I'm looking for a slight upgrade to my Fathers PC (shuttle XPC H67 with an i5-2500K) as he wants to use a 1440p monitor (monitor undecided as yet, maybe a Dell U2713HM (the cheaper model)) for more vertical rows in excel (original plan was for 2 24" with one rotated but he decided it'd take over his desk) but alas motherboard says no to 1440p monitors via DVI (the HD 3000 on the CPU should do it but oh well).
The XPC does have 2 expansion slots however the x1 slot is in use for a TV tuner card so I'm left looking for low power single slot cards. I'd seen an EVGA GT 740 with 4GB vram but recommended PSU wattage is 400 and the XPC has a 300W PSU.
So I've narrowed it down to 2 cards...
An EVGA GT 730 http://www.evga.com/Products/Product.aspx?pn=02G-P3-2738-KR
Or a Gainward GTX 750 http://www.gainward.com/main/vgapro.php?id=933&lang=en
EVGA is a tried and tested brand for me and the 730 should easily cope with 1440p when all he does is browse the web, work, watch TV, play minesweeper and freecell and check his email (and my mother occasionally using paint shop pro)...but getting the maxwell 750 seems more logical however I don't know about Gainward in terms of quality these days (they used to be pretty popular a decade or so ago) and how well that single slot heatsink and fan will do.
Any opinions would be apprciated :)
(For reference, the EVGA 730 is £54 and the Gainward 750 is £90).
if you can afford the extra cost, go for the gainward. The maxwell chip is truly impressive when it comes to the low heat it outputs, and low wattage it consumes, both win/win for your scenario and worth the extra euro imo.
If you don't mind me asking, what brand is that psu? 300 watts is pushing it, but it might be okay. I had an older intel based g41 pentium paired with a 8800GTS which was a power hog, and it ran lol.
Also that gpu has a dual-link connector, so if you're ever in the market for a monitor, and wish to delve into the korean-sphere of monitors, your father's PC is ready for the adventure.
I have no idea what the PSU is, it's whatever Shuttle fit to the XPC SH67H3 :)
Korean monitors are an option, I've told him he has to get an IPS panel 100%..but needs to be decent enough quality etc etc and both those cards have dual link DVI (or should if they both support at least 2560x1600 as neither has displayport)...i just don't know which to look at or what is available here...
Still not sure on the single slot gainward cooler though, it's a shame EVGA hasnt done one!
Yes, well the problem with that cooler is that it seems to blow the air downward, towards your other card. It might get hot spot of air between the two cards. If you could get another fan to blow outward outside of your case, I think that should lower temps (IF temps were to become an issue). TBH i don't see it getting to be a problem tho maxwell runs super cool especially if only light gaming or tasks . But then again at 1440p.. hmmm do you have an extra fan you could "rig" up in case temps do become a problem
Check this out, they modded a 750ti with a fanless cooler. But I just want to show you how without a fan, this thing can get hot, but still work. With a fan you'll be great This is while pushing the card too. But worse case scenario, start thinking of how you can better improve airflow in your PC.
In the end i went with the GT 730, installed it today and...instantly regretted it.
The fan runs at a minimum of 65%. That's loud in a small thin walled case like the shuttle XPC. It also turns out it's Thermi (err Fermi ;)) based so...yeah another negative.
It's going back tomorrow and i'm going to see about getting http://www.msi.com/product/vga/N720-2GD3HLP.html#hero-overview
Kepler based, passively cooled...should be super. Only one thought in my mind about it and that's there is only one fan in the shuttle, ant it's a 92mm exhaust for the CPU cooler...shouldnt be an issue for just office/desktop work though
I have this Shuttle at work to run a graphics card we had to put in the 500W PSU they sell for Shuttle cases even with a GT730. It makes the machine terribly unstable with out a new PSU.