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Thread ID: 93936 2008-10-07 07:32:00 Need Help - First build Blackandblue (14231) Press F1
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710377 2008-10-09 11:33:00 the 4850's are generally a slim single slot card with no external venting so tend to heat up the case a bit, 4870's are 2 slot rear venting - at least for the ones I've seen.

Chosing ATI or Nvidia is a bit tougher - they both have their staunch supporters that will tell you you "have" to have this card or that card. I'd suggest going to a site like Toms Hardware and looking at the benchmarks yourself - you can chose the games you are interested in and compare. Overall there is not much between 9800GTX+ and HD 4850 cards - I'd just pick which was cheaper.

The 4850 was the best budget deal for a while but Nvidia have brought down their prices in response making the 9800GTX+ quite close in price and Nvidia do have a slight edge in games performance with specific titles. That said the 4850 is still a bit cheaper and runs awesomely - I have one myself and coupled with a 22" monitor have yet to see a game struggle to play smoothly.

As for PSU the wattage is not the important thing - generally you need a psu that can supply 28 amps or better on the 12V rail or rails ( 2 or 3 18A rails is ok too as long as they total more than about 28A ) I have an AcBel 420W PSU running an 8800GTs and a E6750 cpu and everything is stable although this is a bit marginal especially if you have a lot of hard drives / fans / case lighting. For SLI you have to go even higher.

Pick a good brand of psu - running your nice gaming hardware on a cheap psu is false economy that make come back to bite you in the arse ( not "ass" I'm not american - mini rant ). Some good brands are - Silverstone, corsair, AcBel, coolermaster, thermaltake ( but just the toughpower range really ). there are others - just avoid the el cheapo ones, if it costs $50 it won't run a gaming machine safely.
dugimodo (138)
710378 2008-10-09 20:08:00 If anyone is interested, I'm still trying to sell a Silverstone 650w PSU.

PM me if interested..
SolMiester (139)
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