PCIexpress2 graphics card from amazon uk for HD blueray

[graphics123]

Hi,

 

I want to buy a PCI express 2.0 graphics cards with www.amazon.co.uk vouchers, ie the purchase needs to be from their catalogue.

 

I am neither a gamer nor an overclocker!

 

I wish to use a digital DVI-D cable to an HD LG Flatron W2253TQ monitor,

 

and the main uses currently are watching DVDs, but once prices come down I intend to watch blueray at full HD.

 

I sometimes use 3D screensavers eg the ones from astro-geminii, but I never play 3D games, never have, never will.

 

(I prefer 2D puzzle element games eg Cradle of Rome, I'm more interested in the ideas than the visuals. For visuals I

prefer the 3D screensavers or 3D films)

 

I am buying a Gigabyte M68M-S2P motherboard and AMD Phenom II X4 910e/2.6GHz and 8G of memory.

 

I wish to buy a PCI express 2.x graphics card FROM www.amazon.co.uk even if its more expensive, whch will deal with the above eg to deal with full blueray digital HD quality

 

without stalling or incompletely decompressed images or lower res or other compromise.

 

digital 1920 x 1080 video without compromise. perhaps in the future I will get a 3D monitor, so perhaps if the gfx card

 

will deal with 3D HD as that eventually will become the standard but that is nonessential.

 

 

 

as regards price:

 

30 quid is very good

 

50 quid is ok if its much better than the 30 quid offerings

 

70 quid is ok if its much better than the 50 quid offerings

 

but 100 or higher is expensive.

 

 

anyway, subject to these constraints, any suggestions?

 

in particular, what would be the cheapest card to meet the above constraints?

 

I dont mind paying an extra 20 quid if there is a significant increase in fps or other,

 

but not if the only noticeable difference is with some extreme diabolical game!

 

 

many thanks in advance.

Edited February 20, 2011 by graphics123

[jelly]

This card should work well for what you want to do! link ---> http://www.amazon.co.uk/SAPPHIRE-HD5670-GDDR5-Express-Graphic/dp/B0032W414E/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1298210417&sr=1-4 . Just so you know i have the same monitor as you and you will not be able to get full hd. ie 1080p the monitor has a max res of 1680x1050.

[graphics123]

This card should work well for what you want to do! link ---> http://www.amazon.co.uk/SAPPHIRE-HD5670-GDDR5-Express-Graphic/dp/B0032W414E/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1298210417&sr=1-4 .

 

ok, thanks for the suggestion, maybe I'll get that, I'll see what further comments are made and decide tonight (in 8 or 9 hours time), ie make the purchase.

 

Also any comments as to why I shouldnt get the cheaper ones or what I'd miss out on for the more expensive ones would be useful.

 

 

Just so you know i have the same monitor as you and you will not be able to get full hd. ie 1080p the monitor has a max res of 1680x1050.

 

are you sure about that?

 

because on XP if I select right mouse button -- properties -- settings it allows 1920 x 1080 and on up to 2048 x 1536,

 

Now when I set it to above 1920 x 1080 there is scrolling beyond the visible screen, ie its fake above 1920 x 1080,

but at 1920 x 1080 there is no scrollng

 

if I set it to 1680 x 1050 which you mention, the text is slightly blurred,

 

thats with my existing gfx card which is an NVIDIA GeForce 6600, also PCI Express which I bought in 2006.

 

 

 

 

if it isnt 1920 x 1080, then I've been conned as I thought it was HD.

 

 

the controls of this monitor are completely impossible, touch controls with incomprehensible logic and

I cannot find any resolution info from those. I have to stick labels on the touch controls as the font is

almost the same colour as the monitor frame, in future I'll only buy monitors with push button controls.

 

I only bought this monitor because it was the only one at Comet and PC World which met all requirements,

namely: below 160 quid, full HD res, digital, tiltable stand

 

 

 

one further question, would this existing card be inadequate for what I want? ( NVIDIA GeForce 6600)

[cery25]

if is not for gaming go for a gt 240 1 gb

[graphics123]

if is not for gaming go for a gt 240 1 gb

 

which of the ones under 85 quid at www.amazon.co.uk would you say is best?

 

eg on this link:

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_19?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=gt240+graphics+card&sprefix=gt240+graphics+card

[cery25]

which of the ones under 85 quid at www.amazon.co.uk would you say is best?

 

eg on this link:

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_19?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=gt240+graphics+card&sprefix=gt240+graphics+card

 

the xfx , asus or the gigabyte

[graphics123]

the xfx , asus or the gigabyte

 

the xfx looks like a good price at 45, the Gigabyte is 68 quid. But there is not much info about the Gigabyte,

 

nor at the Gigabyte webpage http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3252#ov

 

would you say the Gigabyte one is better in all respects than the xfx?

[graphics123]

the xfx , asus or the gigabyte

 

I bought the Gigabyte GT240 + 1GB DDR3, unfortunately I'm now trying to get a refund!

 

the problem is that the ginormous fan completely obscures the adjacent PCI express 1x socket

 

of the Gigabyte M68M-S2P motherboard.

