An old rig looking for a much needed upgrade...

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smoothbeginner100

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Sep 4, 2015
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So, my friend has, relative to it's age, not that bad of a rig.I think the CPU is the major bottleneck.So, get your vomit bags ready and take a look at the specs:

- P4 540 3.2Ghz
- 3GB DDR2-267 CL4 RAM
- 115GB Hitachi SATA HDD
- Gigabyte 9800GT 1GD3
- Asus P5GD2-Deluxe mobo
- 1366x768 Samsung monitor

Yeah, pretty crappy.So i came to ask 2 questions: what great low-end games could he play with this current pc? and what upgrade would you recommend at a budget of $300.If this is in anyway possible, please recommend ASAP, preferrably up to June 10th.
 
Solution
Darkbreeze
There is no upgrade that will make that system relevant. For the price you are talking about, I'd highly recommend simply upgrading the entire system, which should greatly increase the performance potential, while staying within budget. True, it won't be great, by today's standards, but it will be vastly better than anything you could do with that system, AND more importantly, would offer a path for an additional upgrade to a much better GPU card or CPU later.

Something like this:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G4400 3.3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($58.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: Asus H110M-A Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($51.98 @ Newegg)
Memory:...
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WildCard999

WildCard999

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Jul 18, 2014
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A bit over budget but it would be a huge improvement in gaming performance, especially at that resolution.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G4400 3.3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($58.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: MSI H110M PRO-D Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($47.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($36.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($46.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Zotac GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card ($94.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($53.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $339.83
Another thing is that does he need a new copy of Windows? If so that's going to cut into about $90 of his budget.

Here's a list of games he should be able to play with his current setup...
http://www.game-requirements.com/?c=nvidia_geforce_9_9800_gt
 
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Darkbreeze

Darkbreeze

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Jun 24, 2014
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There is no upgrade that will make that system relevant. For the price you are talking about, I'd highly recommend simply upgrading the entire system, which should greatly increase the performance potential, while staying within budget. True, it won't be great, by today's standards, but it will be vastly better than anything you could do with that system, AND more importantly, would offer a path for an additional upgrade to a much better GPU card or CPU later.

Something like this:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G4400 3.3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($58.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: Asus H110M-A Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($51.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($33.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card ($106.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $251.85
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-05-25 13:48 EDT-0400



Depending on what his current power supply is, that might need to upgraded as well, but there is still enough room in the budget to do so and to do using a fairly good power supply. IF he currently has a no name or OEM power supply, replacing it with something reliable and of good quality would be HIGHLY recommended.

This upgrade would offer far better performance, plus a path for upgrading both the CPU and GPU card later, than anything that could be done with his current system which would still end up not being capable of playing modern games at anything like playable settings.

As mentioned above, if a new OS is needed, which is not a given as many systems CAN reuse the OS depending on the version and whether it's a retail or OEM license, then you'll need to take that into consideration.
 
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Solution
USAFRet

USAFRet

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Mar 16, 2013
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Coming from a P4 platform, this is a 'new PC', not an 'upgrade'.

In addition to the above parts list, plus maybe a new case?
HDD is 10-13 years old? Time to replace.
 
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Theldy

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Feb 8, 2016
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nobody mentioned PSU... what PSU you have?

I would recommend build by darkbreeze, but buy XFX ts 550W PSU and GTX 960 second hand instead of 750, it should be pretty decent build with it :)
 
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Memhorder

Memhorder

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Jan 10, 2014
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Well you could pop a Core 2 Quad Q9650 in there or Core 2 Extreme QX9770 if you can find them. These are the best you can get CPU wise and they were. Get more DDR2 which would be cheap (may be hard to find) and the Nvidia 750 ti.

Or grab a new everything :)
 
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smoothbeginner100

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Sep 4, 2015
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Thanks for the answers, guys.I don't really remember what PSU he had, but I think it is a cheap Chinese quality one.As for the case, it's in relatively good condition, just needs a little thorough wipedown.I was thinking an A10 APU system, but hey...your suggestions are better.

Oh, and as for the OS, he has a Win7 CD on-hand, so he should be fine.
 
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Darkbreeze

Darkbreeze

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Jun 24, 2014
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Really? Seems like I specifically said this:

Depending on what his current power supply is, that might need to upgraded as well, but there is still enough room in the budget to do so and to do using a fairly good power supply. IF he currently has a no name or OEM power supply, replacing it with something reliable and of good quality would be HIGHLY recommended.
Click to expand...

You could add this to the build and still be within your 300 dollar budget. I agree that the drive probably ought to be replaced as well, but that could be done in the near future after upgrading the rest of the system, or you could do something like this, and just wait until you can save enough to make budget. It might not be essential, but it would be strongly recommended.


PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G4400 3.3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($58.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: Asus H110M-A Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($51.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($33.89 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($46.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card ($106.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($53.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $352.72
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-05-25 20:39 EDT-0400


And if they were able to add about another forty bucks to the budget, taking the total budget to just less than 400 dollars, they could fit a Skylake i3 in there instead of the Skylake Pentium, and gain a good deal more performance due to the i3 having it's two additional hyperthreads, rather than just the two base cores.
 
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