Graphics Card Upgrade on an XP Machine

Question: Can I upgrade to a 1GB Graphics Card on a MS-7525 motherboard?

Hi.  I need to put a new graphics card into my Compaq Presario Model:sr5410f

I upgraded the processor and ram in 2017.  It runs on XP.  Yes I am willing to put a few more bucks into this thing. I like it.  I'm not ready to let her go.

I currently have a Geforce210, but the fan won't run on it.  It does "work" though.  As long as I don't do anything crazy.

The motherboard is a MS-7525 (Boston)

https://soggi.org/motherboards/msi-oem/MS-7525-VER-1.0-Boston-GL6.htm

Can I upgrade to a 1GB Graphics Card?  If I'm gonna do this, I might as well put in the biggest I can.  Right?

I can't find this info?  The link posted almost reads like it thinks I can't go bigger then 256. But I have a 512mb in it right now.

If I keep it at 512mb, then I'm thinking of going with a used ATI Firepro V5700 for under 20 bucks used.  The other cards I looked at where the same GeForce210, or the Nvidia NVS 310. I'm willing to consider suggestions though.

Thanks for any help.

As far as I'm aware, the only limitation is that XP (the normal one, 32 bit) can only address 4 GB memory in total.  This (as I understand it) includes video RAM.  So if you have a system with 4 GB main RAM, and a GPU with 1 GB video RAM, then the usable system RAM will reduce to 3 GB.

Apart from the ones you mention, things like the Radeon HD 5450/6450 and Geforce 710 should work with XP, and are fairly easily available (even as new stock).

As all the parts of this machine will be slightly long in the tooth, and therefor likely to turn-up their toes in the near future, I would suggest examining the Pre-Used market

I, too, would suggest the GeForce GT 710. People laugh at them, and take the p*** out of them, but they're very serviceable units on the whole, and will even handle light gaming (if you don't go silly with it.)

For day-to-day use, they're on a par with the onboard Intel UHD610 in the 8th-gen core CPUs. And your average user has never complained about that one. 

I run an Asus 2GB 'passive-cooler' variant, though a 1 GB model is available. Total draw of just 19W, and the slot supplies that, so you probably don't even need to upgrade your PSU..... I bought mine near the start of the pandemic, for around GBP £37.50; nowadays, you're looking at closer to £70, but that's just indicative of the general state of the GPU market, unfortunately. I'm not a 'gamer', so the performance has always satisfied me.

As Wee-eddie says, you can pick up good condition pre-owned models quite cheaply. They're not "popular" - most folks seem to want insanely powerful, top-of-the-range stuff! - but the GT710 is very underestimated. Likewise the Presario PCs; I had a slightly older AMD-powered one than yours (2005-vintage), and the amount of hardware upgrades I did to that would curl your hair. Very solidly built, and extremely reliable; at the age of 15 years it finally succumbed to dried-out caps, but you can't sneeze at a life-span like that.

Mike. 

Edited by Mike_Walsh, 08 April 2022 - 08:14 AM.

Hi.  Thanks for all the responses!

Let me just clarify this, because if there is one area of computers that I am not knowledgeable on, it's graphic cards and limitations ect, if that is even a thing, and maybe it's not a thing.  Is it a thing?

So this motherboard is fine with my card being 2gb?  And this 710 says it is PCI-E 2.0.  Is that fine?  The spec sheet on my motherboard says "Supports PCI Express (PCIe 1.1)"  Is that a problem?  I honestly have no idea on this kind of thing.

If not then this GT710 looks great and that I probably what I will go with on Ebay.  They seem to be plentiful and like 30 to 35 bucks.  I just don't want to buy something I can't use is all. 

FYI, I have lots of computers.  I have a gaming MSI that will play any game on the market.  I simply use this for a few things and want to continue to, and the fan is broke on the graphics card, and as such, it can at any time just stop displaying, prompting a restart, and losing any data I have on the screen, so that's why I'm willing to spend a few bucks to keep her going.  It's worth 35 bucks.

I can do anything with her though.  Seriously. I have up to date Mcafee running on it, can do 99.9% of anything on the web, and even render video... slowly... LOL  She's got some life left, and I love letting people know that on any given day, I do some work on a machine running XP. 

But I'm not a Luddite!  LOL

Thanks everyone btw.

 

So this motherboard is fine with my card being 2gb?  And this 710 says it is PCI-E 2.0.  Is that fine?  The spec sheet on my motherboard says "Supports PCI Express (PCIe 1.1)"  Is that a problem?  I honestly have no idea on this kind of thing.

 

If not then this GT710 looks great and that I probably what I will go with on Ebay.  They seem to be plentiful and like 30 to 35 bucks.  I just don't want to buy something I can't use is all. 

 

Both of those things are fine, but personally I'd look for a 1 GB version of the card.  PCIe 2.0 cards are backward compatible with PCIe 1.1 motherboards - the link will be at PCIe 1.1 speeds.  The extra graphics memory (2 GB over 1 GB) will not benefit performance, and I'm a bit sketchy on how it would effect overall system memory availability under Windows XP.  I've never tried a modern, high memory (2 GB+) GPU on a bare metal install of Windows XP.

Something like this should do what you want:-

https://www.ebay.com/itm/194964272486?hash=item2d64c6b566%3Ag%3AlFkAAOSwL0tiUEHv&LH_ItemCondition=3000

These passive-coolers run fine. Because they have such a low power draw, they don't generate much heat. You want these neater-looking later models, not the older one with the weird-looking "cheese-grater" heatsink. Those only have DDR3 memory; these more recent ones have the better GDDR5 VRAM.

The most I've ever seen mine reach was around mid-50s, temp-wise....average is usually around mid to high 40s.

