Hey would anyone like to venture an opinion? :-)
Would this card: GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER GAMING X 6GB PCI-E w/ HDMI, Triple DP https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX79541 (PCIe 3.0) likely work with this motherboard? ASUS M4A88T-M https://origin-www.asus.com/Motherboards/M4A88TM/specifications/ (PCIe 2.0)
I'm looking for a solution to bump up the graphics on this PC for temporary use (i.e. next year or so).
On 2021-01-26 6:31 p.m., Kevin McGregor wrote:
Hey would anyone like to venture an opinion? :-)
Always? :D
Yes, it will work. PCIe 3.0 cards are backwards compatible.
We could nerd about the PCIe 3.0 vs 2.0 bandwidth limits and if this card would ever go past that and so on, but it is pointless in your case. You will be limited by any processor this board can support *waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay* before you hit any limits on that GPU.
Kind regards,
That is way too much card for that chipset, kind of with Alberto here.
Sure it will ‘work’ but also not sure what ‘bump the graphics’ means for you here and your use case may require it but in the absence of context, yeah that is kind of like putting a rocket on a Miata.
Not knowing what you are coming from and assuming you want to stay in the Nvidia GPU space I would say something like a 1030-1070 would be a reasonable balance (even then it is a bit of a stretch) as your board listed is PCI2.0 and you’ll barely be able to feed it to hit anywhere near the capacity.
Especially if you only need it for a year of so, now if you are looking to buy now to transplant into a new rig later well then yeah it will work but don’t expect to really get it’s value until that upgrade.
--
Sean
From: Roundtable roundtable-bounces@muug.ca On Behalf Of Alberto Abrao Sent: January 26, 2021 7:08 PM To: roundtable@muug.ca Subject: Re: [RndTbl] HW question
On 2021-01-26 6:31 p.m., Kevin McGregor wrote:
Hey would anyone like to venture an opinion? :-)
Always? :D
Would this card:
GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER GAMING X 6GB PCI-E w/ HDMI, Triple DP https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX79541 (PCIe 3.0)
likely work with this motherboard?
ASUS M4A88T-M https://origin-www.asus.com/Motherboards/M4A88TM/specifications/ (PCIe 2.0)
I'm looking for a solution to bump up the graphics on this PC for temporary use (i.e. next year or so).
Yes, it will work. PCIe 3.0 cards are backwards compatible.
We could nerd about the PCIe 3.0 vs 2.0 bandwidth limits and if this card would ever go past that and so on, but it is pointless in your case. You will be limited by any processor this board can support *waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay* before you hit any limits on that GPU.
Kind regards,
On 2021-01-26 Sean Cody wrote:
yeah that is kind of like putting a rocket on a Miata.
Can't resist:
https://staceydavid.com/projects/banshee https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_zn4e7tJZA skip to 12:30 point
TLDR; put a 400hp V8 in a Miata; bonus notes: needed more upgrades than you'd imagine so it wouldn't tear itself apart with torque. All in $10k-$20k in mid-00's money.
I like my current cars, but this thing would be so fun to drive because of its power-to-weight insanity. It'd be like putting a V8 in my old 'Lude sitting there... (don't tempt me!)
What does this have to do with *NIX? Absolutely nothing! Except maybe that guys doing this are the same as the overclockers, modders, and tweakers of computers.
On 2021-01-26 Kevin McGregor wrote:
I have a fair bit of personal experience putting newer cards on older systems. They do often look like they'll be backwards compatible, but in the real world it'll sometimes not be true.
There are a few problems:
1. Newer cards have much higher slot power draw requirements and many old boards (esp PCIe v1) won't provide that much power. It was a big problem for using v2 cards on v1 boards. Symptom: no display, system dead or beeping.
This might be less of a thing using v3 on v2 (compared to v2 on v1)... YMMV.
