'Tis the Season to Upgrade

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Mr_Minecraft

Mr_Minecraft

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Nov 21, 2012
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Hey everyone,

Seeing that Christmas is coming up (along with sales and savings) I was wondering if you can help me out. My PC is only a year old, and my plan is to upgrade my motherboard and CPU to a Broadwell (or comparable AMD chip) next year. I also plan to upgrade my graphics card to the next round of Nvidia or AMD cards in 2014.

My question: Is there anything I can add/change in my system now to spice it up until next year? I play games like BF4, Grid 2, Skyrim with 80+ mods (High res packs, ENB, mesh mods, etc), Far Cry 3. Basically all the new games that are very demanding on Ultra (I dont like to turn down my graphics or dip below 40 fps).

My System:
-CPU: AMD FX 8320 Overclocked to 4.5ghz
-CPU Cooler: CM 212+
-Motherboard: Asus Sabertooth R2.0 990fx
-GPU: MSI Hawk Radeon HD 7870 overclocked
-Hard Drive: Seagate 1tb 7200 RPM
-Ram: 8gb G.Skill Ripjaws @ 1600mhz
-Monitor: Asus 24inch 1080p monitor

The way I see it, I have these options:
-Add an additional 7870 in crossfire and deal with the headache
-Use a SSD as my main drive and use my current HDD as a storage drive
-Install another 8gb of G.Skill ram

What do you guys recommend? I know I wont be able to make it another year on my current build, as I am very picky about having my games look the best they possibly can.

Thanks, and Merry Christmas!
-MM
 
Solution
jay2577
An SSD will improve the gaming aspect. Quicker loading times and when the game needs to read from the hard drive that will be quicker too.
Water cooling won't improve gaming.
The best thing you can do is invest in a AMD 280x or Nvidia GTX770 graphics card is gaming performance is what you want to improve but if this is a temporary fix until you upgrade the whole system to a much more powerful machine you might want to just wait.
The 7870 is still a decent graphics card:)
If you look at these Battlefield 4 benchmarks you can see what performance crossfiring will bring. Look at the 270x and 270x crossfired results. The AMD 270x is just a tweaked version of the 7870. It might help you decide:)...
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jay2577

jay2577

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Jun 17, 2012
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The AMD 7870 crossfired is a potent set up on compatible games.
Not all games play well using 2 graphics cards so you shouldn't be disappointed if you don't get every game running super fast.
I use 2 AMD 270x cards crossfired so i think you would get very similar performance to mine.
I also use an SSD and it was one of the best upgrades i have bought. the whole computer feels quicker and loading times are quicker too. Once you have a SSD drive you won't be able to change back:)
8gb of ram is plenty. Maybe in a year or two it will be worth it.
 
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Mr_Minecraft

Mr_Minecraft

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Nov 21, 2012
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One thing I don't understand is that the only speed differences you would notice with a SSD are only for things installed on the SSD. If I install applications and games to the HDD, wouldn't those things still perform the same?

That is the way I see it, and I hope I am wrong so I can go out and buy a SSD :D
 
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jay2577

jay2577

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Jun 17, 2012
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Only things installed on the SSD will be faster. My SSD is only 120gb so it calls for a little space management like only having 1 or 2 games installed at a time. I just keep a USB3 portable hard drive plugged in for storage and when it's full i just plug in a new one:)
 
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Mr_Minecraft

Mr_Minecraft

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Nov 21, 2012
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So what can I do about the gaming aspect of things. I want to be able to run the new games coming out at decent settings untill I upgrade my GPU next year. Based on what you said, a crossfire 7870 would not be worth it, so is there anything else I can do?

I am thinking about possibly going to water cooling, but my damn case doesn't make it easy. I am planning on switching to Cooler Master's Stacker line.
 
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jay2577

jay2577

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Jun 17, 2012
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An SSD will improve the gaming aspect. Quicker loading times and when the game needs to read from the hard drive that will be quicker too.
Water cooling won't improve gaming.
The best thing you can do is invest in a AMD 280x or Nvidia GTX770 graphics card is gaming performance is what you want to improve but if this is a temporary fix until you upgrade the whole system to a much more powerful machine you might want to just wait.
The 7870 is still a decent graphics card:)
If you look at these Battlefield 4 benchmarks you can see what performance crossfiring will bring. Look at the 270x and 270x crossfired results. The AMD 270x is just a tweaked version of the 7870. It might help you decide:)
Ultra_1920.png

 
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Solution
Mr_Minecraft

Mr_Minecraft

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Nov 21, 2012
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So cross-firing a 7870 would almost double the performance, but this is just battlefield. The problem is I don't know when Nvidia/AMD will release their next line of cards. I just hope my 7870 will make it that far.

As far as water cooling goes, I want to do that just because I prefer water cooling over air. I know it wont help gaming, but if i set up a good water cooled system, I can always easily change water-blocks when I get new components.
 
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