Back to school upgrade

[keviny1]

Like the title states I'm going back to school and would like to do a upgrade to last me a while. I'm thinking of either upgrading my 5770 to a his iceq 7850, or my phenom II x4 black 3.4 to something newer. What would ÿøü guys suggest would be my most worthwhile upgrade.

[vuzedome]

Upgrade graphics, and you're good to go.

[keviny1]

Do you think 7850 would be a worth while or go with something different?

[kitamesume]

processor seems fine, well at least its faster than my i3-2100.
ram to 4gb or more is also nice to have, specially if you multi-task so much.
a new harddrive, heck yeah you don't get wrong on that upgrade, specially getting an SSD, gives another life to a sluggish PC.
a better monitor, i remember the joy i had from moving from an 18" crap to a 21" full HD, ohhh the joy, really.

check your PSU first if its rated at least above 300watts(true ratings, not some kinky sticker slapped for design saying its 500watts or so it says, if its generic that is), that HD7850 will drain at least 100watts at average usage which leaves little room for components, at least have a spare of 200watts outside the total power consumption of the processor and GPU as one.

if its generic and has a sticker of 500watts on it, stick to a HD7770 to be safe, or buy a 40$ seasonic or antec 400watt PSU, it works i tell you.


outside of these common upgrade paths, whats your reason of upgrading anyway? feeling sluggy? or just felt upgrading?
reason for asking is because that rig can last you at least two more years if you're outside the field of heavy gaming.

[keviny1]

My pay is actually new, it's a crossair tx750.
The reason for the upgrade is that mu pc is starting to feel a bit sluggish, I'm also using a eyefinity setup on one 5770 so I was thinking that this was probally the problem

[kitamesume]

hmmm, if thats the case, i'd list the upgrades you can do. although we're ditching AMD CPUs for the sole reason of efficiency.

i5-3450 or i5-2400
at least 4GB of ram
motherboards... lga1155 Asrock Z68 Pro3-M is good, its a beauty.
HD7850 would be a pretty choice, HD7870 would be kinda better for that overkill PSU.
downgrade to a 500watt PSU with a "gold" tag on it, actually thats an upgrade. reasons? only duo-GPUs(or more) needs more than 600watts, really.
an SSD is a good bet for a slug-pesticide, not the best bet though. another option would be a raid5 5x1TB array of WD blacks, wouldn't be worth it for the price though, and a little overkill as a storage, i mean using WD blacks is overkill.

[vuzedome]

Oh come on, the guy's a student, don't need an overhaul. Just stick in new and better GPU plus extra ram sticks in there, if that's not enough then wipe your OS and start fresh to feel the extra fresh.

[krumm]

that cpu and gpu is fine, but the gpu would not be a bad upgrade.  If your going to update anything then go for at least the 7850.  The 7770 is not a real upgrade.  A ssd is a possible upgrade as well.  4-8 GB ram is good and probably will not get you any speed to upgrade.

I would look at the price/performance difference between the 7850 and 7870 and upgrade that, but I don't use more then 1 monitor so the 5770 I have works fine. 

[datora]

.
What do you use your computer for?
Do you intend to to more/something else with it?
What are it's full specifications?
What's your budget? / What market in the world are you purchasing in?

An SSD for your system drive & heavy apps should be the very first thing on your list.  128 GB can be had for ~$90 & under in the U.S. these days ... a good, fast reliable one like a Crucial M4 or a Samsung 830.  It's unlikely you need a 256 GB , but if you do they generally have a small performance boost in read/writes, but larger doesn't have any more than the 256 range.

If you have 4 GB "old" slow-ish RAM, like DDR3 1033, and your mobo can handle it, consider looking at 8 GB (or 16) of DDR 3 1833 or even 2133.  If you already have 1600, the jump won't generally be worth it, unless you're into overclocking.

Your x4 core Deneb ... what's the base GHz? [ EDIT: OKay - I see I missed it's a 965 @ 3.4 GHz ]  Are you overclocking?  Consider upgrading the cooling block and pushing it into the 4.3/4.5 GHz if it can handle it [ EDIT: you can push 4.2 GHz stable in almost all Deneb 965s without too much effort; I've seen numerous system reports @4.5 GHz on a good air cooler before water becomes nearly mandatory; stick with air and be happy with 4.2/4.3 if you get it. ] (also, you'll probably bump the RAM MHz in the process).  Budget for a couple decent, quiet, hi air-flow case fans so your system doesn't sound like a Harrier taking off.

[ EDIT: the Bulldozer FX-6200 x6 core barely outperforms a Deneb 965 running ~ 3.6 stock 3.4 GHz; not worth the ~$140 "upgrade," even if you have an AM3+ socket mobo.  If I can find it, there was an outstanding comparison report I read on that some weeks back ... save your money and stick with the Deneb 965, but seriously consider pushing it to 4 GHz & maybe higher. ]


Now, we can discuss your GPU.  Why is your current one inadequate?


