Good Upgrades for my 4 Year Old PC

DonLagdao

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Oct 23, 2015
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I am new here and I just want to know what upgrades should I do with my four year old desktop.
I built this specifically for Hackintosh but after several failed tries, I installed Windows 7 Pro 64bit, but it was already upgraded to Windows 10. Most of the time I use this PC for Photo Editing using Adobe Photoshop. I also used this for VMWare Desktop to install and try other OS. Majority of the files in the second drives are family treasured pictures so I have a 1TB external Drive as a backup.

Desktop Specification:
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z68XP-UD4
Processor: i7-2600K
Memory: 16GB (RipJaw DDR3-2133)
GPU: I am using the onboard HD Graphics 3000
P/S: Cougar CMX-1000 (1000W)
HDD1: 750GB ST750LX003 (Hybrid disk) - OS
HDD2: 2TB ST2000DX001 (Hybrid disk) - Data

I am currently looking for a nice GPU that can run two 24 inch monitors. Is EVGA GTX960 or GTX970 still compatible with my motherboard?

Should I consider getting an SSD and make my hybrid drives specifically for data?

I am also looking for a possibility of buying 3 more ST2000DX001 and use Raid for more reliability. Will this make my system go faster or slower?

Kindly help me please. New ideas is much appreciated.



 
Solution
As long as your motherboard has a free PCIe x16 slot, then it will support those cards. Your motherboard has one of these slots, so as long as it's not being taken up by anything and the two PCIe x1 slots below it aren't being used up by anything then it should fit. I would personally upgrade this first -- I have never had a good time with Intel HD Graphics before. If you do graphically demanding things like high res gaming then I would choose the 970, but if you don't do anything that requires that much GPU then the 960 should be sufficient. Of course if you have the money to spend anyway, then go for the 970.

Using an SSD to store your OS will improve your loading times substantially and make for a much smoother PC experience, so it...

rollingbarrels

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Oct 6, 2015
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As long as your motherboard has a free PCIe x16 slot, then it will support those cards. Your motherboard has one of these slots, so as long as it's not being taken up by anything and the two PCIe x1 slots below it aren't being used up by anything then it should fit. I would personally upgrade this first -- I have never had a good time with Intel HD Graphics before. If you do graphically demanding things like high res gaming then I would choose the 970, but if you don't do anything that requires that much GPU then the 960 should be sufficient. Of course if you have the money to spend anyway, then go for the 970.

Using an SSD to store your OS will improve your loading times substantially and make for a much smoother PC experience, so it is definitely worth considering if you have the money for it.

I don't know much about how RAID affects performance unfortunately but perhaps somebody else here can help you with that.

Despite it being half a decade old, that i7 is still a solid performer compared to modern CPUs so you may not even need to upgrade it if you are already able to do all the editing you want smoothly. You might want to consider it though if you want an extra bit of performance. If you upgrade your CPU you will most likely need to upgrade your motherboard too.
 
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