Toribash
Original Post
Upgrades for my computer
For my upcoming birthday (this weekend :3) one of my presents is going to be ~$420 dollars of computer upgrades. I need to upgrade my CPU, RAM, and Motherboard. I already have a pretty good graphics card so no need to spend more money on that. The combo i was looking at would be these:
Motherboard
RAM
Processor
Are these any good? Pretty much looking to be able to game on it pretty well, medium settings on up.
Any ideas for other good combos within my pricerange? (~$420 or €298)

4gb is all you need for RAM, you probably won't see improvement with 8 over 4.

Didn't check up on the others, but just make sure they are compatible and read the FAQ
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They're pretty good, above average even, but what graphics card do you have? You might want to upgrade that too if you're going to use the pc for gaming.
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I currently use the Radeon HD 4670 card, which I believe is plenty good enough for now?
I doubt I have the money to upgrade that as well as the other parts.
edit: can't use the radeon card on this computer because I don't have the PCIE slot on my motherboard, which is a big reason I am wanting to get a completely new motherboard. I use the Nvidia 8400 GT Slim model (iirc) on this.
also my hard drive is fine, not looking to upgrade that for a while, until I can afford to (probably christmas or something)
Last edited by Echoforce; Sep 9, 2011 at 02:10 AM.

You DO NOT need a hexcore processor. Unless you will be running multiple CPU intensive programs (games aren't that CPU intensive) it will be completely unnecessary. You'll be better off getting an i2500 (if you want to overclock then get the 2500k) and a compatible mobo, the MSI P67A-G45 is pretty good. Also, what PSU do you have? There's no point having awesome parts if you can't use them.
The processors you suggested are more expensive than the one I am wanting, but that motherboard is a little cheaper, are there any reasons I should get those over the ones I am wanting currently? (because those you suggested are probably a little bit out of my budget.(beside the motherboard, is that motherboard better than the one I have on the list already beside just being cheaper?))
I am not actually sure what power supply I have, How many watts are good enough to power these parts? Cheap ones maybe that would do the job that I can get that wouldnt throw the price up too high? I'm on a pretty strict budget.

Originally Posted by Echoforce View Post
The processors you suggested are more expensive than the one I am wanting, but that motherboard is a little cheaper, are there any reasons I should get those over the ones I am wanting currently? (because those you suggested are probably a little bit out of my budget.(beside the motherboard, is that motherboard better than the one I have on the list already beside just being cheaper?))
I am not actually sure what power supply I have, How many watts are good enough to power these parts? Cheap ones maybe that would do the job that I can get that wouldnt throw the price up too high? I'm on a pretty strict budget.

Alright, motherboards are made to support certain CPU sockets. The current line of intel processors (including the i2500) use the 1155 socket and the CPU you were thinking of used the AM3/AM3+ socket. So your motherboard choice will be made after your CPU choice. But we'll ignore that for the moment. The i2500's architecture (basically how the CPU works) is a lot better than that of the X6 1090 and the die socket is smaller. What that means is that the i2500 is a lot better. You'll get performance increases of ~30-40%. The only advantage that the X6 has over the i2500 is that it has 2 more cores. This means that if you are running multiple CPU intensive programs (for example, running a video game, a large image renderer, and a compiling source code simultaneously).

However, if you are on a limited budget you could instead get the AMD 955 BE. It is a perfectly good CPU (I use one myself) with a large overclock potential, if that interests you. It is also very good value for money. If you were to get that then the GIGABYTE GA-970A-UD3 would be a good motherboard for you.

Finally, your choice of PSU is critical. Skimping on it and getting a cheap one puts your entire build at risk. If your PSU fries there is a very good chance that it will severely damage every other component. Without knowing what graphics card you have I can't say how much you'd need, but at a guess I'd say 500 watts. Both Antec and Seasonic make very good PSUs that aren't too expensive. Look into the Antec Earthwatts range.
Originally Posted by Echoforce View Post
I currently use the Radeon HD 4670 card, which I believe is plenty good enough for now?
I doubt I have the money to upgrade that as well as the other parts.
edit: can't use the radeon card on this computer because I don't have the PCIE slot on my motherboard, which is a big reason I am wanting to get a completely new motherboard. I use the Nvidia 8400 GT Slim model (iirc) on this.
also my hard drive is fine, not looking to upgrade that for a while, until I can afford to (probably christmas or something)

Well the HD 4670 is an old card (3 years old now) and was only a budget card at the time anyway.

To play newer games at decent detail youre gonna need at least a GTX460/HD 6850 nowdays