Thinking of upgrading my video card and maybe power supply

claptonman

claptonman

New Member
Well, I've had my brother's computer for a few years now. He built it himself and is a good computer. Here are the Specs:

ATI Radeon X1950 Pro
PC Chips P25G DDr400 mother board
Intel Pentium 4 CPU 3.40GHz (Two CPUs)
2 gigs of ram
550 Watt power supply
Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS
111 gb harddrive

The reason I want to upgrade is while playing Modern Warfare 2, the video card overheats frequently and sometime even restarts the computer. Now this also happens when there are a lot of applications running. Would anyone think the cause of this is an underpowered power supply? If I upgrade my video card, would I need a more powerful one?

And finally, suggestions on a video card better than the one I have but not the best ever. Thanks.
 
I'm thinking $150 max for the video card, unless that's not enough to improve it... And no price limit on power supply. The power supply brand is Antec Neo HE550.
 
Your PSU should be alright.
Probably need upgrade graphic card, and may be more case fans or better ventilation case?
 
daisymtc said:
Your PSU should be alright.
Probably need upgrade graphic card, and may be more case fans or better ventilation case?
Click to expand...

My case is open right now because it overheats, and I got 3 computer fans inside and a store bought fan blowing in. I'm considering upgrading my CPU fan.

And I don't know about the dual CPUs, that's just what dxdiag tells me.
 
claptonman said:
My case is open right now because it overheats, and I got 3 computer fans inside and a store bought fan blowing in. I'm considering upgrading my CPU fan.

And I don't know about the dual CPUs, that's just what dxdiag tells me.
Click to expand...

close your case.air has to flow in the front and out the back.it'll overheat more with it open.
are your fans dusty? if inside your case is very dusty it may not cool as well as it should
 
Before you guys start recommending vid cards you might want to look at the MB specs.

I don't think it supports PCI express x16.

Board has 3 PCI and 1 AGP 8x slot.

I don't think the board is going to support this XFX HD-485X-ZDFC.

OP would be better served with these or these
 
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The pentium 4 he has is a single core cpu, the pentium d is a dual core. I think he'd be better off upgrading his motherboard to something like this and get a new os like this. Then, later one when he wants to he can upgrade his GPU, CPU and so on he can. You'd be better of future proofing then limiting yourself to AGP.
 
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The best agp card would be ATI 3850, than, ATI 4670.
You may need better heatsink? Also, close your case, allow air blow in from front, exhaust at rear.
 
claptonman said:
My case is open right now because it overheats, and I got 3 computer fans inside and a store bought fan blowing in. I'm considering upgrading my CPU fan.

And I don't know about the dual CPUs, that's just what dxdiag tells me.
Click to expand...

Your DXdiag says 2 CPU's because of the hyperthreading technology that your pentium 4 have. You have 2 virtual cores but only 1 physical core
 
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