What to upgrade first (CPU vs GPU), what is my bottleneck

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Banjer_HD

Banjer_HD

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Hello,

I have a question, what should I upgrade first, a new GPU or a new CPU+MOBO+RAM
It is an old pc and I want to get into gaming, where is my bottleneck in gaming?
At the moment I get 60-70fps in Dirty Bomb on low.

My current system specs:
- i5-650 (2 cores, 4 threads @ 3,2GHz)
- GT 240, 1GB
- MSI H55M-ED55
- 8GB DDR3 ram

New choices:

1:
- GTX 1050 ti

2:
- Pentium G4560
- B250m-D3SH
- 8GB DDR4 ram

Thank you for reading!
 
Solution
DSzymborski
A Nehalem i5 is on the slow side at this point, but it's hard to wring anything out of a GT 240, which wasn't ever an actual gaming GPU. So it would make sense to update that first, given your two choices.

HOWEVER

If you pay a bit more and get the Pentium G4620 instead, you can buy yourself more time for a GPU upgrade - the Intel HD 630 integrated on this CPU is much better than the Intel HD 610 on the 4620 and in fact, is a significant upgrade on a GT 240. That may buy you a bit more time to upgrade the GPU and you'll already be on a Kaby Lake platform.
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turkey3_scratch

turkey3_scratch

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You're going to need to upgrade both, but if it was the choice between upgrading the CPU or GPU, I would upgrade the GPU but I would upgrade it to a GPU that is weaker than the 1050Ti; if you upgrade to too powerful of a GPU, then the CPU will probably bottleneck. I think you would be better off upgrading to maybe an AMD RX 550. Should be miles ahead of the GT 240 still.
 
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DSzymborski

DSzymborski

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A Nehalem i5 is on the slow side at this point, but it's hard to wring anything out of a GT 240, which wasn't ever an actual gaming GPU. So it would make sense to update that first, given your two choices.

HOWEVER

If you pay a bit more and get the Pentium G4620 instead, you can buy yourself more time for a GPU upgrade - the Intel HD 630 integrated on this CPU is much better than the Intel HD 610 on the 4620 and in fact, is a significant upgrade on a GT 240. That may buy you a bit more time to upgrade the GPU and you'll already be on a Kaby Lake platform.
 
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Solution
turkey3_scratch

turkey3_scratch

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Good point about just using the iGPU, I didn't think of that!
 
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Iceman21

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For gaming I would upgrade the gpu first. 1050ti and g4560 will be a good combination after the cpu upgrade. For now your old i5 will limit your system, but still you should see significant improvement in gaming.

 
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DSzymborski

DSzymborski

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Yeah, hardly a great GPU or anything, but it may give him a little more space. It may come down to what the timeframe of upgrading the "other" thing he chooses and what other games played.
 
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geofelt

geofelt

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A perennial question.
Here is my stock approach.
It is important to test for YOUR type of games.
Some games are graphics limited like fast action shooters.
Others are cpu core speed limited like strategy, sims, and mmo.
Multiplayer with many participants tend to like many threads.

You need to find out which.
------------------------------------------------------------
To help clarify your CPU/GPU options, run these two tests:

a) Run YOUR games, but lower your resolution and eye candy.
If your FPS increases, it indicates that your cpu is strong enough to drive a better graphics configuration.
If your FPS stays the same, you are likely more cpu limited.

b) Limit your cpu, either by reducing the OC, or, in windows power management, limit the maximum cpu% to something like 70%.
Go to control panel/power options/change plan settings/change advanced power settings/processor power management/maximum processor state/
This will simulate what a lack of cpu power will do.
Conversely what a 30% improvement in core speed might do.

You should also experiment with removing one or more cores. You can do this in the windows msconfig boot advanced options option.
You will need to reboot for the change to take effect. Set the number of threads to less than you have.
This will tell you how sensitive your games are to the benefits of many threads.
If you see little difference, your game does not need all the threads you have.



It is possible that both tests are positive, indicating that you have a well balanced system,
and both cpu and gpu need to be upgraded to get better gaming FPS.
-------------------------------------------------------------
 
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kraelic

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Best to do all 4 pieces. GPU, CPU, motherboard, and 2400 MHz DDR4 ram. You can get the 1050TI for a huge improvement now and the card will move to the new CPU, motherboard, and RAM to maximize the potential of the 1050TI.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1G5awjzI0M

G4560 IGP gaming. I see no need to pay near I3 prices for 200 MHz and a slightly better IGP in the $100 4620 when on a super tight budget.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1304306-REG/intel_bx80677g4620_pentium_g4620_3_7_ghz.html

Got to look hard to find a G4560 at the $64 MSRP currently though =(
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1304308-REG/intel_bx80677g4560_pentium_g4560_3_5_ghz.html $75

The G4600 also has the HD630 and 100 MHz over and closer to the G4560's current vendor pricing. $85
https://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=G4600BOX

I3 7100 $115. HD 630, 400 MHz over G4650, and some encoding features that were cut on the Gs
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1304304-REG/intel_bx80677i37100_core_i3_7100_3_9_ghz.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yb1HYIsXM0 HD610 vs HD630

What speed is your DDR3? You can try overclocking the FSB to get the CPU to 4GHz, but the RAM speed increases with the FSB, have to adjust the multipliers as 160 FSB would run 1333 ram at 1600
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxDEw-0MhA0 P55 but similar to the H55
 
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Banjer_HD

Banjer_HD

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Thanks!
But I am in Europe so the prices are a lot different! In my country we have a site called tweakers and you can search for the lowest prices there, the lowest price for a G4560 was EUR66,55 ($75)

That was a lot of usefull information in that answer, thanks!
 
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Banjer_HD

Banjer_HD

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Thank you very much! this is how I am going to do it. :)
Very smart to go on the intergrated graphics!

 
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