A bit torn between 5850 + other upgrades, or a new card.

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Aeros

Honorable
Jun 4, 2013
5
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10,510
Hi,

As the title implies I'm a bit torn between 2 choices.
I have around 300 euro (roughly 260 pound) to spend for a new pc upgrade.
My pc is now around 3-4 years old and in desperate need of an upgrade.

I was thinking of buying a second 5850 and putting them in CF + 8Gig RAM + an ssd but I'm not sure if this is a good idea performance wise. Else I'd just buy a new gfx card for around 250~300 and put that in, though I don't know if my pc would experience bottlenecking because of it's age.
Anyway, here's my pc specs:

ATI RADEON 5850
Corsair Vengeance 8gb (1600mhz)
ASUS P7P55D PRO
Recom 850 Watt
Intel i5 750 @ 2.67 Ghz
Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit)

I use 2 monitors; one at 1920x1080 & 1680x1050.

Also, I mostly play MMO and FPS so I'd like to move up from my current 26~36 fps (at high/ultra), to a stable 40~50+ fps (or higher).

Any ideas are more than welcome!
 
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sam_p_lay

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Mar 26, 2010
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Yeah GTX670 is a good bet currently, though I'd wait for the GTX760 Ti to see if you can get the same thing for less (it's expected to be a rebadged GTX670 at a lower price). I wouldn't go with Crossfire. Radeon 5000s Crossfired very poorly in many games. I had a 5970 which is effectively a single card Crossfire solution (a doubled up 5870 clocked down to 5850 speeds) and it was pretty crap. Infact Rage actually played FAR smoother on a GTX550 Ti than it did on my 5970.
 
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A

Aeros

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Jun 4, 2013
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Would it work well with my current system?
Just wondering since I haven't been paying attention to new hardware for like a year and have no clue if it would bottleneck or not so.

Looking into the GTX670 tho, thanks.
 
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ubercake

ubercake

Splendid
Oct 28, 2009
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I can tell you the microstutter issues I had with my 5850s in crossfire are what changed my opinion of AMD graphics cards in a bad way. I don't recommend getting a second 5850 at all. AMD is still hashing out microstutter issues with multi-card/crossfire setups 3 years after I got rid of my 5850s for this very reason.

Given the options you're considering, I'd go for the new graphics card altogether (GTX 770). You're going to run into a bit of a bottleneck. You will definitely see improvements in the video performance, but bottlenecking will be an issue with the older CPU/architecture with a current gen video card. This just means, even though you'll see improvements, you're not going to realize the max potential of a latest gen video card on that architecture.

If I were in your shoes, though, I'd consider this a good time for a platform upgrade. I'd go to an Asus P8Z77-V LK motherboard and an i5-3750K. This should fall inside your current budget. I'd also seriously consider replacing the PSU as well. I would do all of this before considering the video upgrade. You don't have to get the newest architecture, but you're going to eliminate the CPU bottlenecks you would run into with the older CPU and architecture. After doing this, you'd be in a very good position to upgrade video for the next few generations of video cards.
 
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Xavier Tan Sync

Xavier Tan Sync

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May 8, 2013
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Absolutely work well with your system. And all the best :)
 
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