don't toot the "buy a new PC" whistle, but a P3 is deffinately due for an upgrade. I would check around the Hot deals section for the sub-$400 Dells. The 200 watt may be able to handle a radeon 9600, but it may not. It's a tough question to answer, would need to calculate all the other componets energy draw, or simply just try it and see if it power up. Being a gateway, you may not even be able to upgrade the power supply. Proprietary components are a pain in the ass. Do you know what kind of AGP port you have? If it isn't atleast a 4x, then a new card might be incompatible with your AGP port.
So what do I do, I can't buy a new computer. Oh, and the agp port is 4x. The computer isn't really a gaming computer, but the graphics card sucks at the moment, and I'd like to be able to play the games I already have.
Not right now perhaps, but if you save a while you can. One thing is for sure, sinking any money into your existing PC is not a good idea. You could probably harvest some parts from it and build your own pretty cheap. Hard drive and CD drive can be used for sure. I just checked my local tech shop and they've got this guy for 300 bucks. You would need your own OS for sure, but check out the specs compared to what you're running now:
Ok, I'm not buying a new computer, heck, this isn't even MY personal computer. I found that the full load power usage for the 9600PRO is 18 watts from here The Truth About Graphics Power Requirements V2. I used a power supply calculator to find the peak usages of the current setup, and it was higher than 200 watts, which means that the computer should be able to handle a little bit more power usage. -Edit- Nevermind, it's a 200 watt power supply, the card must use less power than the lowest the calculator had. I looked at the sticker on the side of the psu, and it didn't say anything about the number of watts it had, but I looked up the model number and it said 200 watts.
