Want to buy a 7970, but will it work with this system and PSU?

[toyota]

A 920 is plenty for a 7970. Would it be better with a 2500K? Absolutely but bloomfield is no slouch. It's not like he's running Bulldozer.....

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_7970_CPU_Scaling/

well Bulldozer would almost match the stock 920.

 

[Ovven]

He should be able to easily OC that processor without much (if any) increase in power draw. I run my 920 at 3.13ghz 1.02v (down from stock 1.25v).

 

[Don Karnage]

well Bulldozer would almost match the stock 920.

8150 - 3.6Ghz
920 - 2.66Ghz

Its sad BD still loses to a 920

 

[3DVagabond]

All I can do is give you my personal advice. I would never run a 7970 on that small of a PSU. Ask yourself, if you were building a PC with a 7970 would you put a 475W psu in it?

 

[InfiniteLurker]

[Regarding the easy overclock] Is that easily doable on a Dell? I thought they didn't have options in the BIOS for this, but I'll admit I haven't looked into it at all.

Just to give some perspective, my last overclocking experience was on a build of a Celeron 300A. It was so simple to get that 300MHz up to 450, but I've since tended to opt for ease and stability. Free time is my limiting factor these days.

 

[InfiniteLurker]

All I can do is give you my personal advice. I would never run a 7970 on that small of a PSU. Ask yourself, if you were building a PC with a 7970 would you put a 475W psu in it?

At this point, if I move forward I will be upgrading the psu. I just wasn't sure if I needed to, and was hoping to not have to do so. Now, knowing that I might be restricting the 7970 with the CPU, I'm walking down the path of a whole new build, which I just don't have the time to deal with right now, even though I'd love to.

 

[notty22]

[Regarding the easy overclock] Is that easily doable on a Dell? I thought they didn't have options in the BIOS for this, but I'll admit I haven't looked into it at all.

Just to give some perspective, my last overclocking experience was on a build of a Celeron 300A. It was so simple to get that 300MHz up to 450, but I've since tended to opt for ease and stability. Free time is my limiting factor these days.

Your Dell is not o/c able. Some of the Alienware models are, they explicitly say so. It's almost 100% sure there are not even software work arounds on the normal Dell's.
Also the m/b's aren't built for the power usage that o/c could bring.

 

[Panopticon]

Im pretty sure hes right about that actually its more to do with the bios options then anything else. I have an alienware laptop and the multiplier/voltage options in the bios are locked in. The only way you can oc this model is with an 3rd party bios.

I would say if you want the card get it because you will see an improvement. Buy a new PSU and enjoy. If you consider the fact that with a new psu you basically are a mobo/cpu away from having a new system so you could upgrade to IB this summer on the cheap and then really let the 7970 fly.

 

[InfiniteLurker]

Well, I just saw the other thread about Newegg having the 7970's available, got excited and went ahead and got one and a new PSU.

That's a good plan to wait until the summer and upgrade the rest.

Thank you all for the help!

 

[3DVagabond]

Well, I just saw the other thread about Newegg having the 7970's available, got excited and went ahead and got one and a new PSU.

That's a good plan to wait until the summer and upgrade the rest.

Thank you all for the help!

I think you'll be pretty stoked coming from a 4770 (not a bad card for it's day). The 920 is still a fast chip, and while you might not see maximum FPS that the card's capable of, it should still be fine and a monster improvement over what you have.

 

[djnsmith7]

I'm wondering why you'd even want to risk a $550 GPU with a <500W PS. I agree with the suggestions above to grab a new PS & move on. Looks like several good PS suggestions have been linked already.