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Best bang for buck upgrades?
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29-08-2010 5:37pm#1
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Hmm...
What is the maximum resolution of your monitor?
The problem with no OCing is that it largely rules out sticking with your current platform. If you want to avoid OCing, you'll have to compromise heavily on quality or double your budget in order to update your entire platform
You really need a CPU update at this point, but that would neccessitate a full platform upgrade as your current mobo is ancient and can't even use 45nm C2Qs. At this point your one and only option is a Q6*00 CPU, but even then you won't get too much out of them without an overclock. To make matters worse 65nm Core2s are now obsolete and you can only really get them second-hand - but the problem is that there have been a lot of people in the same boat as you so Q6*00s are now thin on the ground and are starting to command serious prices.
At this point you'd be darn lucky to find one, but if you did find one under €120 jump on it as if it were on fire. Preferably not the Q6600, as some of the early bins were very hot-running and are hard to keep in check with a cack, noisy stock fan even without OCing Plus the Q6700 isn't quite as infamous for high (>3,5GHz) OCs as the later-stepping Q6600s so you might find one cheap somewhere if you're lucky. The further past €80 you go (and you'd be damn lucky to get any old quad that low!), the further your hope of getting some extra RAM disappears
Graphics depends on your monitor resolution. If you have a 1080p set already or plan to upgrade the HD5770 1GB is the bare minimum. A cheap GTX460 would be great but for that to happen you have to get that second-hand CPU in for as far under €130 as posssible! If you're using a lower-res screen things ease up a bit; just under 1080p a 1GB HD5770 or cheap second-hand 1GB HD4870 are plenty and a 1GB HD5750 is fine; heading closer towards 720p you'll find even a HD5750 512MB pulls its weight fine; a second-hand HD4850 or HD4770 going cheap (<€80) would also suffice.
After that you'd plow any remaining cash into getting one or two 1GB sticks of PC6400 DDR2; as close to the spec (speed/latency/voltage) as your existing sticks as possible. If your current ones live on 2.1V you'll need new ones that manage likewise; if they run at the standard 1.8V the new ones can't be overvolted either; if your Corsairs are low-latency (CL4) you'll need similar or tighter new ones, and most PC6400 modules on the market are now CL6 high-latency parts
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Lack of any Full-HD screens makes things a fair bit easier
Odds are the monitor is actually a higher res than the TV. "HD Ready" = 720p+ = 1366*768. The 19" is likely to be 1280*1024 (if 5:4) or 1440*900 (if widescreen). In either case a cheap HD5750 will get you by, although you might want a 1GB version or a HD5770 if you're gaming and straming HD content to the TV simultaneously for some reason...
If you look around you could find HD5770 1GB for €135, 512MB version for even less; a second-hand HD4870 would be cheaper still, though rather hot and thirsty. If you don't do anything too intense on both screens simultaneously then you could easily get away with a HD5750 (<€100 new if you're lucky) or a second-hand HD4850 (fairly thirsty) or HD4770 (not very thirsty at all)
Hopefully you could get away with a Q6600, maybe with a BIOS update. Q6700 even better, just don't spend too much on them! An extra 2GB RAM is a nice upgrade too!
If by some fluke of nature (or simply by sticking with a HD5750 or another cheap, decent card then not paying too much on CPU/RAM) you still have €20-30 change from your €300 pot then you might as well invest in a better CPU cooler for a quad, even if not OCing. The earlier 65nm quads kicked out a lot of heat This translates to a noisy stock cooler and hot case; dropping in an Arctic Freezer 7 Pro Rev2 or (if your case is wide enough!) a CM Hyper 212 Plus would both cool and quieten things down a bit
As for the €500 option, not as vital anymore but it really depends on whether you can transfer the OS; if you can then you could transfer the PSU and optical drives (and HDD if not too old) and build something from the Budget Gaming PC Guide minus relevant parts (don't re-use the case unless its a decent model with good airflow though!) 0 -
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Lads thanks for all the replies so far, lots of food for thought!!
Would say throwing a HD5750 and an extra 2gb ram make any noticable improvement for gaming immediately? I see that as a cheap and easy option if it does
If I went down the other route of upgrading most of the system i'd have to make sure my current components work with the new ones and working on a budget not wanting to replace the likes of storage/optical drives (yeah, i'm cheap!!) seems like it could be more of a headache than its worth.
