Low Power GPU

[DELDER]

I have an hp pavilion 590 with a 180w power supply, 12 gb of RAM, 2 tb hdd and AMD A-12 9800 processor. I am looking for a gpu that would work and fit into this computer. I don't really want to upgrade my power supply so if there is any work-arounds or gpu's that would work I would like to know. 

[shoutingsteve]

look for GPUs that are 1-slot and don't have Power ports on them.  What is a price you would like to spend on it?

[DELDER]

My price range is anywhere from $100 to $200 (Canadian btw). I also looked at gpus without power ports and wondered if that would limit performance. 

[shoutingsteve]

1 hour ago, DELDER said:

... and wondered if that would limit performance. 

Yes. I believe it would.

[DELDER]

I suppose it may be better to build a new computer. But for the time being, are you aware of any gpu's that will work? Every time I look, I cannot find any.

[BTGbullseye]

15 hours ago, DELDER said:

I suppose it may be better to build a new computer. But for the time being, are you aware of any gpu's that will work? Every time I look, I cannot find any.

The RX 550 does not require additional power beyond the PCI-e slot power. It should work with your system. They're around $90 new on Newegg.

[DELDER]

Thanks BTGbullseye, I will give it a look.

[DELDER]

Its been a while and I have been looking at some different forms and I think that I have concluded that the RX 550 might be too much for my computer. I have discovered the GT 1030 has half as much memory as the RX 550. Would this be a better decision to go with as my computer is just a small pre-built?

[Mark Kaine]

dude, you just have to look up recommended power supply for the gpu you're interested in, which means the options will be very limited with that power supply 

 

generally the 1030 is an entry level gpu that would make sense in your build but I have no idea how it compares to the 550. 

 

Edit : 300w PSU is recommended for 1030, yours is likely a low quality budget PSU on top of it, you basically have to get a 250-300w quality PSU before even thinking about getting a GPU.

 

It might still be worth it, but with that PSU just nope, it's asking for trouble... 

[DELDER]

9 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

dude, you just have to look up recommended power supply for the gpu you're interested in, which means the options will be very limited with that power supply 

 

generally the 1030 is an entry level gpu that would make sense in your build but I have no idea how it compares to the 550. 

 

Edit : 300w PSU is recommended for 1030, yours is likely a low quality budget PSU on top of it, you basically have to get a 250-300w quality PSU before even thinking about getting a GPU.

 

It might still be worth it, but with that PSU just nope, it's asking for trouble... 

I think that I will just trash the computer and build a new one. Thanks for the suggestion though!

[OrdinaryPhil]

The GTX 1650 typically does not require and additional PCI-power, meaning it is powered by the slot and performs just fine. (1080p-60ish). 

I personally love this card and both MSI and ASUS make very nice models.

Just be careful - while the card doesn't normally use 6-PIN or 8-PIN power - there arethat models apply a factory OC (for like 2% more performance, lol) and those DO require the extra power and IMO undermine the entire point of this card.

I'd love to see if NVIDIA will be releasing a slot-power RTX this gen (I'd buy an RTX 3050 in a heartbeat if it managed to run without PCI-pin power). It may be worth waiting for... may not. In either case, the GTX 1650 is current the most performance you can get this way, it is retails new for $149 in most cases.

[DELDER]

1 hour ago, OrdinaryPhil said:

The GTX 1650 typically does not require and additional PCI-power, meaning it is powered by the slot and performs just fine. (1080p-60ish). 

I personally love this card and both MSI and ASUS make very nice models.

Just be careful - while the card doesn't normally use 6-PIN or 8-PIN power - there arethat models apply a factory OC (for like 2% more performance, lol) and those DO require the extra power and IMO undermine the entire point of this card.

I'd love to see if NVIDIA will be releasing a slot-power RTX this gen (I'd buy an RTX 3050 in a heartbeat if it managed to run without PCI-pin power). It may be worth waiting for... may not. In either case, the GTX 1650 is current the most performance you can get this way, it is retails new for $149 in most cases.

That seems like a very powerful card to be using a 180w power supply to power it. 

[Mark Kaine]

2 minutes ago, DELDER said:

That seems like a very powerful card to be using a 180w power supply to power it. 

Yeah its not gonna work... 

another issue is if you'd be using a 400-500w supply it'd possibly fry your motherboard or something - it's not made for this kind of power or heat.

[DELDER]

32 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

Yeah its not gonna work... 

another issue is if you'd be using a 400-500w supply it'd possibly fry your motherboard or something - it's not made for this kind of power or heat.

That's why I have been looking at just building a new pc. I feel that building a new one will be much better in the long run. However I am fairly certain that a GT1030 would work. 

[Asthereal]

Second hand GTX 1050 Ti? Many of those need no extra PCIe power and should serve you well.
There are also tons of options for low profile, should your case be one of those silly narrow ones.

 

[DELDER]

2 minutes ago, Asthereal said:

Second hand GTX 1050 Ti? Many of those need no extra PCIe power and should serve you well.
There are also tons of options for low profile, should your case be one of those silly narrow ones.

 

This is true, however 180w power supply is not enough for that card. 

[Asthereal]

3 minutes ago, DELDER said:

This is true, however 180w power supply is not enough for that card. 

