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Old Gaming PC upgrade advice

Tags:
  • Motherboards
  • Budget
  • AMD
  • Gaming Upgrade
  • Graphics Cards
  • Systems
  • CPUs
Last response: in Systems
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October 8, 2013 8:52:27 AM

With BF4 coming out in a month I'm looking to upgrade my old rig I threw together 4 years ago. It's current state is thus:
CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q300 @ 2.5GHz
Motherboard: Asus P5G41T-M LX2/GB
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTS 250
RAM: 4GB (came pre-installed in the tower)

I want to upgrade it so it will run the current gen of games at acceptably good settings. I'm pretty sure I can't just throw a 7950 in my current rig and have everything work, so here's what I've looked up to use:
CPU: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/ite...
Motherboard: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/ite...
Video Card: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/ite...

Is all this necessary? Is it enough? I really have no idea at this point, it's been a really long time since I looked into computer hardware. I want to try and spend as little as possible, and if I can get this upgrade in under $400 I would be ecstatic. I'm also open to alternate suggestions if anyone thinks that the current hardware I have selected is inadequate.

Also, I'm planning on purchasing this hardware on Cyber Monday, so please make your suggestions under the assumption that the prices for everything will be somewhat cheaper.

Thank you for your help.

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October 8, 2013 9:10:38 AM

I know exactly what you are looking at. I did the same thing to my old workstation, a 2x e5472@3.0ghz (previously 2x e5410@2.33ghz), 8gb memory etc etc. Dropping a 7950 boost in, replacing a 6850, worked like a charm. A few months later I built a 3770k gaming machine and actually didn't notice that big of an increase in performance in FPS games. Something processor bound like Civ 5, I noticed a huge speed up in times between turns etc, but on Crysis 3, it got somewhat better, averaging 15fps higher at 1920x1200.

Upgrading your GPU to a current model if you can find a good deal is definitely a good investment, as if you build a new machine later, you can obviously drop the new GPU into the new build.
A card that would be balanced to your machine, as there will be lots of responses about bottlenecking and you only need such and such a card, would be the 7850 but with the deals on the 7950/7970, there isn't a good reason to not get the best your budget will allow comfortably. Getting a card that won't be bottlenecked by your current platform will just result in you buying a card that won't see your performance increase that much anyway.
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October 8, 2013 9:12:01 AM

Another stop-gap measure could be to purchase the fastest processor your motherboard will handle on the cheap if you can find it. I got the 3.0ghz chip for $30USD/each. Good value with options like that if you can't or don't want to put a new machine together.
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October 8, 2013 9:14:05 AM

Personally, I would just get the card and see how that runs with your setup. Your CPU is older, but by no means slow yet. If you still feel the need to upgrade, then you can upgrade the platform.
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October 8, 2013 9:25:55 AM

The Recomended requierments are
OS: Windows 8
CPU: Intel Quad Core or AMD 6 Core
RAM: 8Gb
Video: GTX 660 or AMD 7870 with Min of 3GB on video card

I would just get an i5 with a GTX 760 and 8 or 16GB or ram

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Mobo: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

GPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...
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October 9, 2013 11:06:44 AM

@Dwatterworth, yes the rig is definitely a (what was then) upper-middle end workstation with a decent video card thrown in. Sounds like I'm not the only person to ever try that, lol. Was cheaper to do that than to build from scratch
Thank you all for your replies. So the gist of what you're saying then is that I might be fine just to get a higher end video card and upgrade the rest later?
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a b U Graphics card
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October 9, 2013 11:14:38 AM

Yep. A new video card will work just fine in your current machine and will definitely run new games. Obviously for the most demanding games you'll have to turn settings down but it will run something like Crysis 3 at medium at least.
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October 9, 2013 12:15:31 PM

Awesome, thanks a bunch. This will save me some pretty big $$$.
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