2. Even worse is older cards often had the 6 pin PCIe supplemental power connector to make up for lackluster slot power. Most new cards that aren't crazy high-end solely use slot power, making the power situation in #1 more of a problem.
3. X card just doesn't like Y old board even though power specs look ok. Hit this many times trying to use low-end low power draw v2 cards on random v1 boards. Low-end cards should not experience power draw issues ever. But some still won't work.
If you can, make sure you can return (or sell) the card if it doesn't work in your board. Based on my experience it's like 20% probability it won't work.
As for the (if it does work) it'll be overkill argument already put forth: depends. If you're just trying to get 2D / desktop (no games) and you're mostly interested in the massive-multi-monitor capability, do like I did and get the lowest-end card that does the newer DP spec and daisy-chaining. Then you only need 2 digital-out ports on the card to get 3 (maybe 4) monitors. 1 DP can drive 2 monitors daisychained.
If it's gaming, then better/faster vid card will help, but like they said, you'll start seeing diminishing returns as your CPU/RAM become the bottleneck, not the VC. But I wouldn't say it's completely useless, assuming it works. Getting a $700 card for an old box is probably silly, but $200-$300 doesn't sound horrible, especially if you're getting other features you want.
And make sure your PS is a good one (Japanese caps) with enough juice leftover.
On January 27, 2021 5:18:56 a.m. CST, Trevor Cordes trevor@tecnopolis.ca wrote:
Did happen back on PCIe v1 days. So far I have not experienced that with PCIe v2. A good point nevertheless.
Not sure, but I don't think that's the case for the 1660, as it should have its own power connector. Don't quote me on that, though.
AM2/AM3 boards such as the one he linked have beefy power everything because, well, that's Phenom II-era AMD. It was not yet on "bring-your-own-power-plant" territory like Bulldozer, but getting there.
All true.
Then again, if that's the case, I would throw a gazillion (read: 3) older GPUs with two video outs each and call it a day. Six monitors! POWAH!
He does have plenty of PCIe slots on that board.
Speaking of which... is that the case, Kevin? If yes, let me know, because I may be able to help you here.
Not completely useless, but still... If it were me, I would try to find an used GPU to get by and purchase the new one when the time for a whole new machine came.
And make sure your PS is a good one (Japanese caps) with enough juice leftover.
That's always a good thing to do, no matter what.
I'd be happy enough with a used card, but they're in short supply as well. Probably most used cards are going for the same price as new ones!
Does anyone have a lead on a used NVidia 1660-level card? They're roughly $300 new -- if you can find one.
I'd prefer to have a new computer with a AMD 5900X, 32 GB ECC RAM, M.2 1 TB SSD and an NVidia 3060-level video card... but supplies are tight on video cards and CPUs especially so I thought I'd just get a 'decent' video card to stretch my current system's life out a little longer.
My use case doesn't involve more than 2 monitors, but it does include video editing/transcoding and 3D drawing & rendering so I'd like to have something fairly snappy. One card should do. I think most 1660-level cards have an 8-pin power connector; ~125 W is a typical total power draw for the card.
On Wed, Jan 27, 2021 at 7:16 AM Alberto Abrao alberto@abrao.net wrote:
On 2021-01-27 8:37 a.m., Kevin McGregor wrote:
I'd be happy enough with a used card, but they're in short supply as well. Probably most used cards are going for the same price as new ones!
Right now it is not a good time to bother with used parts, in my opinion. The pandemic screwed it all up :(
Prices are wonky because availability is hit-or-miss.
Does anyone have a lead on a used NVidia 1660-level card? They're roughly $300 new -- if you can find one.
Memoryexpress does seem to have them in stock, here in Winnipeg. Not many though, so act fast if that's what you want.
Also not a good time to upgrade anything, so I can relate to that.
As long as your PSU is up to it, you'll be fine.
Kind regards,
-
Alberto Abrao -
Glen Ditchfield -
Kevin McGregor -
Sean Cody -
Trevor Cordes