[ further EDIT: read this review.  All of it.  It's eye-opening:

 - AMD FX-6200 CPU Review: A Small Bulldozer Refresh

Gives me great dissapoint.  I invested in an AM3+ mobo specifically to eventually upgrade to this CPU.  Looks like a total waste of money.  Better investment would be to find a Phenom II X6 1100T @ max. GHz and maybe mildly OC one of those.  It will out-perform and use quite a bit less wattage.  The FX-6200 uses ludicrous amounts of electricity at a high overclock to seriously compete with an 1100T in nearly every single category.  I haven't looked into an FX-8150 yet, and won't due to price at this time. ]

[kitamesume]

^ exactly why stay away from AMD CPUs for the sole purpose of efficiency.

at the moment the only thing that needs an upgrade on his system are an SSD, a mild bump in GPU, a new HSF for overclocking, and more ram.
anything else would lead to an overhaul of the whole unit, not the best option imho unless you'll aim for an i5+HD7870 no less.

[keviny1]

I currently have  a 60gb ssd with 6gb ram already, I'm currently at work so I'll post my full system specs when I get home to make things a little clearer, thanks for the responses so far

[Saras]

7850/7870/7950 will drop in price by 20-40$ soon, due to GTX660ti. So I suggest waiting half a month and going for the 7870.

[datora]

.

^ exactly why stay away from AMD CPUs for the sole purpose of efficiency.

Actually, I am and have been an AMD advocate for nearly two decades now.  Don't go implying that I am telling people to stay away from them.

AMD dropped the ball on the Zambezi CPUs.  That's purely a fact.  The AM3+ socket was designed to take advantage of that tech, and they fucked up.  Now there will not be any further upgrade path.  It's very legitimate criticism to point that out.  I can buy a Deneb 965 for about $90 today, and it does not require an AM3+ socket ... no need to drop top dollars on a such a mobo.  An 870 FXA is completely adequate and 30%-50% cheaper.

I still advocate AMD for a budget build with some pretty serious balls, but the Zambezi line barely performs at the level of an 1100T.  To outperform an 1100T by any credible margin, you have to jump your power use through the ceiling on a hard overclock.

"Efficient" is not a word I would use to describe those compromises.  I sure as fuck am not dropping $150 to $200 on a CPU to replace the one I have for no significant performance boost.  If AMD puts out a 2nd gen Zambezi or equivalent that uses the AM3+ socket, I'll be first in line  to be interested, once the performance numbers are out.  I just don't see that happening.

And, on-topic: No.  It's not worth the money to replace your CPU, unless you maybe find a cheap Deneb 980 or an 1100T, and you intend to play with overclocking.  Actually, this is exactly what I recommend that you seriously consider doing; it's the cheapest path to maximum useful performance that you're going to get with your mobo under current circumstances.

Since you already have an SSD, you're unlikely to need an upgrade on that.  Even if you have a SATA II SSD, moving up to a SATA III would be nice, but it's not going to be an amazing performance jump.  Please post the model you currently have, and do mention your intended uses, including a couple of the most intensive software & game titles you intend to be using.

[keviny1]

motherboard: ASUS M4A78T-E AM3 AMD 790GX HDMI ATX AMD
Gpu: xfx radeon hd 5770
Cpu: amd phenom II x4 965 black edition deneb
memory: 6gb ddr3 1333 g.skill
powersupply: crossair TX 750
harddrive: ssd Corsair Nova Series 2 CSSD-V60GB2 2.5"
case: COOLER MASTER HAF 932
 keyboard: Logitech G15
 mouse: Razor naga

Sorry for the delay in posts, here is my current setup, i also have 2 500gb harddrives for storage. im using an eyefinity setup and when ever i open a game i get a message from windows saying i should switch to windows basic because aero is slowing my pc down. But also just lately everytime i go and open an app or chrome it takes at least 30 sec for it to even pop up and start to open. i usually do a clean install of windows every few months or so as well. this is the reason why i came to a conclusion that i should upgrade.

as for programs i would be using, gw2(when released), i get a lot of games off steam so i wouldnt mind not having to worry  about playability, sc2, D3, i do kinda of want bf3 but im still holding off on that. besides gaming i just watch alot of anime, and would like to start learning how to use adobe programs.

i was thinking if i was to upgrade my gpu i would go with saphire 7870 

[Pagonis]

Atleast back in Uni we had Windows Server or something (not really an admin, just programmer) account and we just RDP to that.

Used one of the cheapest laptops while studying, as Visual Studio studio was running on the server. Didn't had to copy my assigments to USB flash drive also.


