XPS 8700 nVidia GTX video card upgrades,

Most of the EVGA GTX 1060's ships with the needed two 6 to 8 pin adapter as part of the package, along with a metal EVGA tag, posters/stickers, everything needed for install.

To install the latest driver, simply download & install GeForce Experience, the current drivers will be downloaded, or manually download the latest on the NVIDIA site & install. GeForce Experience is optional, although does notify one when newer drivers are released.

www.nvidia.com/.../index.aspx

Cat

For using multiple monitors or a UHD 4k monitor, what is the best, low cost Graphics card for Non-gamers??

32 in or 27 in 4k 3840 2160; What should I be looking to purchase?

960?

For using multiple monitors or a UHD 4k monitor, what is the best, low cost Graphics card for Non-gamers?? 32 in or 27 in 4k 3840 2160; What should I be looking to purchase? 960?

At today's pricing for GTX 1060's (on Newegg), one is better off purchasing a far powerful GTX 1080 (non-Ti) for basically the same price. That gives one 8GB of GDDR5X memory, which is more powerful than GDDR5. Many are sold at or just a little more than the 1060's of all types. so today, the 1060 doesn't have the same value, compared to when I purchased both of mine.

So if one is considering a GTX 1060, take a peek at Newegg & see what select 1080's are going for, you'll be overwhelmed with performance for less cash than when these were first released.

I'm looking towards the future (HBR2), which will become the successor to GDDR5 altogether, AMD is releasing some cards this month, although I'd prefer to wait & see what NVIDIA offers. They won't just sit back & allow AMD to take away their market share, and maybe why existing NVIDIA offerings (best pricing) are at the top & lower tiers.

Cat

GTX are 1080 are way too expensive for what I am using it for at $500.  Plus, i have to upgrade the PSU.

Should I be good with GTX 1060 or 1050.  GTX 970, 960?

thanks everyone

Hi,

i forgot to mention that I want to keep my stock PSU 460W.  Should I be ok with the stock PSU with both 970 or 1060?  And I do not do photography, graphic design.  This is for productivity and basic office work/school.

I can possibly get the GTX 970 PNY 4GB or GTX 1060 (both used)if I am patient or wait until miners stop inflating the prices.

I want to run 3415w on GT 720 and that may work on gt720 card.  But for Qnix, Benq 4k monitors; I may want to have a better card like you have mentioned; correct?

May even use a 40" Tv for a monitor as the current monitors are too expensive.   What are some of the best 30+ in 4k monitors ?

TL;DR

- I suggest a GTX 1050

This one (today) looks to be the best price and EVGA is a solid card.  

EVGA GeForce GTX 1050 GAMING, 2GB GDDR5, DX12 OSD Support (PXOC) Graphics Card 02G-P4-6150-KR

- can't help with monitor/TV suggestions. Just be mindful that many TVs don't look so hot as a computer display so you might want to try before you buy.

~ ~ ~ details ~ ~ ~

XPS 8700 stock PSU will work with  a GTX 1060, 1050ti, 1050 or 960.  

GTX 970 is borderline on the stock XPS 8700 PSU. Some get it working and then report back a year later they had problems. I don't trust it and have upgraded for the 8700s I have with GTX 970 cards.

Anyway,  since you are not gaming, and only running office/productivity software the GTX 1050 is fine. you don't need the performance of a GTX 970, and if you did you'd want to get a GTX 1060 anyway.

Cat's comments are due to the current pricing of  GTX 1060 and GTX 1070 cards. The prices are inflated due to very high demand caused by Etherium crypto-currency mining. A GTX1070 is the most efficient card on the market for Etherium mining and as a result both the GTX1060 and GTX1070 prices are jacked up right now.

My hope is the bottom will fall out of the mining market about the time that supply catches up with demand and a fire sale on GTX1070 cards will occur later this year.

Anyway, good luck on the upgrade.

Dan-H, thanks for coming to my rescue, I wasn't trying to push a nearly $600 GPU on anyone, it's just that if I were eyeballing a GTX 1060/1070, may as well jump on the 1080 for basically the same price, even if a PSU upgrade is needed. EVGA now has 'G3' & 'B3' PSU made to fit mini towers, in several wattage ranges to meet the need.

While I may not have needed to upgrade the XPS 8700's PSU for the GTX 1060 SSC upgrade, may had been good that I did, as the sudden freezing in place issues that required a forced shutdown totally disappeared, Also judging by the weight of the OEM 460W PSU & the EVGA replacement, the latter was twice as heavy, once outside of the PC, the Dell unit felt as though a cheap, mass produced built PSU. Am going to assemble another PC from spare components, if the same happens, I'll know the cause fast.

