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Hello All. I am looking for a single slot video card to use in a company Dell 260 desktop - a small tower chassis not meant to be expanded. What's the best I can look for in the new world of two or more slot cards?

I am trying to drive a Dell 24" LCD and a Dell 19" LCD. Some gaming, mostly work - office apps, web page dev and photo editing. Not much heavy lifting.

Which exact model of Dell machine is it? There are Vostro 260s, Optiplex 260s, etcetc, afraid it's difficult to say without some clarification .

the other part of this equation is whether or not it's a low-profile expansion slot. If it is (as a lot of slim desktops have) then that limits what you can buy even further.

I'm going to guess that it's a Radeon HD7750.

7750 sounds about right. You could go cheaper though - perhaps a 6570 like this would work:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814161390

It's passive so it should be quiet as well.

If you want to go more powerful (unlikely to be necessary) open the case and find out if you have any 6 or 8 pin connectors on your power supply. I attempted to give a mate my old 4850 but his Dell didn't have any connectors to power it...

Radeon HD7750 is likely the best choice because its 28nm fabrication process allows it to provide better performance per watt than older GPUs that were fabricated at 40nm. Less power = less heat, so it can get by with a smaller cooler.

NarwhaleAu wrote:

If you want to go more powerful (unlikely to be necessary) open the case and find out if you have any 6 or 8 pin connectors on your power supply. I attempted to give a mate my old 4850 but his Dell didn't have any connectors to power it...

Radeon HD7750 uses at most 55 watts, which is well within the maximum of 75 watts that can be drawn from the PCIe X16 slot, so no additional PCIe power connectors are required. However, if you find yourself in that situation again, you may be able to use a simple plug adapter (if the power supply has enough capacity on the +12V rails).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812887001
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812189120
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812267004
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812200106
Many graphics cards will include these adapters in the box.

Thanks - it is an Optiplex mini tower. I now have an older single slot card in it. I also upgraded the PSU to have needed power inputs, etc.

I'll look 7750

That would be my old AGP Radeon 9800 Pro, the last single slot card I had. *fond memories*

Looks to me like you're stuck with AGP graphics. I hope I'm wrong.

The best you're going to do (for a reasonable price) with AGP is a ATI 3650 for $40. Just an FYI, you're getting performance similar to a Nvidia GT 520 or slightly better than Intel Graphics 3000 so you're not going to be doing much in the realm of demanding games.

What year did you buy this computer? I think you will be held back by the CPU in games.

Its a company box - Dual core 8500 (if I recall) - not a main gaming box but pretty good for an older CPU. Looking to play older games anyway - Far Cry. Portal, maybe Deus Ex. I'm not looking for God-box here.

I swapped my Dell 24" LCD for a Benq 24" I used for gaming and the Optiplex 620 box with Win 7 got unhappy. Didn't find the Benq, went to smaller Dell. only

I had not been looking at anything but one step from the top of the line (7950 to replace my 5850 sometime) - but then this swap made me look.

The 7750 has great promise and easy price. Thanks for the good advice.