Is it worth it to upgrade parts in an 8 year old desktop?

May 29, 2018
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Hi, I have a Dell Inspiron 570 that is starting to slow down, even with CCleaner and all that. I think it is from 2010, running with the original parts in it. I have no idea what should be upgraded, and if it is worth it. Desktops do last a long time from my experience.

Parts I am considering upgrading:

SDD: 240GB Samsung EVO 860. That with a bracket is already $90. I'm not even sure the bracket will fit right in this tower. It has no SSD right now. Startup time is slow- I think I'll get that one.

HDD: To save $45, I'm not upgrading it, although I have no idea if this one will last. I still have the original 500GB HDD in there. Nowadays it's the same price as 1TB on Amazon, but we only use about 150GB. But would it stop working any time soon?

Backup HDD: We don't have one. Seems to be about $100 for a 3TB (It'll be used with the network router for other PCs along with this one)

RAM: It has 4 slots, which all have a 1GB card in it. It can take up to 8GB of RAM and currently has 4GB. To upgrade that to 6GB is $42, and 8GB would be double- $84 (Using Crucial). There aren't huge slowdowns with Chrome or anything unless lots of tabs are open. We also use Outlook 2010. Is it worth it to upgrade the RAM at all?

All of that together is $274, or $232 if I get 6GB of RAM instead of 8. That's without a new HDD. That's pretty close to a new computer's price...So what should I be upgrading? I am trying to keep the cost down, especially if the motherboard might just decide to, well, die.

Sorry for the long post, and thanks in advance.
 
Solution
Not worth putting any money into it.

Maybe an SSD (Can move it to another PC later), but other than that no way.


Better to put the money toward a new PC.



May 29, 2018
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AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core, and I have no idea what the motherboard model is. Whatever came with the Inspiron 570.
Here is a link to the specs on CNET, if you'd like: https://www.cnet.com/products/dell-inspiron-570/specs/

We tend to use computers till they die :) I think in essence the question is, is 4GB of RAM enough in 2018 for a regular user and is an SSD enough to make it fast again. I want to keep the computer, but I don't want to waste too much money on it. So I can't tell what is worth it or not.
 


Yikes, that is an old system... and wasn't exactly a powerhouse in its day.

4GB of RAM is just fine for a system of that age. Even if you added more you wouldn't see a marked increase in performance.

An SSD is an ok upgrade for a system like that. It will greatly increase boot times at the very least. Though, I doubt you'll see much performance increase from day to day tasks. The CPU will really hold you back in just about everything you will be doing.

Basically, the slowest computer you can find on the market today will take this PC's lunch money and give it a swirly, before sending it on stage in its underwear in front of the whole school. Honestly I can't think of an upgrade that will really help your PC as far as day to day tasks are concerned.
 
the only thing i could see getting for it is maybe an SSD drive but its hard to tell if you would get any of the advantages of an SSD drive because of the age of the system. i think a RAM upgrade would be out because most computers that age maxed out at 4GB of ram.

but really its not worth it to put any more money into that PC and just get a new one. a cheap chromebook would run circles around your desktop when it comes to performance
 
May 29, 2018
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I'm not buying a new desktop, not yet. It may be low-end but it is pretty solid for a normal user. I've seen those slow $200 laptops, they can barely turn on. So the answer is that I should not bother with upgrading the RAM, since it won't improve it's performance so much? Just get an SSD?

The good thing about getting an SSD is that I can use it in a new PC after this one dies.
 
May 29, 2018
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This PC maxes out at 8 GB of RAM. Still not worth it to upgrade the RAM, though? Would it make much of a difference?
 


depends on how much you do at once but doubling you ran would show some but little improvement. there really isn't anything you can do to that PC to get a noticeable improvement in performance

as for your take on chromebooks, i bought someone an asus chromebook as a gift a few months ago and we haven't seen any slowdown whatsoever from it and this one is the version with a rockchip CPU in it



 

DSzymborski

Titan
Moderator
Yup, don't put any more money into it except *maybe* an SSD. $274 would a large percentage of the way to a new desktop that would destroy this one, which was a budget PC at the time.

If you wanted to incrementally upgrade this PC, 2012 or 2013 is when it would have made some sense to start. In 2018, it's way too many generations behind to get much of a benefit.
 
May 29, 2018
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Chromebooks are good, I'm using one right now. The desktop, though, is necessary since we need programs that only work with Windows. If the performance improvement is so small from RAM upgrades, I guess I won't bother with that.

It uses 2.7 out of 3.7GB normally, by the way,
 
If you think you have to pay a lot for performance I'd like to argue that point. I was just over looking at what your money could get you for a modern PC and came across this little tower https://www.bestbuy.com/site/hp-pavilion-desktop-amd-ryzen-3-series-4gb-memory-1tb-hard-drive-hp-finish-in-natural-silver/6253600.p?skuId=6253600

This thing surprised the heck out of me. The CPU is something I've recommended for modern entry level gaming computers. It is plenty fast for anything you want to do. It has a spacious hard drive as well. It has 4 GB of RAM, but as we've indicated 4 GB is enough, plus upgrading this RAM would actually benefit you. It also has wireless networking built in, and in a bizarre twist it includes a DVD drive... which isn't normal these days. If you were looking at $270 worth of upgrades you are already most of the way to the full price of this system.

Just a suggestion though. I know you said you weren't looking at a new system but I figured another option wouldn't hurt. There are a few good PCs to be found in the $400 to $500 range... there just happen to be a lot of junk systems in that price range too, so it is hard to shop in.
 
May 29, 2018
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Thanks! I hope when the time comes when we buy a new desktop, they'll have a new version of that. For now, I'm just going to buy a 250GB SSD, and hope that the existing HDD will survive a few more years.
The RAM seems to be OK, with 2.7GB out of 3.7GB being used on average.
 


that's the problem with brand name PC's. to keep costs down they skimp on features, use low quality parts, and make the hardware so restrictive giving them very limited options for upgrades.

 

Ed Chombeau

Honorable
Mar 20, 2013
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I had an 7 year old HP Desktop; it was near top of the line for it's day. But Dell is selling their top line XPS's with all the umph you need for around $1,000. No hastle, out of the box--runs fast and cool and quite with an 8th gen i5, a GTX1050ti, 512 SSD, and 16 gigs of RAM.-----This is way better than any mods you can do for under a thousand bucks.