 

 

I need the PCI 1x socket in order to use USB3, as the only way to use USB3 seems to be

 

to use PCI express sockets.

 

 

can you advise on any graphics card which doesnt have some ginormous cooling unit

 

so that I can use the adjacent PCI express socket.

 

 

The sockets are like this:

 

pci express 16x

---------------------------

pci express 1x

---- :GT240's cooling unit eclipses this socket,

pci

------------

pci

------------

 

they really should have put the cooling unit on the other side, seeing as both

 

the motherboard and gfx card are by the same company, you'd have thought they'd have

 

spotted the mal design. Either that or they should have put the pci express 16x socket

 

at the lowest point of the above diagram.

 

 

 

USB3 is 10x as fast as USB2 and I've already bought 2 USB3 1T drives,

 

unless someone knows an alternative way to get USB3, so far I've only

 

found PCI express cards to utilize USB3

[Owenisbad]

Why not just get two 7200rpm 1tb internal hdds? surely they would be quicker and cheaper than external usb3 ones.

This looks decent and only takes up 1 pci e slot, but having a graph card with a single slot cooler limits your choice quite a bit.

[graphics123]

Why not just get two 7200rpm 1tb internal hdds? surely they would be quicker and cheaper than external usb3 ones.

This looks decent and only takes up 1 pci e slot, but having a graph card with a single slot cooler limits your choice quite a bit.

 

I want the GT240, but why didnt they put the cooler on the other side, or put the PCIe 16x socket on the other side, its a geometrical problem not a hardware technology problem.

 

Do all motherboards put the PCIe 1x slot below the 16x slot?

 

its bad planning, hardware should NEVER obscure sockets, its not rocket science to get it right, its placement level, put the socket here not there.

 

 

I want USB3 because I move the drives between systems. eg when I visit relatives I can put the Verbatim 53018 in my jacket, its very small very light (plastic casing) very fast very quiet

very cool and 1TB. The small USB3 drives are twice as expensive, about 90 or 100 for 1TB, large USB3 1TB is about 56 quid. But the convenience factor is too good.

Once this new PC is built I will have 3 PC's, I want to be able to move disks between systems. Its too much hassle to have a disk locked to one PC. When I go on holiday

I dont want to have to backup 3 drives.

 

 

 

and I can then work entirely from the small drive on the computer at the relatives, AND I can use it from my laptop. Internal drives cannot be used with laptops.

 

and USB3 is TEN TIMES as fast as USB2. Internal drives are stuck on one machine, cannot be used from a laptop, they are big, too big to carry conveniently in clothing,

they have exposed circuitry and ribbon cables,

 

according to wikipedia 7200rpm is up to 1Gigabit per second,

 

USB3 is up to 4.8 Gigabit per second, in some years its going to be the only option as its so much better. if you've used the Verbatim even via USB2 you'll never want to

use anything else, its light years ahead of SATA. I thought I'd get value for money from SATA, but when I looked at products I found that there is no price advantage to SATA.

 

basically they dont make SATA to USB3 converters because USB3 is faster, but they do make USB3 to SATA converters!

 

the ONLY way to use USB3 is via PCI express, all other sockets arent fast enough, even PCI isnt fast enough.

 

 

I only use SATA because you cannot boot from USB, other than that there is no advantage whatsoever for SATA

 

 

for technical reasons they dont even know if the FUTURE SATA can be faster than USB3, USB3 is here right now, its cheap, and its damn fast.

what I read is that the future SATA6 is half duplex whereas USB3 is full duplex, no idea what that means.

The tide is already going USB3's way.

 

there's an article here comparing USB3 with SATA

 

 

USB3 is going to win simply because its more convenient and cheaper for laptops, price is the ultimate decider.

the above link explains better than I can why USB3 is better.

Edited March 28, 2011 by graphics123

[graphics123]

Why not just get two 7200rpm 1tb internal hdds? surely they would be quicker and cheaper than external usb3 ones.

This looks decent and only takes up 1 pci e slot, but having a graph card with a single slot cooler limits your choice quite a bit.

 

as regards the HD5670, I'm interested in using a remote monitor by wireless via the Q-waves product,

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Q-Waves-Wireless-USB-HDMI-Extender/dp/B002RL9F38/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1301341528&sr=1-1

 

when I tried this with my PC from years ago, I found it was difficult to use a remote monitor without first using a cable connected monitor ie each time I booted XP I had to boot to a monitor connected by cable, then reconfigure to the remote monitor.

 

I dont know if with the HD5670 I can boot directly to the wireless monitor without needing a monitor connected by cable?

 

 

the way the Q-waves works is you have a USB2 wireless transmitter connected to the PC,

 

then a wireless receiver with VGA and HDMI sockets from which you connect the monitor

 

The photo at the above link

 

shows the transmitter and receiver very clearly. I didnt get full HD quality with the VGA, I think its analog but its

 

acceptable quality.

[Fixedgeariain]

This adds nothing to the convo but the word "quid" makes me think of "squid" which in turn makes me think of calamari....mmmmm calamari...