Hey, I have a quick question;
Is it possible to use my Nvidia 8600GTS card (plugged into PCIe x16, 6 pin power) without actually having the monitor plugged into it? I am currently using my AMD A10-7800's integrated graphics because I only have a VGA cable and slots on my monitor, so is it possible to use the Nvidia card while being plugged into the motherboard instead of the actual card?
Short version: no.
However, the GTS 8600 card probably has DVI-I output(s), so you could use a DVI-to-VGA adapter to plug a VGA cable into the nVidia card.
It's just a passive adapter, so it's very cheap ($4 in the USA, at least). They are often included when you buy a graphics card. If you have any PC enthusiast friends, they are likely to have a few lying around. If I didn't have to deal with international postage, I'd offer to send you one for free.
All things considering, unless there is a compelling reason for using the 8600 you would be better off using the integrated?APU instead. The APU is far and away faster and much more feature advanced than that old 8600 (which is fast approaching 10 years ago when it came out).
Eh, I remember last time this card was plugged into a PC of a friend of mine, games ran quite good, albeit it may just have been a better processor, I have an AMD A10-7800 with integrated graphics (1GB VRAM) and they had an Intel Q6600 with that GTS 8600 and games ran much, much faster than with my current setup.
For some reason, while some games like BF3 and such run quite fast, Skyrim and Minecraft lag and stutter, even in low resolutions like 720p
I read it. By one benchmark:
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/
The A10-7800 is considerably better than the GTS 8600. Proves nothing about the performance in specific games.
Why not try it? A DVI to VGA adapter is cheap.
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