Phenom II X3 720 -- Worthy of GPU Upgrade?

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NutPredator

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I assembled my current system almost five years ago now. I never really had intention of upgrading it much, thinking it would last me quite awhile (it has) and then I'd put together a new system.

Just recently I got curious if there is anything modest I could actually do at this point to get a little more gaming performance before my next system sometime down the line.

CPU: AMD Phenom II X3 720
GPU: Radeon HD 4890 1GB
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 (rev 1.0)
RAM: 4GB DDR2 (not sure of speed)
Monitor: BenQ 24 in. native 1920x1200

In my quick research, a couple GPUs caught my eye: GTX 660 Ti 2GB and the new GTX 750 Ti 2GB. Overall, I would want to spend more than maybe 200 bucks to put into this system at this stage.

The 660 Ti looks the more powerful of the two, and like a similar type of card to my current one in power consumption and noise, while the 750 Ti is very appealing at its price point and because it's so quiet (the 4890 gets really noisy sometimes by my standards).

I expect however that my CPU may not keep up well with either of these. Is there a way to tell without actual testing if that would be the case, or how bad the loss would be?

Glancing at CPUs, the AM2+/AM3 socket mobo I have doesn't give a lot of worthwhile options. Phenom II X4s and X6s don't look cheap or easy to come by and they wouldn't be worth the cost probably compared to gains from a new system.

If my CPU would hamper either of these cards, that leaves me to perhaps overclock. I recall reading ages ago the X3 can possibly have an unlockable 4th core (which I don't think I can with my mobo) and good overclocking.

Would it be feasible to overclock enough to remove any CPU bottleneck given one of these new cards? To do so without a lot of investment in additional cooling?
 
Solution
ewok93
If you get one of those GPUs, or really one any more powerful than what you have, you will have a large bottleneck from both your RAM and CPU, you really need to do a full upgrade for it to be worthwhile. For $200 you can practically build a PC similar to what you have, but for around $300 you can keep your harddrive and case, then get this: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2XcwP . That will be much better than what you have because you won't be getting a video card that is much powerful than the rest of your build.
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ewok93

ewok93

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If you get one of those GPUs, or really one any more powerful than what you have, you will have a large bottleneck from both your RAM and CPU, you really need to do a full upgrade for it to be worthwhile. For $200 you can practically build a PC similar to what you have, but for around $300 you can keep your harddrive and case, then get this: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2XcwP . That will be much better than what you have because you won't be getting a video card that is much powerful than the rest of your build.
 
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bigj1985

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I don't see you running into any problems using a GPU of the 660ti caliber your CPU will be just fine trust me. There will be a slight bottleneck but nothing substantial especially with a small OC.

I think people take this bottlenecking thing way over the top. You will be wanting more power in GFX intense CPU bound games but games making use of mostly your GPU that processore should push it just fine.

I was running my OC GTX 570 on an ORIGINAL quad phenom for god sakes and I was still able to game fine. The Phenom 2 is a much better CPU. You basically have a P2 965-980 with a core disabled still a descent processor.
 
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ewok93

ewok93

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That would be a massive bottleneck, hes going to get the maximum performance of his CPU in games, and there really aren't many games at the moment that run well on a slow processor. It is simply an older processor. You won't get a lot higher performance in any games you play, certainly not in current games, or even Minecraft.
 
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NutPredator

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Very much appreciate the advice and detailed suggestion. That looks like an inexpensive but nice build, however if I was going to buy a whole new system together I think I'd be willing to wait a bit and have more money to put into it. Or, to at least throw a 750 Ti or something into that build. The CPU looks quite a bit better than mine.

Is there a way to test for bottlenecks without just buying things and trying them?
 
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NutPredator

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That was poorly phrased, I guess. It doesn't seem like there is any hard and fast rule to know when you may end up with a bottleneck. That's mostly what I was wondering about. If I could determine ahead of time how my CPU would perform with one of these cards.
 
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