Backstory: 3 years ago. Kitty spilled water bottle on table, water trickled into top exhaust fan, GPU started singing Fireworks by Katy Perry and died. Goal: To re-build my gaming rig; buy a new graphics card, and finally start gaming again. Question/Dilemma New graphic cards are mostly PCI(e) 3.0, so I'm not sure if buying a good one would be overkill, or severely bottle-necked by the fact that my mobo is PCI(e) x16. I've learned about backwards compatibility and that a 3.0 card will definitely work, but my Q is how much of it will be limited? Would it be overkill to buy a MSI GTX 660 2GB PCI Express 3.0 x16 video card? Because I'm aware the bandwidth will be limited, therefore decreasing the speed/performance of rendering the graphics. How bad/noticable is it? Current Motherboard Do share your opinions! Danke
Found this chart. Suffice to say the drop won't that significant. I'm ordering my card right now! YIPPEE!