Can I play games on this potato pc

[gladwin]

I have never really played pc games, I want to maybe try a few games on my current. I was thinking of trying minecraft .

Specs: Optiplex 3020 sff

i5 4590s , 8gb ram, 250ssd,500hdd,
no gpu ( though there's an empty pci slot)

 

Can i play anything on this , or can i upgrade it to make it play some games ??

[ET_Explorer]

Of course you can, you would need low profile gpu to install it to this computer.

You would need to upgrade the ram to 16 GB.

[flibberdipper]

I feel like even Java Minecraft might be a bit of a stretch for it just because of how oddly GPU-hungry it has become in semi-recent times, though Bedrock would still work flawlessly on it. If you intend to do anything more than that though you will need to throw a dedicated card in and probably upgrade your RAM to at least 16GB.

 

You can get GT1030's on eBay now for around $30 bucks which isn't bad so long as you get the GDDR5 variant. Unfortunately there aren't many LP cards to choose from, and all the ones worth half a damn (namely the 1050Ti and 1650) cost entirely too much.

[gladwin]

25 minutes ago, flibberdipper said:

I feel like even Java Minecraft might be a bit of a stretch for it just because of how oddly GPU-hungry it has become in semi-recent times, though Bedrock would still work flawlessly on it. If you intend to do anything more than that though you will need to throw a dedicated card in and probably upgrade your RAM to at least 16GB.

 

You can get GT1030's on eBay now for around $30 bucks which isn't bad so long as you get the GDDR5 variant. Unfortunately there aren't many LP cards to choose from, and all the ones worth half a damn (namely the 1050Ti and 1650) cost entirely too much.

ok,, the gt1030  would work with the stock psu ??

 

[flibberdipper]

10 minutes ago, gladwin said:

ok,, the gt1030  would work with the stock psu ??

 

With plenty of headroom to spare, yes.

[HenrySalayne]

1 hour ago, gladwin said:

ok,, the gt1030  would work with the stock psu ??

 

Linus is always saying "don't waste your money on a low-end GPU like a 1030".

The 1030 is faster than your iGPU, but still horrificly slow. A 1050 ti is 3x the speed of the 1030. This would be my starting point, upgrading to 16 GB of RAM later down the road.

 

[CosmicEmotion]

I would say get a 1650 Ti and put Linux on this bad boy. No other upgrades needed. You should have an awesome time with it. 8 GBs is more than enough to play almost any game the 1650 can take on. Minecraft in particular is also much faster on Linux.

[Ripred]

Doom plays on a calculator, play Doom lol

[thevictor390]

You can always play games! Start with smaller and simpler stuff and work your way up. Indie classics like FTL will run on anything. Subtract 5 years from the age of the PC and it will run most games from that era.

[Birblover12]

22 hours ago, Dean0919 said:

Anything from xx50 and below from Nvidia cards is garbage. Always pay attention to last 2 digits. xx50 is bad, xx60 is average, xx70 is good, xx80 is very good and xx90 is absolute beast of the beast.

I wouldn't say 50 class cards are "garbage" per-se (as long as we're talking 10-series and above), I used 50 class cards for a long while, and as long as you realize it's not going to be a powerhouse of a card and you're playing at 1080p it will be fine. Perhaps not the best value for the money, but reason I say this is because suddenly once you hit 60 class cards and above many prebuilt machines (ESPECIALLY Dells) simply don't have the correct PSU Wattages/PSU Cables meaning you'd have to buy an entirely new PSU just to run a better card which can be worth it to some, but it's something that many don't factor into their costs and then get caught off guard.

 

That being said, OP just don't get a GT-1030, you will want to cry with how pitiful it is, try to save for a good GPU like a xx50 or xx60 class GPU if you can, try using Ebay and looking on the used market to really stretch your dollar, LTT has many guides on what to look for when doing this so perhaps look there if you need help. Things like a 1050 Ti or 1650 Ti iirc don't require PSU upgrades and are plug and play, though if you can fit a new PSU into your budget (whatever it is) then the sky is really the limit as far as what you can buy.

[Copper Shortsword]

On 11/29/2023 at 9:51 PM, gladwin said:

I have never really played pc games, I want to maybe try a few games on my current. I was thinking of trying minecraft .

Specs: Optiplex 3020 sff

i5 4590s , 8gb ram, 250ssd,500hdd,
no gpu ( though there's an empty pci slot)

 

Can i play anything on this , or can i upgrade it to make it play some games ??

I have a 3rd gen i3 and it runs Minecraft fine. I can even play rlcraft, Minecraft modpack, (on servers tho, it doesn't like running a RLcraft world on it's own).