How much will replacing just the graphics card improve my gaming experience?

[juliancs]

So I'm stuck with my 2009 MP for a while. It's 2.9 Quad, and I've currently got 12GB RAM in it (it's my music work station).

I have bootcamp installed and play a lot of games, but my card is a GTX 285 and is ageing. I see lots of success stories here with people getting the latest(ish) Nvidia cards to work on their MPs, but I wonder how much of a bottleneck my CPU would be? If I shoved in a nice new card, would I get a significant boost, or would it be wasted on the fact that the processor is still quite old and holding everything back?

If so, what would you folks recommend for a good, stable card for using in Windows? I'd try get a PC card and flash it to save some money. I've still to decipher any of the sites instructing one how to do this...

Cheers!

 

[Cubemmal]

So I'm stuck with my 2009 MP for a while. It's 2.9 Quad, and I've currently got 12GB RAM in it (it's my music work station).

I have bootcamp installed and play a lot of games, but my card is a GTX 285 and is ageing. I see lots of success stories here with people getting the latest(ish) Nvidia cards to work on their MPs, but I wonder how much of a bottleneck my CPU would be?

None at all

If I shoved in a nice new card, would I get a significant boost

Yup.

I upgraded a 2.9 quad with the Sapphire 7950 and it's a great gaming machine, doing full time Windows duty now as I wait for my nMP. It plays the GPU intensive games in three monitor surround with eye candy just fine.

Make sure you update to the latest drivers from AMD. The Nvidia 680 is another choice but it is more expensive and only 2GB. Of course you can get a hack-in-card GPU too and upgrade the firmware, I just wanted a plug-and-play supported card.

 

[Sinx2oic]

yep I got a EVGA GeForce GTX 680 SC Signature NVIDIA for my 2009 works like a charm, be interesting to see how the CF D700 compares.

 

[Gav Mack]

I got 5/6x the speed over my 8800gt with a flashed EVGA 680 reference card as far as my son's minecraft was concerned. Equally impressed myself with the boost it gave PS CS6 though!

 

[juliancs]

Thanks all for the reply. Seems it is worth it then! Debating the 7950 mac, but if I can find an idiots guide to flashing a PC Card I might try go for a 770.

 

[Gav Mack]

My used EVGA GTX 680 cost £210 all in including a pair of new power cables. Was even unregistered for the EVGA warranty so I did it myself. Flashed the Mac Edition EFI in bootcamp that took a couple of mins.

770 do some research on here or netkas forum, think some of them use excessive power for the MP and you may have to live with no boot screen unless you get MacVidCards/Rominator to mod one for you.

 

[Sinx2oic]

I never bothered with flashing it, if you don't then just use an app like bootchamp. Just make sure you either choose a 2x6 pin card or you need an adapter.

 

[willtothewong]

I too am looking to upgrade my 5770 in my Mac Pro.

The 7950 Mac Edition is simply too expensive when compared to PC 7970's that are ~$350.

I've read on this forum that the 7970 works out of the box without any mods.

I may just get an Asus or MSI 7970 and cross my fingers and see if it works....

 

[juliancs]

Well, looks like I'll be grabbing a 680 and flashing it. Hope I can figure it out. I' hope it will improve my games; I think most of them are CPU heavy though - Company of Heroes 2, Planetside 2, Guild Wars 2, Total War 2....(all twos )