PC upgrade

[Walt]

Hi everyone,

One of my best friends wants to upgrade his pre-built pc. He has a Dell Inspiron 3847. Which has an i5-4440, 8gb drr3 and gt 625 (oem). The upgrade is meant for more fps and a better game experience. I think we need to upgrade his gpu but first we need to know which psu it has. Is there a way we can find it out without opening it up? (He doesn't live nearby and don't want to open it up himself) 

He doesn't need a really good gpu (at maximum a 1050TI) but what do you advise? Also does it need to be a blower style card or is there enough airflow in the case? Also keep in mind that the is probably not that great.

Thanks!

[TheGlenlivet]

4 minutes ago, Walt said:

Hi everyone,

One of my best friends wants to upgrade his pre-built pc. He has a Dell Inspiron 3847. Which has an i5-4440, 8gb drr3 and gt 625 (oem). The upgrade is meant for more fps and a better game experience. I think we need to upgrade his gpu but first we need to know which psu it has. Is there a way we can find it out without opening it up? (He doesn't live nearby and don't want to open it up himself) 

He doesn't need a really good gpu (at maximum a 1050TI) but what do you advise? Also does it need to be a blower style card or is there enough airflow in the case? Also keep in mind that the is probably not that great.

Thanks!

http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/product-support/product/inspiron-3847-desktop/manuals

This has all the info you'll need, but I would open it anyway to check it out.

[stefanDB]

PCs like that one often come in different varieties, they may have different PSUs and I wasn't able to find any info on it in my 2 min search. it is far easier to just unscrew the sidepanel and take a look, he doesn't need to take apart the actual PC components. I also recommend a blower style card since there only seems to be one tiny exhaust fan, and overclocking the card isn't great anyway due to the PSU.

[BrinkGG]

9 minutes ago, Walt said:

Hi everyone,

One of my best friends wants to upgrade his pre-built pc. He has a Dell Inspiron 3847. Which has an i5-4440, 8gb drr3 and gt 625 (oem). The upgrade is meant for more fps and a better game experience. I think we need to upgrade his gpu but first we need to know which psu it has. Is there a way we can find it out without opening it up? (He doesn't live nearby and don't want to open it up himself) 

He doesn't need a really good gpu (at maximum a 1050TI) but what do you advise? Also does it need to be a blower style card or is there enough airflow in the case? Also keep in mind that the is probably not that great.

Thanks!

Just make sure the GPU you get does not need a 6pin PCIe power connector and you should be off to the races. 

[Walt]

22 hours ago, Brink2Three said:

Just make sure the GPU you get does not need a 6pin PCIe power connector and you should be off to the races. 

Is it true that the gtx 1050Ti has no PCIe power connector? And if so is it worth considering because the psu is not that great?

[ZenMonkey]

1 hour ago, Walt said:

Is it true that the gtx 1050Ti has no PCIe power connector? And if so is it worth considering because the psu is not that great?

 

It is true. All the power the 1050 Ti needs is provided by the PCI-e slot it's plugged into. Because it's not a power hungry card and only requires 75W, it should be good to remove the 625 and replace it with the 1050 Ti. However, the 625 OEM is only a 29W power draw so it depends on how tight Dell was with the PSU. Best thing your friend can do is open the side and see how many watts the PSU supplies.

[Walt]

On 17-1-2018 at 6:29 PM, ZenMonkey said:

 

It is true. All the power the 1050 Ti needs is provided by the PCI-e slot it's plugged into. Because it's not a power hungry card and only requires 75W, it should be good to remove the 625 and replace it with the 1050 Ti. However, the 625 OEM is only a 29W power draw so it depends on how tight Dell was with the PSU. Best thing your friend can do is open the side and see how many watts the PSU supplies.

It's a 300Watt do you think we need to buy a new psu?

[ZenMonkey]

31 minutes ago, Walt said:

It's a 300Watt do you think we need to buy a new psu?

 

Without knowing every piece of hardware he has in his system, I'm assuming a stock intel cpu fan, 2-3 system fans, and one hard drive in addition to what you've mentioned, so I'll say it should be enough, but I can't guarantee it if he has other devices using power and/or his power supply isn't 80+ rated. Best case is it works fine, but he shouldn't expect high boost clocks, and definitely no overclocking.

[Walt]

56 minutes ago, ZenMonkey said:

 

Without knowing every piece of hardware he has in his system, I'm assuming a stock intel cpu fan, 2-3 system fans, and one hard drive in addition to what you've mentioned, so I'll say it should be enough, but I can't guarantee it if he has other devices using power and/or his power supply isn't 80+ rated. Best case is it works fine, but he shouldn't expect high boost clocks, and definitely no overclocking.

Is there any software tool to see how much he’s using?

[ZenMonkey]

31 minutes ago, Walt said:

Is there any software tool to see how much he’s using?

 

There's no software tool that I know of. As far as I know, you need a meter like https://www.amazon.com/P3-International-P4400-Electricity-Monitor/dp/B00009MDBU to get an accurate real-time measurement.

[Walt]

13 hours ago, ZenMonkey said:

 

There's no software tool that I know of. As far as I know, you need a meter like https://www.amazon.com/P3-International-P4400-Electricity-Monitor/dp/B00009MDBU to get an accurate real-time measurement.

There are no blower style 1050Ti's. Is this because the don't get that hot? The case has not much airflow so I thought a blower style was better.