Upgrading my PC. Need help.

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spelorzi

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Jun 17, 2014
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So. i'm trying to upgrade, this is what I'm running:

CPU: i5 4430 @3 GHz
MBO: MSI H87-G43
RAM: 2x4 GB DDR3 1600MHz
GPU: Zotac 560ti 1GB
HDD: 500GB WD Blue
PSU: Coolermaster Silent Pro Modular 80+ 850W
Screen: LG Slim 19' 5ms@60hz (1920x1080)


What i do:

Work: Graphic Design (Photoshop, Illustrator mostly).
Gaming: WoW, D3:RoS, Dota2, CS:GO - And also new titles like Titanfall, BF4, Wolfenstein, Watch Dogs.

Right now my budget is 350$~380$. Will be upgrading piece by piece. Which will be the best upgrade i can do first performance wise? I Was thinking on getting a GTX770.

Thanks in advance!
 
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Most of those issues were for the newly released R9 290 and R9 290X, and I believe they've been resolved by now. Those happened because AMD released the cards but didn't have solid drivers yet; I believe that happened with the HD 7000 series as well, but they matured REALLY well.

That said, for the games you play it's probably better to get the GTX 770 than a similarly priced R9 280X; World of Warcraft runs a bit better with Nvidia GPUs, and I've heard Watch Dogs was extremely Nvidia biased. BF4 runs faster on AMD cards, but Nvidia cards still do well.

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Ron Burgundy

Ron Burgundy

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Aug 16, 2013
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Check out reviews on newegg, ncix and tigerdirect. They should function the same but have different build quality/warranty/customer service etc..

Im asus fanboy

 
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spelorzi

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Jun 17, 2014
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I Do like the R9 270x, but i've read so many problems about them (heating, faulty, drivers) that made me turn away from that. That's why i was choosing GTX770 instead
 
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Most of those issues were for the newly released R9 290 and R9 290X, and I believe they've been resolved by now. Those happened because AMD released the cards but didn't have solid drivers yet; I believe that happened with the HD 7000 series as well, but they matured REALLY well.

That said, for the games you play it's probably better to get the GTX 770 than a similarly priced R9 280X; World of Warcraft runs a bit better with Nvidia GPUs, and I've heard Watch Dogs was extremely Nvidia biased. BF4 runs faster on AMD cards, but Nvidia cards still do well.

To answer your original question: I would recommend upgrading the GPU first as well. Another decent way to go would be to get a GTX 760 and toss in a 120 - 256GB SSD which will help speed up loading a lot, and MMOs such as WoW really take well to being installed on an SSD since it frequently access it to load new scenery, models, etc. The GTX 760 is still a huge step up from the GTX 560 Ti.

Basically the order of upgrades I would do is:
1. GTX 760 or GTX 770
2. 120GB-256GB SSD (Sata 6Gbps)
3. i5-4690, or if you feel like it an i7-4770/4790; though there isn't a huge amount to gain in games from the i7, it may come in handy a ways down the road since you're not on an overclocking platform, so hyperthreading at that point may come in handy... and an i7 will do better to support a really high end video card such as what may be released 2-3 yrs down the line, or if for some reason you upgraded to a GTX Titan Black or something like that.
 
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True, there's a lot of negative stigma regarding AMD cards and false claims. One of my buddies said he'd never use an AMD card again because his HD 6950 arrived DOA. Then he had artifacting and overheating issues on his GTX 580 and sent it in for a replacement and said it was all well and good because it got replaced easily... double standard lol

People have the idea that AMD cards (and CPUs) have ridiculous overheating and power consumption issues and it's a super frequent problem, and people who don't/haven't use(d) AMD cards talk bad about them rather than speaking from personal experience.

Every single Nvidia driver between 314.22 (march 2013) and the latest 337 (I think) WHQL driver caused my games to crash. I'm really happy this latest one worked, because it also reduced CPU usage and I have smoother gameplay now :D
 
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anti-painkilla

anti-painkilla

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http://www.techspot.com/review/827-watch-dogs-benchmarks/page3.html

This lists the benchmarks for Watchdogs. If you are wanting these high end games with all the eye candy you can get, spend what you have now on a GPU, then when you have money go for the SSD.

I am not going to compare US prices for cards, as they all have different crazy deals (rebates and freebies). If you dont have watchdogs, there is a gigabyte R290 for $400 incl the game. Have a look around at what is best value for you.

You can get a Samsung Evo 250GB for $134, I would do this after the graphics card.
 
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