Power Question...

[blahblahblah]

Okay, I have a 450W Power supply, that is not the problem. And I would like to upgrade my graphics card. The problem is, I don't have any unused molex plugs. I have one molex plug that is being used to power one optical drive and two fans. And another one that is being used to power two optical drives and a floppy drive. Could I use either of those to power a new graphics card or do I have to buy a new power source?

Secondly, what graphics card should I use? I need a graphics card that will last me a long time (the plan is 3 plus years before I will upgrade my computer again). Is Direct 9.0c worth it? What about 3Dc? All these new cards have blistering performance for today's games but I am more concerned about games 2 years from now since I will not be able to upgrade in the future.

I have read all of the reviews and I don't see a clear winner. I need some help and opinions.

My rig.
Athlon XP 2800+
1 Gb of RAM
450 W PSU
9600 Pro

Another piece of info. My monitor only supports a maximum resolution of 1280x1024.

Wow, wrote way more than I wanted to. Thanks for any help.

 

[Asus]

If you could put one string to power floppy and both your optical drives while using the other string for a gfx card and 2 fans. That would be a better arrangement.

For being safe on power I would recommend the X800 of course.
For performance, I'll let you judge based on the games you currently play or will play.

As for PS3.0, look how long it took PS2.0 games to start coming into the market since the 9700's release. Plus there is also a big difference from 1.1 to 2.0 but not from 2.0 to 3.0. Only gaining efficency and true displacemnt mapping (if developers utilize it).

Basicly any effect PS3.0 can do, PS2.0 can do since they only upped the minimum requirements.
ATI has some of features in PS3.0 except the ones that require a lot of power consumption. So it's more like an enhanced 2.0. Check out the chart at the bottom.

3Dc is an interesting concept and if developers use it then they can increase detail by using the extra bandwidth the compression saves.
Link
Link
3Dc discription
Check out the SS2 pics and see if you notice any detail difference.

I'm sure you've seen this but we can link to it again.
Power consumption

 

[blahblahblah]

Actually I have three optical drives. (Really useful for installing games. Throw in one CD per optical drive and then install. Don't have to swap disks) So could I throw all three optical drives and a floppy drive on one string?

Needless to say, you are the man Asus.

 

[Asus]

um, you could put an optical drive with the gfx card because I doubt you will be using all of them WHILE playing an intense game...
:thumbs:

 

[umop]

Actually there are molex splitters that you can buy, that you plug one molex into it, and it turns it into 2, like the letter Y, that way you won't have to unplug anything.

 

[blahblahblah]

I am worried about having enough power to run everything on one line (ie optical drive, and a graphics card)