Are bundles like this one any good? Havn't been keeping track of whats good lately and can't remember ever using an AMD processor in any of my machines before either. All I'd need along with that is a graphics card then I think? So many different options out there argh! All I want is to play some games!!!! 0 -
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Would say throwing a HD5750 and an extra 2gb ram make any noticable improvement for gaming immediately? I see that as a cheap and easy option if it does
Slight to moderate improvement (particularly with quality/AA/AF) but nowhere near as much as you would with the new CPU, as I suspect in some newer games the HD5750 might get bottlenecked a bit by the old, slow C2D:oIf I went down the other route of upgrading most of the system i'd have to make sure my current components work with the new ones and working on a budget not wanting to replace the likes of storage/optical drives (yeah, i'm cheap!!) seems like it could be more of a headache than its worth.
If you went down the other route then I could help tell you if your case/PSU/HDD/DVD would be worth moving to the new machine. After that its just a case of replacing the CPU/mobo/RAM/GPU and any of the above that need itAre bundles like this one any good? Havn't been keeping track of whats good lately and can't remember ever using an AMD processor in any of my machines before either. All I'd need along with that is a graphics card then I think?
The problem with bundles is that the companies that sell them are usually darn pricey to begin with, and you could get better components cheaper seperately in the likes of HWVS/eBuyer/Pixmania! But yes, once you have those components then in theory you're just a graphics card away from hooking it all up to your old hardware and you're off But it still might be better to replace your current HDD and case with newer ones, depending on the quality of your current ones 0 -
I'm back! Put some more thought into this, been using the PC a little more lately and would like to keep it that way, might go for a decent enough upgrade.
First off, graphics - hows this?
XFX HD 5770 850M 1GB DDR5 €130
Would that work if I put it into my current machine? (Might pick this up first followed by the rest at a later date)
Then I have new mobo, cpu and ram to go with:
Intel Core i5-650 €160
Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3L €80
2GB DDR3 Crucial Ballistix Tracer €60
€430 give or take a few quid. A few cooling options on top of that and think I would be ok for playing some of the newest games on decent settings? Any suggestions or pick apart my choices?i'd rather not buy lemons 0 -
I'm back! Put some more thought into this, been using the PC a little more lately and would like to keep it that way, might go for a decent enough upgrade.
First off, graphics - hows this?
XFX HD 5770 850M 1GB DDR5 €130
Would that work if I put it into my current machine? (Might pick this up first followed by the rest at a later date)
Then I have new mobo, cpu and ram to go with:
Intel Core i5-650 €160
Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3L €80
2GB DDR3 Crucial Ballistix Tracer €60
€430 give or take a few quid. A few cooling options on top of that and think I would be ok for playing some of the newest games on decent settings? Any suggestions or pick apart my choices?i'd rather not buy lemons
*Cough* 4GB-Kit OCZ Gold DDR3 - 66.09
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Whoa! Wasn't expecting the platform update!
If you can stretch the extra tenner get this. Utterly gobsmackingly stupidly insane value Then if you upgrade to a 1080p monitor or TV in the future you won't even notice a drop in FPS Suffice to say it utterly destroys the HD5770
Okay, as for the platform update... You're Doing It Wrong
CPU is pathetic compared to an i5 quad. Slightly more expensive it may be but even at stock speed the i5-760 utterly destroys any of Intel's dualies and almost everything from AMD.
Mobo is pretty much the only meh Gigabyte on the market at the moment. Even this for €60 is less of a stinker If you want to keep it cheap this is decent enough. Full ATX LGA1156 mobos are darn pricey, with this being probably the cheapest decent model. Ouch
RAM is barking mad... :eek: Why on earth would you have 2GB when you have twice as much? Its only a fiver more...
If you can spend another ~€25-40 more on this you can have a cutting-edge rig... if not, you might have to think about dropping back down to a much cheaper AMD platform 0 -
Excellent advice there Solitaire, saving me a fortune Ah no, seriously though if i'm going to be spending close to €500 on upgrades may as well get the best I can to save in the long run.
So you reckon the gtx 460 is a much better card for little less? Done!
As for the RAM, as I wasn't sure what's what lately I went with the brand name I trusted from before so picked the first crucial sticks I found. 4gb for same price? Done!
My case is an Antec Sonata 3, just had a look and didn't realise it could take mATX boards as well (:o) and i've no real need to go full blown ATX so that MSI board you linked to is a contender.
So i'm now looking at €460 from hardwareversand for:
GTX 460
i5-760
4gb ram + mobo.
Have a good PSU, case will last - DVD and hard drive work - though will add another hard drive cause running out of space on it fast. 1680 x 1050 is the max resolution of my monitor, think its actually a 22" widescreen, will be on the look out for an upgrade here over the next few months. Am I missing anything now? Thanks 0 -
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