Well, I finally got the old system from my friend. Another friend of mine and I did some research, and found that the HP Motherboard is an "a1250n" board; and, has one PCI-e slot on it. I don't know if it is x1 or x16; however, the system was originally sold around February of 2005.

Sad thing was, HP installed XP Pro 32-bit. They should have installed XP Pro x64... I have my XP Pro x64, and will be installing it in the next couple of days. Today, I re-installed the original 512 MB RAM into slots 3 and 4; so, now the system has 2.5 GB RAM, total. The hard drive is a Western Digital, SATA 250 GB drive.

I currently have installed a PCI Video Card with 512 MB RAM; however, as discussed in my original thread about this system, that card won't crunch.

What I need to know now, is what PCI-e card would you all recommend I put into this thing to crunch GPU WU's? I'm assuming that NVIDIA is the brand to get; however, which model would best fit this system, being that it is now nine years old. The PSU is original, the motherboard is original, new RAM, (2 GB), has been added, the hard drive is new from stock that I had on hand, the sound card and PCI Video card are new.

If I get a PCI-e card to crunch with; do I need to remove the new PCI Video Card, or can I use the PCI card with a monitor attached and let the PCI-e run "headless" just to crunch?

Thanks for all the prior help and suggestions; and, thanks in advance for answering my current questions.

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TimeLord04
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Maybe a GTX750 from nVidia. It does not need more power than that supplied from PCIe. I bought one but has not installed it so far on my 2008 vintage SUN WS with SuSE Linux 13.1, since of course what you get is a CD with only Windows drivers.
Tullio

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Is this the board? http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c00496280&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=1127366
I had a hard time finding that...

It says it's PCIe 1x even though it appears to be full size. I have a HP xw4600 board that has a small PCIe 1x slot in that position...that's been 'modified' to take a 16x card. There is a problem with the video card contacting the ram slots with larger cards. Even my ATI 6770 hits the first two ram slots. It will work, but the card will be hard against the closed toggles. I'd try to stay with a short card.

Since it's a 1x slot, using another card in the PCI slot for graphics would be advisable. In XP 32 bit, I didn't have any trouble using a PCIe nVidia card with the monitor connected to an ATI PCI card. XP 64 bit may be different. PCIe nVidia and PCI nVidia may be different. You'll just have to try it.

Good Luck.

Sad thing was, HP installed XP Pro 32-bit. They should have installed XP Pro x64... I have my XP Pro x64, and will be installing it in the next couple of days. Today, I re-installed the original 512 MB RAM into slots 3 and 4; so, now the system has 2.5 GB RAM, total.

If the machine had 512MB RAM in it's original configuration, 32-bit was a good choice, also with 2.5GB I'd recommend to stay with 32-bit if you don't plan to add more RAM, unless you actually plan to run some 64-bit software of course.

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Is this the board? http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c00496280&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=1127366
I had a hard time finding that...

It says it's PCIe 1x even though it appears to be full size. I have a HP xw4600 board that has a small PCIe 1x slot in that position...that's been 'modified' to take a 16x card. There is a problem with the video card contacting the ram slots with larger cards. Even my ATI 6770 hits the first two ram slots. It will work, but the card will be hard against the closed toggles. I'd try to stay with a short card.

Since it's a 1x slot, using another card in the PCI slot for graphics would be advisable. In XP 32 bit, I didn't have any trouble using a PCIe nVidia card with the monitor connected to an ATI PCI card. XP 64 bit may be different. PCIe nVidia and PCI nVidia may be different. You'll just have to try it.

Good Luck.

TBar,

Well, the case of this PC actually states that it is an "a1200n" system; however, when searching HP for that, nothing comes up. The diagram you have linked to, (above,) actually is very VERY close to what the actual motherboard looks like. The memory slots on the board I have are actually mounted to the left of the PCI-e slot, and are parallel to the PCI-e slot. Other than that, yes, this is the board's diagram.


Link,

I don't have a copy of 32-bit XP to install. I've had this copy of XP Pro x64 waiting for a computer to put it on for several years. Since the system is 64-bit, I will be using my XP Pro x64.

I will be installing Apache OpenOffice 4.0.1 onto the system. I don't know if that will take advantage of the 64-bit OS, or not.

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TimeLord04
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Maybe a GTX750 from nVidia. It does not need more power than that supplied from PCIe. I bought one but has not installed it so far on my 2008 vintage SUN WS with SuSE Linux 13.1, since of course what you get is a CD with only Windows drivers.
Tullio

Tulio,

is the GTX750 a 1x card? TBar has found that my PCI-e slot is 1x.

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TimeLord04
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I googled and found this...


http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/314089-33-simple-upgrade-pavillion-a1250n

I googled and found this...


http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/314089-33-simple-upgrade-pavillion-a1250n

Wes Kay,

Based on that, I should pull out the PCI Modem, (not used anyway), to make sure the draw from the PSU doesn't exceed 2 Amps.

Thanks. :-)

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TimeLord04
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Maybe a GTX750 from nVidia. It does not need more power than that supplied from PCIe. I bought one but has not installed it so far on my 2008 vintage SUN WS with SuSE Linux 13.1, since of course what you get is a CD with only Windows drivers.
Tullio

Tulio,

is the GTX750 a 1x card? TBar has found that my PCI-e slot is 1x.