That stated, am happy that both of my GTX 1060's were purchased prior to the jacking up of GTX 1060/1070 pricing, of which I also have one of the latter, the FTW edition, purchased for $429 not long after release & prior to the GTX 1060's (FTW & SSC).

I wasn't aware of a recent mining rush, other than it's gone on for a few years now, only those who hopped on the wagon early (prior to the GTX 900 series days) reaped the most profits, as there were fewer miners. My thinking was that NVIDIA may be clearing inventory, and I suspect to some degree, this is true, in preparation for a new lineup, hopefully with HBR2 memory (what would had been GDDR6 or 7).

One thing for certain, NVIDIA isn't going to allow AMD to steal their market share with their Vega lineup, they likely have a cat to pull out of the bag, if not this fall, at the latest, early 2018. Again, am saving as much as possible, I want my hands on a NVIDIA card with HBR2 tech inside that I can taste it, this will allow me to shuffle my current GTX 1070 into my 2nd best PC, the 1060 FTW installed there in another, would be like three upgrades with a single purchase & once again, the MSI AMD Radeon 7770 GHz edition would be reboxed & my lowest rated GPU would be a GTX 960, originally purchased in 2015 for my XPS 8700.

In summary, unless one truly needs a new GPU, the 10 series is on it's way out, it's now around this same timeframe of the 900 series lifespan, that it too was also a poor choice, especially with the rumors swirling of a GPU (the 10 series) that would boast 'irresponsible performance'. Plus with AMD releasing the Vega series all but casts a new NVIDIA series in stone, unlike Intel (over CPU's), NVIDIA won't play second fiddle for long.

Competition is good, and HBR2 powered cards will be sweet to behold!

Cat

I wasn't aware of a recent mining rush, other than it's gone on for a few years now, only those who hopped on the wagon early (prior to the GTX 900 series days) reaped the most profits, as there were fewer miners.

read up on Etherium. Different from BitCoin and is the reason why GTX 1070 graphics cards are selling at 150 to 300 more than they were at the beginning of the year.

A GTX 1070, optimized for mining is close to 1080ti performance, and the performance per watt of power consumed is the best I believe.

I've read this from multiple sources, but here is an example.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davealtavilla/2017/06/30/these-are-the-best-gpus-for-ethereum-crypto-mining/#2aee64ac2675

stock is low, and prices are high:

www DOT nowinstock.net/computers/videocards/nvidia/gtx1070/

I bought a pair of MSI GTX 1070 Gaming X cards last december for about $375 and it included some game I sold on eBay for about $30. The going price is $499 and up and they are hard to find.

The GTX 1080 is not as efficient nor as cost effective at mining which is why they can be found at very good prices.

And, since the mid-range market disappeared because no GTX 1070 stock, I think people are settling for the 1060, and that is putting more demand on these cards which is driving up the price.

I don't know how long the Ether mining craze will last but it seems to be the main driver of price on the 1070.

Dan-H, indeed I do need to do some reading & research on Ethereum mining, time to put this GTX 1070 (& maybe one or both of my 1060's) to work for me, replenishing upgrade cash, of which have spent a lot in the last year. $400 alone on for 4 16GB sets of GSkill TridentX DDR3-2400 on promo, running in XMP mode. Yes, to me, was worth it on both of my Z97 builds, each running a 'Devil's Canyon' CPU, have both the i7-470K & i5-4590K, which easily ramped up to stock Turbo speeds of the 4790K (4.4Ghz), achieved by bumping up the ratio to x44 & setting the CPU fan speeds to wide open. 

That is, as long as it's a legit business & my ISP permits a PC on the network 24/7, of which I don't recall they do in their TOS. Yet, I've participated for 6-7 months straight in the past with the folding@home software, and how I break in a new GPU, by folding anonymous. As well as using the software to ensure a new build that I've done for others runs fine, a couple of 24 hour runs, with 30 minute idle a 6 hour break between runs. I no longer trust Prime95 on today's pasted & glued together Intel CPU's. 

Other than that HBR2 or GDDR6 GPU, there's nothing I'd love to have more than a X99 system (Haswell-E), even though the 6 core CPU are a bit higher in cost & any MB's double. The IHS is soldered onto these CPU, so as long as I can keep one cool enough (on air), I feel that getting a decade of quality usage out of such a build would be great. 

I bet that one of these systems, the 40 lane i7-5930K Haswell-E, paired with my already owned GTX 1070, would be one heck of a mining machine.

BTW, in case I forgot to tell you earlier, that PSU upgrade on my XPS 8700 that you told me wasn't needed for the GTX 1060 has ended over 2.5 years of frustration, 3.5 if the year placed back in it's box counts. Was having random freezes, and the worse thing, no dump or error files, other than I forced shutdown. This frequency increased when the 4790K was installed & let back off when the stock i7-4770 was reinstalled, even with a clean install of Windows 7, 8.1 & 10. Couldn't had been the GPU, because I had three different ones prior to the 1060 installed, so the PSU was all I could figure, now am a happy camper again. 

