upgrade to what?

Despite the HD 5570 being a low end card (there are only a couple lower than it from the HD 5xxx series), it will still be much faster than your current card. Side by side comparison of the two of them,

Video Card Comparison - GPUReview.com

As Rhammstein said for newer games it will be low to medium settings depending on the game, with most probably being on the low side. For older games it shouldn't have any problems with them. If nothing else it would be a nice boost over what you currently have.

As for how much the X1300/X1550 uses, if I looked long enough I might find it. Using this,

eXtreme Outer Vision - eXtreme tools for computer enthusiasts

and entering in the specs of your Dell (assuming 1 hard drive, 2 sticks of ram, 1 DVD drive, 1 case fan, and the optional X-Fi); with the X1300 in it it comes out to 252W, with the HD 5570 it is actually a bit lower at 238W.

Now with that said that calculator isn't to be taken as gospel as to what is required, but it a very good guideline as to what you should be able to run on your current 305W PSU.

thinking of biting the bullet here and getting some more juice...

COOLERMASTER GX 550 80PLUS PSU 120MM FAN POWER SUPPLY


I'm assuming they are universal in size?

mfcphil said:

thinking of biting the bullet here and getting some more juice...

COOLERMASTER GX 550 80PLUS PSU 120MM FAN POWER SUPPLY


I'm assuming they are universal in size?

Sort of. ATX power supplies all are supposed to fit in the same cutout in the case, and be mounted with 4 screws in standard locations.

Your PSU's wiring (24 pin ATX, 4 pin +12V) appears to have the standard ATX pinouts. I think that a generic ATX PSU will fit, although you might have to remove the nonstandard mounting clip:

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dime521/en/SM_EN/parts.htm#wp1461861

I think the clip is there because the E521's case lacks the mounting rails that common cases have.

The cabling on your PSU also looks a bit unusual also, with cables coming out of two different faces of the PSU's case. I doubt that's significant. (Generic PSUs normally have all cabling out the back.)

There is at least one maker that produces supplies stated to be compatible:

Silencer 500 Dell

but they're a bit expensive.

You may want to plan any upgrades carefully. You may find that they aren't cost-effective.

linnemeyerhere said:

Sounds like a fantastic build. Would an Asus mobo with Sata III @ 6.0 and USB 3.0 be of interest? Haven't shopped it but it may only be a few more dollars at this point? Otherwise it looks to have great potential. Make sure you take pictures throughout the build to post when your completed. Cheers and good luck this is such a fun process, relax and take your time and savior the process!

I'm not building it myself....a company on-line is building it...the motherboard was one of the things that I could not upgrade.

Hopefuly there is room for upgrades in the future on this one!

does that only give you 2 usb ports at the back of your pc?

mfcphil said:

Not sure if there is a 6 pin power suply in there so I will be after something that does not need that....

Saw some Radeon HD 5670 on Ebay.....will this be good for my system?

Asus 1gb Radeon Hd 5670 Pci-E 2.1 Hdmi Graphics Card

cards that dont use 6pin arent meant for hard core gaming.

a 5670 would do ok for most mid - low end gaming (cod would run good, and things like that, but crysis or bfbc2 would need more power to run good).

if i were you i would upgrade the psu to give yourself more opportunities.