Considering an Upgrade to my PC

ErvinBoyes · Jun 4, 2018

The short version:

I probably need to upgrade my RAM for my workstation. Do I get more DDR3? Do I get 16 or 32gb? Do I switch to DDR4 and buy a better CPU with it. I need my pc to be good in the long run

Long version:

Context
I'm a 17 year old student in my first year of secondary school, or high school. I'm planning to go to University for graphic design in the future, and pursue a career in this field. However, I do want to be able expand my horizons. I want to be able to edit videos, which right now my PC is awful for. Premiere just lags so bad and I'm only editing 1080p video. It's only really a problem when I try using the media browser, it almost crashes, and sometimes does, when its trying to load files. It does use a lot of RAM, but not completely 100%. It's been a while since I've tried After Effects but I still remember render times taking quite a while just to be able to preview it. Even my illustrator and photoshop files lag when I have very heavy projects, not to the point where its unusable though I'd say it's enough to put me off doing work sometimes, which is a problem. I'm using the latest version of all the adobe products. I also want to be able to try web design and perhaps maybe in the future some 3D modelling. I fear my current PC might not be good enough for this. Games also seem to run a little slower compared to benchmarks on YouTube, but maybe it's just background processes. Games are still completely playable though, for the most part. Incase it matters, all my drivers are up to date, and my temps are fine. I don't believe I have any faulty hardware: I have ran tests for the RAM and hard drives, and they were fine. Also my PC is completely free from dust as I just cleaned it.

Problem
It seems like my RAM is the problem, so do I upgrade my ddr3? My current RAM is not sold anymore so I'd have to buy a completely new set of RAM. Do I get 32gb or 16gb? Do I get a new motherboard and CPU just to be able to get DDR4 (which I wouldn't mind)? Is it even my RAM? My main goal is to have a computer that will be relatively high end for years to come, without the need for constant upgrades, and I'm afraid that keeping DDR3 will just lead to me upgrading more in the future. But then again, the cost of a new CPU and motherboard is very high, and I'm not sure if its worth it. If I do upgrade my CPU what would be best in the long run? a 6 or 8 core i7, or Ryzen? I'd be willing to spend around £1000 to upgrade my PC if it's not good enough. It will take some saving up for but I believe it will be very beneficial in the future, and especially in the long term.
That being said, would it be better to buy a laptop like the XPS 15? I'm scared to upgrade my laptop because amazon reviews seem to always have so many horror stories about not being fast or just breaking within a couple of months. I do have an ok laptop right now (it has a 2.5 ghz i5 with 6gb of RAM), and I feel like it would be better to just use that for light work, and then use my PC at home for heavy stuff, seeing as PC's are much better value, but feel free to tell me if you think otherwise. Any help is appreciated, Thanks a lot.

CPU: Stock i7 4790k cooled by a Dark Rock Pro 3 BK019
GPU: MSI gtx 970
RAM: 8gb G.skill 2133mhz
PSU: corsair cx750m
MOBO: MSI Z87-G45
Cooling: 4 120mm fans
Case: Corsair 230t
Storage: 1x 2tb WD blue (OS, games, downloads etc), 1x 120gb Kingston SSD (some games, adobe programmes), 1x crucial 256gb SSD (some games, adobe programmes, fl studio, projects, samples and plugins, etc)
OS: Windows 8.1 64 bit
Monitor: 34inch 1080p lg 21:9

King_V · Jun 4, 2018

You may be able to do this with different DDR3 RAM that has the exact same timings as your existing RAM. Ideally, it'll work fine in dual-channel mode.

Possibly, it'll work only in single channel mode. Possibly the RAM will drop down to a lower speed.

Possibly as well, they won't play nicely together at all.

I've only tried this once on an OEM desktop system, and was lucky in that the different brands of RAM just happened to work well together, keeping the timings and speed.

ErvinBoyes · Jun 4, 2018

King_V :

I've tried looking for some and I didn't have much luck, I might not have searched enough though. That being said, I'd prefer not to risk it.

justin.m.beauvais · Jun 4, 2018

So, for video editing you definitely want to have more RAM, and maybe more processor cores. The rest of your system is fine and any upgrades should really just be CPU, motherboard, and RAM, with the possibility of a video card.

I beleive that the 4790K is plenty fast for video editing and the 8 threads are what I'd consider a minimum. So, you are going to want to get more RAM. 16 GB should be your minimum for short 1080p videos up to maybe 1 hr. Anything longer and you're going to want to go for 32 GB. If you decide to start doing 4K editing you may as well cut that time to a quarter of that hour because that is all you'll be able to keep in memory. That is a good setup for anything but 3D modeling.

If you want to get into 3d modeling you are going to need some upgrades. Either a Ryzen 5 or 7, or an 8th gen i5 or i7. You are also going to want to change your video card as the consumer NVidia cards are pretty horrible at 3d modeling. You are going to want to go with something AMD (RX 580 or Vega) or a Quadro.

Your ideal midrange PC that can game, video edit, and 3d model is going to be a Ryzen 5 2600x or Core i5 8600k, with 16 to 32 GB of DDR 3200, and an RX 580 or Quadro P2000.

