Hello - I would love some advice from the hardware experts out there regarding how best to upgrade my home-built, though not terribly high end PC. I built this roughly two years as a low end media PC and have since started using it for gaming, primarily World of Warcraft. It works fine but I'm really only seeing framerates in the 20fps range ... so I'd like to upgrade.
Here's what's currently inside:
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA78GM-S2HP AM2+/AM2 AMD 780G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5000+, 2600 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
Video Card: HIS Radeon HD 4650 1 GB DDR3 HDMI DL-DVI (HDCP) AGP Video Card Retail
RAM: 8GB 240-pin DIMM
HD: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5"
Case/PS: Antec Sonata III 500 Black 0.8mm cold rolled steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 500W Power Supply
OS: Win7 64-bit
I'm hoping it just might be a matter of upgrading to a beefier video card, but I'm curious if a better processor or motherboard is called for.
Any thoughts on what my upgrade path might be here? If there are any relevant bits of information I'm missing please do let me know and I'll do my best to fill in the gaps.
Happy holidays!
Here's what's currently inside:
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA78GM-S2HP AM2+/AM2 AMD 780G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5000+, 2600 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
Video Card: HIS Radeon HD 4650 1 GB DDR3 HDMI DL-DVI (HDCP) AGP Video Card Retail
RAM: 8GB 240-pin DIMM
HD: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5"
Case/PS: Antec Sonata III 500 Black 0.8mm cold rolled steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 500W Power Supply
OS: Win7 64-bit
I'm hoping it just might be a matter of upgrading to a beefier video card, but I'm curious if a better processor or motherboard is called for.
Any thoughts on what my upgrade path might be here? If there are any relevant bits of information I'm missing please do let me know and I'll do my best to fill in the gaps.
Happy holidays!