Any motherboard with better graphics cards than mine?
October 16, 2011 8:34 AM   Subscribe

I'm thinking about upgrading my computer. I was wondering if there was a motherboard that had a better - or at least comparable integrated graphics card to mine, a GeForce 8400GS.

I have an old Dell Dimension E510 with a Pentium D 2.8GHz processor and 2GB of ram. I'd like to, if I can, just start my upgrading with a motherboard and processor (and probably a case since I'm guessing it won't fit in the Dell case) and re-use most of the parts from my current computer for now if I can. To that end, if there was a motherboard that had a better integrated graphics card than my current card, it seems like that could kill two birds with one stone.

I do some gaming, although it doesn't have to be a top-of-the-line gaming machine, but something that can play Arkham City when it comes out and play games for a few years with only minimal upgrades (like eventually buying a separate graphics card).

I'd love to get a motherboard/processor combo from Newegg or Microcenter, so links to those sites would be great, but any information would be awesome!
posted by SeeTheTurtle to Computers & Internet (8 answers total)
 
Integrated graphics? Why? "Real" graphics cards can be had for under fifty bucks now.
posted by LogicalDash at 8:55 AM on October 16, 2011 [1 favorite]


Don't count on reusing your RAM; you probably have DDR2 in there, and newer processors require DDR3 (which is, thankfully, very cheap right now).
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 9:01 AM on October 16, 2011


System requirements for Arkham City haven't been released yet, so let's pick a game that recently got released, like Deus Ex: Human Revolution, to look at.

DXHR Minimum Requirements:
OS: Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 7
Processor: 2 GHz dual core
Memory: 1 GB RAM (Windows XP) / 2 GB (Windows Vista and Windows 7)
Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 8000 series or ATI Radeon HD 2000 series or better
DirectX®: DirectX 9.0c
Hard Drive: 8.5 GB

DXHR Recommended:
OS: Windows 7
Processor: AMD Phenom II X4 or Intel Core 2 Quad or better
Memory: 2 GB
Graphics: AMD Radeon HD 5850
DirectX®: DirectX 9.0c
Hard Drive: 8.5 GB

It might be worth looking at this review on AnandTech of how integrated cards were performing in January of 2010, including showing Arkham Asylum. Lines like "It’s not great by any means, but it’s not pixelated mush." shouldn't fill you with hope.

You should probably bite the bullet and get a cheap separate graphics card now. I always point people to the Tom's Hardware guide, which will help you figure out what's worth buying at practically every price point.
posted by Remy at 9:09 AM on October 16, 2011


Those Dells use a proprietary motherboard+chassis layout meaning you basically won't be able to buy a different motherboard to fit inside the case, only a Dell Replacement Part.

Furthermore, the power supply in that Dell E510 is 305W according to the manual [PDF]. Even if you just wanted to slap a real video card in it, you'd most likely have to upgrade the power supply, and you'd still be hampered by that P4-era processor.

So probably the only stuff you can reuse out of that Dell would be hard disk & the optical drive. Which saves you maybe $50 - 60, so it's not all bad, but I am sorry to say your upgrade options on that Dell are extremely limited and probably more expense and trouble than they'd be worth.
posted by Edogy at 10:39 AM on October 16, 2011


I should be more specific, that case and motherboard are BTX, not really Dell proprietary, but they might as well be. I'm not sure if anyone even makes new BTX boards anymore.
posted by Edogy at 12:01 PM on October 16, 2011


If you really don't want to spend much money, an old nvidia 9800GT is a superb price/performance point. With a couple of gigs of RAM and an ok dual core processor it will play anything that was released on an Xbox 360 and look really nice.

But your dream of Arkham City on an integrated video chipset is a bit doomed.
posted by Sebmojo at 3:02 PM on October 16, 2011


Response by poster: I upgraded the power supply on my Dell to run the 8400GS, so I might be able to re-use that and I figured I'd probably have to get a new case too. I had thought if there was a better graphics card than the one I currently have that it might hold me over - and be easier for Mrs. SeeTheTurtle to accept - until I upgraded the video card.

The Nvidia 9800GT might be the better choice though. I might also thumb through Tom's Hardware for a nice combination for an upgrade.
posted by SeeTheTurtle at 8:22 AM on October 17, 2011


Since the release details for the PC version of Arkham City just got released, here are the system requirements:

OS: Windows XP, Vista, 7
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz or AMD Athlon X2 4800+
Memory: 2GB RAM
Hard Disk Space: 17 GB free hard drive space
Video Card: ATI 3850HD 512 MB or NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB
DirectX®: 9.0c
Other Requirements: Online play requires log-in to Games For Windows – Live
posted by Remy at 1:00 PM on October 18, 2011


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