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/fqzKq4
This upgrade is close to your budget, but you can adjust it in a number of ways. That said, it will solidly chew through anything you need it to. If you wanted to scale it back I'd go with this build:
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/V2scxG
It swaps out for the AMD alternative video card and while it won't give you quite the 3d rendering performance, it will perform solidly in all tasks. It also gives you the headroom to throw in another kit of RAM for 32 GB if you wanted to do that to make it a more robust video editing machine.

Now, if you wanted to just upgrade for video editing and 3d modeling is something you wouldn't mind putting off, go for the Ryzen 2600X, drop the video card upgrade, double up on the RAM (up to 32GB), and you'll have a video editing beast.

Hope that helps.

Afterthought, why is your OS on the 2 TB drive? You'd see much better performance if it was on one of the SSDs.

vapour · Jun 4, 2018

heavy work on Laptop is not recommended due to less ventilation = aging faster...
I will suggest an entire new platform for your tasks, sell what you have atm (you may keep storage if you want to) and I will get something like this:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 7 2700X 3.7GHz 8-Core Processor (£272.39 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: MSI - X470 GAMING PLUS ATX AM4 Motherboard (£119.98 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory (£170.87 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Samsung - 860 Evo 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£102.00 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: MSI - GeForce GTX 1060 6GB 6GB 6GT OC Video Card (£245.47 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case: NZXT - S340 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£55.19 @ Aria PC)
Power Supply: Corsair - TXM Gold 550W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (£69.06 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £1034.96
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-06-04 19:51 BST+0100

If extra money, get 32 gb ram and maybe GTX 1070.

ErvinBoyes · Jun 4, 2018

justin.m.beauvais :

So, for video editing you definitely want to have more RAM, and maybe more processor cores. The rest of your system is fine and any upgrades should really just be CPU, motherboard, and RAM, with the possibility of a video card.

I beleive that the 4790K is plenty fast for video editing and the 8 threads are what I'd consider a minimum. So, you are going to want to get more RAM. 16 GB should be your minimum for short 1080p videos up to maybe 1 hr. Anything longer and you're going to want to go for 32 GB. If you decide to start doing 4K editing you may as well cut that time to a quarter of that hour because that is all you'll be able to keep in memory. That is a good setup for anything but 3D modeling.

If you want to get into 3d modeling you are going to need some upgrades. Either a Ryzen 5 or 7, or an 8th gen i5 or i7. You are also going to want to change your video card as the consumer NVidia cards are pretty horrible at 3d modeling. You are going to want to go with something AMD (RX 580 or Vega) or a Quadro.

Your ideal midrange PC that can game, video edit, and 3d model is going to be a Ryzen 5 2600x or Core i5 8600k, with 16 to 32 GB of DDR 3200, and an RX 580 or Quadro P2000.

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/fqzKq4
This upgrade is close to your budget, but you can adjust it in a number of ways. That said, it will solidly chew through anything you need it to. If you wanted to scale it back I'd go with this build:
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/V2scxG
It swaps out for the AMD alternative video card and while it won't give you quite the 3d rendering performance, it will perform solidly in all tasks. It also gives you the headroom to throw in another kit of RAM for 32 GB if you wanted to do that to make it a more robust video editing machine.

Now, if you wanted to just upgrade for video editing and 3d modeling is something you wouldn't mind putting off, go for the Ryzen 2600X, drop the video card upgrade, double up on the RAM (up to 32GB), and you'll have a video editing beast.

Hope that helps.

Afterthought, why is your OS on the 2 TB drive? You'd see much better performance if it was on one of the SSDs.

Thanks a lot for the reply, I'll do some research based on what you've said. To answer your question, Just lazyness, and the fact that my SSD's used to act up on an old version of windows, so I had to have it on my main hard drive. Now they're safe though, so thanks for reminding me to do that

ErvinBoyes · Jun 4, 2018

vapour :

Thank you. Is there any point in switching my power supply and graphics card though? My 970 is just a little bit worse than a 1060 I think, and my PSU is better than that. My parts aren't old either. The rest is useful though thank you

vapour · Jun 4, 2018

ErvinBoyes :

You can keep 970 if you want to, on par with 1060. For PSU, green labeled CX750M is not that reliable and I will not save money on a new psu for new parts. I am just providing a new build in case you need to sell the old pc as a whole. If not, you can reuse GPU and storage or even case if you want to. Point is 8 core 16 threads and OC to ~4.2GHz will be much faster than 4790k in video editing.

ErvinBoyes · Jun 4, 2018

vapour :

ErvinBoyes :

You can keep 970 if you want to, on par with 1060. For PSU, green labeled CX750M is not that reliable and I will not save money on a new psu for new parts. I am just providing a new build in case you need to sell the old pc as a whole. If not, you can reuse GPU and storage or even case if you want to. Point is 8 core 16 threads and OC to ~4.2GHz will be much faster than 4790k in video editing.

Ah right, thank you for clarifying that

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