And don't hate on AMD. Because of AMD we have beastly, godly, etc, CPUs from Intel. xD

[xShadow]

tl;dr: Consider new graphics card, and that's about it

when ever i open a game i get a message from windows saying i should switch to windows basic because aero is slowing my pc down. But also just lately everytime i go and open an app or chrome it takes at least 30 sec for it to even pop up and start to open. i usually do a clean install of windows every few months or so as well. this is the reason why i came to a conclusion that i should upgrade.

Not really. I have an i5 750 myself and a 5850 HD. I'm also not even using an SSD. It generally doesn't take me that long to open things, and I only get that aero thing when I'm playing something that's taking up a good chunk of my GPU (which is completely normal with high-end games; you want them to be raping your GPU).

There might be something wrong with the SSD or some random program you use on that system slowing things down. Have you checked your SSD out to make sure it hasn't slowed down with time or anything? I don't think this is a problem with your specs being underwhelming. Chrome starts on my Core 2 Duo laptop (note 4 years old, got it just starting college) in about 10 seconds. On this computer it starts in about 3 (again, I'm running on a 400 gig hard drive that's like 6+ years old).

[datora]

.
The issues you are describing don't sound like a hardware bottleneck.  Sounds more like a configuration problem.  Possibly some driver or another isn't playing perfect with everything else?  Some config/install not correct w/ Win7 & it's having brain farts?  Some application(s) you have running are seemingly in conflict.

I always blame Windows.  Just because ... it's always doing something completely retarded in the background and doesn't feel that you, as the owner, have any rights to know what cracksmoking fuckheaded thing it's trying to FAIL at.


That aside, your upgrade options are limited.  Still don't know your budget, but ...

RAM - 6 GB?  That's not a typo?  Which would mean you have a 2 GB plus a 4 GB chip.  To get maximum efficiency out of duel channel memory, you really want a matched pair.  Your mobo tops out at DDR3 1600 memory.

So, let's assume for the moment that you might want to and have capability in your BIOS to overclock.  Under the best of conditions you could plop in 2 x 4 GB matched set of DDR3 1833 chips and push your timings & clock as best you can.  That will not be a huge performance tweak, but it's certainly not zero.  By itself, nothing to notice, in combination with other tweaks, it could add up.  Good 1833 chips that can be pushed can be had for $40-$45, and you'll want timings that look like 9-9-9-27 or under; if you only run at 1600, you want to see 8-8-8-24 or under ... and those are optimistic numbers to shoot for to make the money & time worth it.

SSD/HDD - you are limited to SATA II / 3.0 GB/sec speeds.  Getting a top-performing SATA III SSD will certainly maximize what performance is possible, but the top end of that capacity will be outside of your reach.  A RAID 0 of a pair of SSDs (SATA II or III) can generate some impressive numbers .. but, you're gonna want to want it 'cause that will take time & money.  Might be worth the investment from the standpoint that it will be good training for you and you could migrate those drives to another mobo if you decide to go with a Full Monty upgrade within ~18 months.

Also, when SSDs (especially 'older' ones from last year) get really full, they tend to gum up.  Rule of thumb has been to keep ~10% of the SSD free.  So, @64 GB, your formatted capacity should be right around 58-ish GB ... does your SSD have at least 7 GB of unused space on it?  Might not hurt if you can keep 8 or 10 free.  If you're down to 3 or 2, that could be (part of) your observed problems.

CPU - I've already said a lot on that.  If you can still find an 1100T and you want to do some overclocking, go for it.  You could get a very nice performance bump out of that ... especially if you upgrade the RAM and aggressively tweak it at the same time.

Cooling block - don't know what you're using now.  If it's the stock block that came on the Deneb 965, it has it's limits & you'll want to upgrade.  Again, only worth it if you want to get all geeky and overclock.  If you go that route, budget for a few good case fans and make sure they are assisting your cooling block.

PSU - overpowered for what you can do already.  Be happy with it.

GPU - turns out your original supposition is correct: about the best thing you can do, especially in light of the game load you intend, is to upgrade your GPU.  Others here are more up to those recommendations than I am.  I'm not a gamer and am really happy with my nvidea GTX460.  It does far more than I require and it's highly linux compatible, as well as overclock friendly.  But, you need something more cutting edge & I'm not up on the current tech there.

Set yourself a budget and shop hard for the best GPU you can get for it.

mobo - You are reaching the limits of what your mobo can do for you, so probably start planning to upgrade the whole rig from scratch in 12-24 months, depending on what this one can do for your needs.  No telling what tech will be available in 18 months, so just be zen and keep your finger on the pulse so you'll be positioned to buy when you're ready to move on.

Hmmm.  Speaking of resource conflicts ... any chance that your on-board GPU isn't disabled properly and there's some idiot conflict with your PCIe GPU ..?


All that said ... I think you need to look to how your operating system is installed and configured, what options you do & don't have enabled ... and look to what you have installed.  Somthin' Ain't Right, based upon your performance report.  Figure out what that is and you'll have an upgrade.