Upgrade for MSFS

Lockheed

Hi, I recently picked up a used gaming rig as i wanted to get back into flight simulation. It runs FSX great but in the next year and a half i'd like to transition towards MSFS.
The specs are as follows
ASUS Z97 Pro Gamer
Intel I7-4770 3.5ghz
Strix GTX 970 4GB
2x 4gb sticks of DDR3 ram
250gb SSD and a 1TB HDD

Off the bat I'm thinking upgrade to 16gb ram, perhaps a graphics card upgrade, my I7 is great but throttled occasionly because i'm running a stock cooler on it at the moment, so a nice cpu cooler needs to be factored in and perhaps some case fans too. Havent measured them yet so not sure what size they are.

Could anyone maybe give me some pointers as to what i should look at getting first?

Samuel T. Cogley

There is an issue with MSFS where it's very sensitive to memory bandwidth so I would get the fastest DDR3 you can lay your hands on and upgrade to 16GB not sure of the specifics on that mobo or CPU I *THINK* you can go upto 2133. GPU wise I'd look at something like a 1080/5700XT, really anything higher is going to be bottlenecked I imagine. Wait until the newer 3000 series is out properly you should be able to get one pretty cheaply. c.€200

Upgrade to the cooling is always nice but you don't have to spend mega-bucks. The case probably takes 120mm fans. Again you can get cheap but good fans.

I'd start with memory and cooling as the GPUs will take a while to settle down in price.

Edit what PSU is it?

Aodhan5000

Arctic p12s are great fans for the money. Can pick up a 5 pack for 25 quid usually