No, it's a 16x card.
Tullio

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Maybe a GTX750 from nVidia. It does not need more power than that supplied from PCIe. I bought one but has not installed it so far on my 2008 vintage SUN WS with SuSE Linux 13.1, since of course what you get is a CD with only Windows drivers.
Tullio

Tullio,

is the GTX750 a 1x card? TBar has found that my PCI-e slot is 1x.

No, it's a 16x card.
Tullio

If I use a GTX750, will it slow down to 1x; or, do I need a different card to work in this slot?


Thanks, again, everyone. :-)

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TimeLord04
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Maybe a GTX750 from nVidia. It does not need more power than that supplied from PCIe. I bought one but has not installed it so far on my 2008 vintage SUN WS with SuSE Linux 13.1, since of course what you get is a CD with only Windows drivers.
Tullio

Tullio,

is the GTX750 a 1x card? TBar has found that my PCI-e slot is 1x.

No, it's a 16x card.
Tullio

If I use a GTX750, will it slow down to 1x; or, do I need a different card to work in this slot?

Thanks, again, everyone. :-)

Any card you use in a 1x slot will run at 1x. If you look around you will see a few people running a 780 on a 1x cable. It will work for crunching but the video will be SLOW, no gaming for you. You're just lucky it is a full sized slot. I've had to remove the end plate on the small 1x slots to run a 16x card. A GTX750 should work fine on that machine for crunching. However, if you try running video through a 1x slot while crunching both will suffer.

It's actually a PCIe x16 slot according to the manual. Just looks like the 6 in x16 got cut off for their layout photo. It is only a PCIe v1.0 x16 slot, but that is more than sufficient for crunching.

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The motherboard should have the slot info just below the slot. Just look at the motherboard. Either way, a 16x card will work just fine for crunching in a 1x slot, as long as it fits. HP has short 8x slots with open ends so a 16x card will fit. Too bad their short 1x slots don't have open ends.

I would also use GTX750, but get the GTX750, not Ti. The Ti will need extra power which is provided by the additional connector.

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Actually, it depends on which 750 Ti you get. I have 3 EVGA GTX 750 Ti SuperClocked and none of them require the additional connector. If you get it online, look at Frequently asked questions and see if they answer about needing a 6 pin connector. I like to use Newegg.com to research which Graphic cards I get. Generally if it has 1 fan usually it doesn't require a 6 pin. If it have 2 or more fans or an oversized cooler unit on there then usually it does require a 6 pin.

Zalster

Would it also make a difference if I bumped the system memory to 4 GB from the 2.5 GB that I have now; or, should I not spend the money... It should only be about $50 to get a second full 2 GB of RAM, and I am willing to spend that if it will make a difference.

If I read the manual correctly for the "a1250n", unbuffered memory is limited to 4 GB RAM. Fully buffered RAM is not specified to having a limit; but, I'm sure that there is one.

I will start looking into getting my hands on a good GTX750 card for this system.

Thanks, again, everyone. :-)

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TimeLord04
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Would it also make a difference if I bumped the system memory to 4 GB from the 2.5 GB that I have now; or, should I not spend the money...

I'm running a cruncher on an Athlon 64 x 2 5600+ and that's where this opinion comes-from.

Don't spend a dime on that machine other than to put a reasonably inexpensive GPU in it (a 750 should be about right). The money for a reasonably inexpensive upgrade is almost like taking money from your pocket and burning it; the improvement may be noticeable in that system, but will be very slight in "the big picture."

Let it crunch GPU-only, allowing the CPU to do nothing but feed the GPU.

Enjoy the "almost free" RAC increase for what it is, whatever that is. Don't sweat it.

If throughput is what you are after, you'd be better-served by buying a more expensive GPU and installing it in the machine with the Athlon II 240 in it (assuming it has DDR3 memory in it). Again, letting the 240 do nothing but feed the better GPU.

I learned the hard way about upgrading out-of date hardware. $50 is half-way to a 3.8GHz FX six-core processor and probably 30% of the way to a "modern" motherboard & CPU combination.

The old system might benefit from many things, all of which would be poor economic choices. It's just too old to do anything other than what it does.

For an Athlon 64 3500+ I certainly wouldn't worry about bumping the memory up (unless you can get it for nix), but installing the best GPU that you can for a reasonable price would be best and just crunch on that GPU.

Cheers.

Good news and bad news...

Good news: I bought the GTX750 TI Superclocked GPU.

Bad news: The HP system's motherboard can't handle it.

Other news: I refused to give up; so, for a total of around $400, I'm getting a new system, including the NVIDIA GTX750 TI, and an Antec 550 Watt Power Supply. A new AMD CPU, dual core with GPU attached, new motherboard, new case, new Logitech cordless keyboard and mouse. They are reinstalling my Win XP Pro x64 and all new drivers for the new system. I plan to use the built in GPU from the AMD for the monitor, and leave the NVIDIA GTX750 TI headless.

I am thus, retiring the HP Athlon 64 3500+ system. I will be picking up the new system in a few days, and will report the entire specs. then.

Thanks again, everyone.

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TimeLord04
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You will be rewarded.

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