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PCI express and PC gaming


Whitesupraboy2

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Ive been given an old server and want to use it for gaming. Its not old old.

 

and has two Xeon 3Ghz processors, Memory im upgrading to 4Gb minimum may go for 6Gb.

 

Hard drive's are scsi, so are nice and fast so I think its a good base for a good spec gaming machine for now.

 

Only issue is it says in the spec sheet

 

PCI Express

one full-length x4 lane (slot 2)

one full-length x8 lane (slot 3)

 

 

Is this going to effect me much by not being 16x? Any recommendations in this area for a specific graphic's card? Should i just get a 16x one and it will run at 8x speed fine?

 

Bit out of touch on PC hardware other then low spec built in PC's as have been gaming on the Consoles for a while now.

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There will be a very very slight impact running at 8x from what I have seen but not enough to be noticeable, we are talking a couple of frames per second at best.

 

Have a quick read of this

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pcie-geforce-gtx-480-x16-x8-x4,2696.html

 

Crysis is still the big kid on the block I think with regards to graphics and there the difference is 1 FPS.

Game away!:)

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I am not that clued up on the Nvidia side of things as my last Nvidia card was a geforce 3 but someone can advise. I would put a little extra in and get a 1GB ATI 5770 it's a very good price / performance card and can be had for £99.99 on Overclockers.

You could save a bit and get a 5750 but I dont think the performance drop is worth saving only a few quid.

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Check out the price of mem first, being a dell server it might need ECC stuff and that costs a fair bit more

 

It does Gav hence sticking to 4gb as I said...not made of money lol... It's a dell who always do things their own way!. Which now means I don't have to run 64bit os either as Wez mentioned unless you guys think I'll be soon wishing I had gone 64bit

 

I was considering a server os but no point eating resources for no reason, how is game support on windows 7 now?

 

Ok I'll say my limit for graphics card.... £100

 

Everyones advice greatly recieved 4yrs witout getting my hands on some good tech and I'm like a fish out of water!!

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There will be a very very slight impact running at 8x from what I have seen but not enough to be noticeable, we are talking a couple of frames per second at best.

 

Have a quick read of this

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pcie-geforce-gtx-480-x16-x8-x4,2696.html

 

Crysis is still the big kid on the block I think with regards to graphics and there the difference is 1 FPS.

Game away!:)

 

 

Thanks by the way was a great read. Looks like the difference is minimal like you say and most likely is the processor may become the limiting factor.

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It does Gav hence sticking to 4gb as I said...not made of money lol... It's a dell who always do things their own way!. Which now means I don't have to run 64bit os either as Wez mentioned unless you guys think I'll be soon wishing I had gone 64bit

 

I was considering a server os but no point eating resources for no reason, how is game support on windows 7 now?

 

Ok I'll say my limit for graphics card.... £100

 

Everyones advice greatly recieved 4yrs witout getting my hands on some good tech and I'm like a fish out of water!!

 

You'll still need a 64bit OS if you want to make use of all that 4GB of RAM and a half decent Gfx card with 1GB of VRAM. A 32bit OS can only address 4GB of RAM in total - 4GB system RAM + 1GB RAM on Gfx card = 5GB so you'll probably only be able to access 3GB of you system RAM if you go with 32bit ;)

 

I wouldn't bother with 32bit anyway if you are going with Windows 7 as pretty much everything runs on Win 7 64bit - come across 2 programs so far which are not yet 64bit compatible but neither are showstoppers! Being a ex-server too I expect 64bit drivers will be easy to come across for it.

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You'll still need a 64bit OS if you want to make use of all that 4GB of RAM and a half decent Gfx card with 1GB of VRAM. A 32bit OS can only address 4GB of RAM in total - 4GB system RAM + 1GB RAM on Gfx card = 5GB so you'll probably only be able to access 3GB of you system RAM if you go with 32bit ;)

 

I wouldn't bother with 32bit anyway if you are going with Windows 7 as pretty much everything runs on Win 7 64bit - come across 2 programs so far which are not yet 64bit compatible but neither are showstoppers! Being a ex-server too I expect 64bit drivers will be easy to come across for it.

 

cheers for the info. I didnt actually realise the Graphics memory counted towards the manageable memory in a 32bit system!

 

looks like 64 bit is the way forward!

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