Isn't it? The 1050 Ti should use 75W, so you'll have 100 left for the rest of the system. Might be tight, but it should work.
Alternatively you can try to find a lower end 750 Ti, which uses 60W. But the rest is just too little performance for too much money.

 

Might be more efficient to buy a better PSU plus a second hand 970, but I'm guessing the system has a weird motherboard...

I disagree however with what Mark said. A 500W PSU should never fry your motherboard if you have the correct wiring.

[DELDER]

4 minutes ago, Asthereal said:

Isn't it? The 1050 Ti should use 75W, so you'll have 100 left for the rest of the system. Might be tight, but it should work.
Alternatively you can try to find a lower end 750 Ti, which uses 60W. But the rest is just too little performance for too much money.

 

Might be more efficient to buy a better PSU plus a second hand 970, but I'm guessing the system has a weird motherboard...

I disagree however with what Mark said. A 500W PSU should never fry your motherboard if you have the correct wiring.

The motherboard in the system is a Sunflower motherboard. As for the 750 ti, it could work but I was planning on making a new pc anyways and I don't see any benefit delaying that with a gpu upgrade anymore. 

[Asthereal]

2 minutes ago, DELDER said:

The motherboard in the system is a Sunflower motherboard. As for the 750 ti, it could work but I was planning on making a new pc anyways and I don't see any benefit delaying that with a gpu upgrade anymore. 

What the heck? I don't see a 24 pin, but I also don't see any other way the motherboard gets its power.
Where does this board get power from? The side somewhere? Do you have a pic?

The four-pin for the CPU is standard though. That part still makes sense.

[DELDER]

Just now, Asthereal said:

What the heck? I don't see a 24 pin, but I also don't see any other way the motherboard gets its power.
Where does this board get power from? The side somewhere? Do you have a pic?

The four-pin for the CPU is standard though. That part still makes sense.

Yeah its a weird PC. I don't have the PC in front of me but I can send a picture later. 

[Asthereal]

2 minutes ago, DELDER said:

Yeah its a weird PC. I don't have the PC in front of me but I can send a picture later. 

Cool, let us know. I'll investigate a bit more as well when my game of chess is finished.

[OrdinaryPhil]

1 hour ago, DELDER said:

That seems like a very powerful card to be using a 180w power supply to power it. 

Being slot-powered is going to be the same across nearly every option there. PCI-E delivers 75w - doesn't really matter if your card CAN draw more... it will get 75w. The RX 550, the GTX 1050ti, and the 1650 are all going to draw 75w, but the 1650 will convert those 75w into the the best visual fidelity of the lot.

 

Yes the 180w power budget will be tight. But if you're using an SSD and don't have RGB+ a bunch of spinning disk drives, you'll probably be okay doing anything that the 1650 is capable of...

[Asthereal]

1 minute ago, OrdinaryPhil said:

Being slot-powered is going to be the same across nearly every option there. PCI-E delivers 75w - doesn't really matter if your card CAN draw more... it will get 75w. The RX 550, the GTX 1050ti, and the 1650 are all going to draw 75w, but the 1650 will convert those 75w into the the best visual fidelity of the lot.

This is true. However I think a second hand 1050 Ti will probably provide more bang for buck than a new 1650.

The rest of the system is quite old (and weird), so you might not want to invest too much in an upgrade.

Seems more sensible to get something usable now, and save up for an entirely new system in the future.

[OrdinaryPhil]

1 minute ago, Asthereal said:

This is true. However I think a second hand 1050 Ti will probably provide more bang for buck than a new 1650.

The rest of the system is quite old (and weird), so you might not want to invest too much in an upgrade.

Seems more sensible to get something usable now, and save up for an entirely new system in the future.

It's tough to make suggestions without knowing the budget, but yes, the 1059ti will certainly be cheaper.

[Asthereal]

1 hour ago, OrdinaryPhil said:

It's tough to make suggestions without knowing the budget, but yes, the 1059ti will certainly be cheaper.

Budget is mentioned in the third post: 100-200$ Canadian.

It's an A8 system, so no matter what you upgrade to, there's no room to grow anymore. But we might find a way to use a normal PSU, which could in time move to the new system, along with the graphics card. So it'll either be that, or something like a low end 750 Ti that only uses 60W. But those tend to be expensive second hand, because other people also want to make this particular upgrade.

 

EDIT: A12, but same problem.

EDIT2: Wait, that's an AM4 CPU. Probably no BIOS updates though... Ugh, still no real upgrade path.
EDIT3: I think I found it:

 
So yeah, 4-pin main power and 8-pin SATA power. That seems to be it for power to the board. In theory you might be able to get this to work with a normal power supply, but I have no idea what the dangers might be. SATA should be normal SATA, and the second 4-pin should be normal 12 volt. In theory an extension for the second half of your 4+4 pin CPU power plus a SATA power cable should do it. But that's two "shoulds" and that's two more than I like. What a mess. Probably best to get a cheap second hand 750 Ti or so that doesn't need 6-pin PCIe power, and save up for a whole new system.
 

EDIT4: The longer I stare at this board, the less sense it makes. It's fun though. Glad I joined this topic.