And as Jon says, PCI-e 2.0 is backwards-compatible with PCI-e 1.1. The link speed just adjusts downward to the older standard's bus-speed, that's all. It should still run OK.

Mike. 

@ Jon :-

I was always under the impression that 'only' 1 GB was scraping the bottom of the barrel for a discrete GPU.....and that 2 GB was just about adequate for general day-to-day use. I'm not a gamer, not really,  though I do occasionally like to waste the odd half-hour with either Xonotic or the old Half-Life2; Xonotic has had a Linux port for well over a decade now, and Half-Life2 runs happily under WINE. The GT710 seems quite content with these, though of course they're not exactly up-to-the-minute AAA titles, are they? 

Of course, having said that, the ATI Radeon XPress 200 chip I had in the old Compaq rig poached a grand total of 128MB of system RAM for VRAM with a 1024x768 monitor.....and the picture on that was always crystal-clear; never any tearing, or owt like that.

Notice the date of that Tech Report article! 

Mike. 

Edited by Mike_Walsh, 08 April 2022 - 08:04 PM.

Hi Mike, I still remember the days of 512 KB or 1 MB SVGA cards being standard   They were limited, but a 4 MB card could provide 24 bit colour at the maximum resolution my CRT monitor could support at the time (1280 x 1024 I think??).

For typical desktop graphics, you don't need huge amounts of video RAM.  It's really the faster gaming cards that need the larger amounts of memory for storing textures and so on. Judging by the type of computer and cards being discussed here, I doubt 1 GB would be a limitation in this case.  Also note that in Windows anyway, there's a shared memory model where system RAM can be used by the video card if it's ever required.

Hi.  Thanks for all the help everyone.  Having already made an unsuccessful "make an offer" bid on a GT710, I have now been doing some more thinking, and maybe this is not the right card after all. It seems to have been released after April 8th 2014, the official Microsoft cut off date for XP, and as such, at best, maybe with a BIOS update, it will work, maybe not.  Or work with issues

I'm thinking that since my main goal is to have a fully working card, maybe I should go with the Firepro V5700 512mb because it was released in the same year as my system.  Does that make sense?

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/firepro-v5700.c858

Full disclosure.  I did look at my power supply. It's 250 watts.  I'm running two internal HDD's, board/cpu, 2x2gb of ram, and nothing else.  Sound like enough juice?

BTW, this has all really been helpful in learning more about graphic cards and older systems.  I feel more knowledgeable because of all of this.  I have a few older systems I want to overhaul and give away and this will help me do that.  Thanks for the valuable info.

On the concept of "Giving away" older systems. 

Before you start spending your money

That is a very admirable thought, but who do you think would welcome an old, unsupported, system?

On the concept of "Giving away" older systems. 

 

Before you start spending your money

 

That is a very admirable thought, but who do you think would welcome an old, unsupported, system?

LOL!  Newer systems that run or can run windows ten or eleven I assure you.  Just because I have chosen to own a system that runs XP, doesn't mean I think everyone else wants one.

Surely I'm not the only person around that likes having a desktop that runs an older OS?  Maybe people who like to play older games?  My main use is for writing.  Much like the old timers who won't give up the old fashioned typewriter, I just prefer it.  It's comfortable.  It works for me.  Office 2007 gets the job done.  I have zero intention of ever quitting it when it comes to writing.  Zero.

  I do have several personal computers that run Windows 10 though.  I'm not 100% crazy.  I just need to replace this graphics card before it fully goes is all.  A stich in time sort of thing.

@TexasJustice:-

I can sympathise entirely about wanting to run older systems. I'm talking Linux here - 'Puppy' Linux, specifically; an entire 'family' of small, lightweight Linux distros designed to keep older hardware still useful - and in my case I run a whole "kennels" of Puppies dating back to around 2010!

The beauty of Puppy, however, is that it's fully modular, and it's perfectly possible to update all the necessary parts of even a 12-yr old distro to keep it secure, and still fully-functional.....even capable of running modern web-browsers.

I understand your concerns; I know that with Microsoft, support 'windows' and all that stuff are far more critical than they ever were under Linux in general. However, although I hung onto it for a few months, I finally quit XP in early 2015, so I haven't run it for over 7 years now.

I don't know if you're aware of it, but you might get on better asking about this over at the XP Forums. I know some of the guys over there are installing XP on newer systems that didn't even exist at official EOL.....and they don't seem to be having any issues.

Mike. 

I don't know if you're aware of it, but you might get on better asking about this over at the XP Forums. I know some of the guys over there are installing XP on newer systems that didn't even exist at official EOL.....and they don't seem to be having any issues.

 

 

Mike. 

That is absolute great advice.  I think I know what to do now and why, but I might as well go over there, do some searches, and see what they have to say.  I'll let you all know how this turned out in a few weeks.   Thanks. 

 

Surely I'm not the only person around that likes having a desktop that runs an older OS?  Maybe people who like to play older games?  My main use is for writing.  Much like the old timers who won't give up the old fashioned typewriter, I just prefer it.  It's comfortable.  It works for me.  Office 2007 gets the job done.  I have zero intention of ever quitting it when it comes to writing.  Zero.

 

No I'm sure you're not alone.  I have read of at least one writer (I can't remember who it was) who persists with WordStar, a long obsolete early text modeword processor, over any modern software.  And you can still use this old software through emulators or virtual machines on modern computers, if you like.

Regarding the graphics card, the reason I mentioned the GT 710 was because it had Windows XP drivers available.  Most of the cards newer than this do not, and therefore getting them to work properly with Windows XP would be difficult if not impossible.  However I'm sure the Quadro card you mention will be satisfactory (but do use a seller with a good reputation, and who accepts returns in case of issues)