The only thing missing is an intake fan & I believe with a door mod, since it already has some ventilation, will allow me to install one there, can install an unused PWM splitter from one of my Noctua fans, connect to the CPU header. Also have upgraded the Dell CPU cooler with a Cooler Master Vortex Plus, recommended by a member here, the low profile Noctua won't work, the only issue to resolve is getting the fans spinning faster, which I believe can be done via SpeedFan. 

Thanks for all of the guidance you've provided me over the last 2-3 years.:emotion-2:

Cat

System:

Windows 10

XPS 8700

460W PSU

BenQ XR3501 DP>MiniDP adapter

Gigabyte GTX 1050 Ti OC

State: after updating BIOS to A11, it worked!

Get a EVGA GeForce GTX 1050 TI SC. It is small (single fan)and more than enough for your needs. 1050s does not really need two fans. This GPU does not need a 6 pin like the Gigabyte version and the EVGA is better unless you want to overclock more the overclocked card to get a few boast. I tried both on two ancient Dell Vostro PCs and it made those machines play AAA games without skipping a beat so for your needs it will be more than enough. If you want 3 HDMI ports then get the Gigabyte.

i will.  hoping for a ~$120 price

Re: post above: the ethereum mining has helped me sell a Rx 480 graphics card for 330. 

Secure Boot must be OFF and LEGACY Option Roms and CSM must be ON in order to post with NON DELL video card. When installing an after-market graphics card into a certified Windows PC with UEFI enabled, the system may not boot.

http://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3156/

I finally found the 'secret' to adding an intake fan, Dell cleverly disguised the front of the chassis (can be seen with the front bezel removed) with black tape. Although at first glance, appears to be a black painted surface. I kept looking for the other two holes for screws, there are two tabs that locks in the same 92mm fan, and after the careful exam, hidden beneath that tape. So that black streak at the bottom obviously was removed for 'upper end' configurations, and concealed for those not wanting to pay over $2,000 for the fully loaded XPS 8700, whatever that may had been (probably a i7-4790 configuration).

There's also nice i5 & i7 choices (both Bradwell & fits in the same 1150 CPU socket) with Iris Pro Graphics (over 1GHz), which can free the PCIe 3.0 x16 GPU slot for an NVMe SSD, wished that I seen this option earlier, plus unlocked, on a smaller die, and only 65W rather than 84 & 88W (for the i7-4770/4790 & 4770K/4790K). So better than stock graphics & saving energy at the same time, along with a nice NVMe SSD to supercharge the OS at everything we do. TBH, other than allow the install, didn't see the need for a BIOS update for the 4790K, since frequency can't be manually controlled, unless it shipped with other features (maybe the one to optimize W10 install?).

Now am an even happier camper, using SpeedFan to draw cool air at 1,500 rpm, the exhaust forcing the hot air out at max force (3,000 rpm, makes that same dollar bill flap in the wind, rather than *** towards the case), and have the CPu fan set at 4,500 rpm max on demand, blowing downwards for max cooling of CPU/heatsink. For whatever reason, Dell had the hot air blowing inwards toward the already hot components (used the dollar bill method to test). Also don't know know why Dell, in their infinite wisdom, limited both the PWM & 3 pin exhaust fan speeds capped at 908 rpm, could had saved me the cost of a new cooler, plus Noctua replacement fan which initially ran no faster. SpeedFan is the answer to best cooling of this PC, along with the added 92mm intake fan, of which I installed the cable on the exhaust header, and control the exhaust by a PWM splitter cable on the CPU header.

With a mini tower, which tends to hold more heat anyway, it's best to draw in cool air & force out the hot, so that the system, to include the GPU, run as cool as possible. Considered a door mod for a side fan, although decided to allow to leave those holes already there for natural airflow, so as not to disturb what I'd accomplished.  

SpeedStep is right, it may be good to disable Secure Boot at a minimum to install a new GPU, although most all new models has a UEFI BIOS. On my first GPU upgrade, the MSI Radeon 7770 GHz edition recommended by another member here, had to reflash the BIOS of the card (a risky procedure) to be UEFI compliant. Had I known that it wasn't, would had chosen another model, although I do admit to sticking a fork in myself to budget cards, this was prior to the GTX 900 series release, of which I'd later purchase a MSI branded (reference style) 2GB GDDR5 GTX 960. Had I waited just a week longer, EVGA for $40 more, had a 4GB GDDR5 version that was an overall better card all the way around.

I see in the future the already owned in another PC, EVGA GTX 1070 FTW going into the XPS 8700, while heavy, not as bulky as the reference GTX 960, which also scraped some knuckles going in.;-)

Cat