Upgrade from AMD Athlon II X3 445?

Forum CPU & Components : CPUs Upgrade from AMD Athlon II X3 445?

Now that Bulldozer is out and definitely will not work with my motherboard (870 chipset), I am unsure of what to do as far as upgrading goes.

I have the following system:

CPU: AMD Athlon II X3 445 (core 4 did not unlocked) not overclocked currently
GPU: Nvidia GTX 460 OC'ed
RAM: Cosair 4 GB DDR3-1333
Motherboard: Asus M4A87TD/USB3 AM3 slot
PS: XTX 650 watt

I thus far have not been pushing my system with Call of Duty Black Ops and a few other games, but with Skyrim and Battlefield 3 coming out, I think thatll change.

What would you all do in with this? Upgrade to a Phenom II 955 (and overclock) or upgrade the MB/CPU to an I5 2500k set?
I don't care about running games at the absolute max settings, but I do like them to run smoothly at at least high settings. Any advice?

Reply to vash1012

for money's sake, take the 955BE. If you really dont care about maxing out settings, that is the best choice. I run it now, and its OC'd to 4.12Ghz...plenty for your gpu and then some.

However, if money is no issue, and you are really wanting a great system, the i5 is the better choice, as later you will only need to upgrade your gpu for games in about 2-5 years.

------------------------------ - Cooler Master HAF X
- Corsair HX750W
- ASUS Sabertooth 990FX
- Phenom IIx4 955BE
Reply to casualbuilder

i5 2500k MB/CPU combo certainly is costly and better.
That's all depend in how much money u have.

I would recommend u to purchase another GTX 460 and SLI, but I don't know if ur mobo would SLI.
AND there's another thing, SLI usually is very demanding from CPU to keep the data to vga flowing, I think ur cpu would be a massive bottleneck in a sli setup.

Actually I'm running bf3 beta with my signature machine. And usually bf3 lags in 1680x1050 with max graphics. Maybe its beta faulty, or this game really is taxing, dont really know.

Saying this I would recommend AT LEAST to run in high config a CPU and VGA upgrade.

------------------------------ Core i7 2600k, Asus P8Z68 Deluxe, 16GB Patriot DDR3, 2TB HD , SLI GTX 460 1GB, XFX 750W BE, 3D Vision, CM 690 II Advanced
Reply to vitornob

955BE with an OC to around 4.0GHz would handle 2 460's in sli. but, you would be limited to a single GTX580 at best, and probably have the cpu bottleneck it.

Like Vitornob said, the i5 is your best best, but if you aren't worried about max graphics, the 955BE would suit you plenty.

Skyrim will play on that 460 easy with an OC on both GPU and CPU.

------------------------------ - Cooler Master HAF X
- Corsair HX750W
- ASUS Sabertooth 990FX
- Phenom IIx4 955BE
Reply to casualbuilder

The AMD Phenom II X4 970 Black Edition Deneb 3.5GHz is $130 with a promo code for the next week or so.

If you want to spend some more $$$, instead of the 2500k + mobo I'd dump the GTX460 for an MSI R6950 Twin Frozr III PE/OC Radeon HD 6950 2GB and tweak that mutha up to GTX580 territory...

Reply to Wisecracker

If I was gonna do SLI, I would need a new MB. I think the 870 chipset can only do a 2nd card in PCI-E 4x and I honestly don't remember if this MB is SLI capable anyway. I think it might only be crossfire capable. So if that was the route I'd like to go, I'd probably go ahead and get the I5. I think ill go the Phenom II route. That should last me another year or two on this GPU and maybe more if I upgrade the card. Thanks guys!

Reply to vash1012

870 does not do sli...as only some 890's and 900 series mobos have this. Second, if you are going to ditch the 460, do not do not do NOT go to AMD, as they do not support physX. Build a gaming pc with gaming pc preferred parts. dont skimp on your GPU.

------------------------------ - Cooler Master HAF X
- Corsair HX750W
- ASUS Sabertooth 990FX
- Phenom IIx4 955BE
Reply to casualbuilder

I don't believe any of the games the OP cited utilize PhysX

Reply to Wisecracker

nope, these games dont. Anyways heres my suggestions.

1. Don't upgrade anything till you actually get the games and play with them for a bit.
2. If performance is lacking or you don't feel that your PC is up to par then try to unlock your CPU to get the 4th core and overclock to 3.2ghz alongside a healthy overclock of your gtx 460 to ~900mhz core speed.
3. If you still don't get the performance you want then get a Phenom II X4 955be, upgrade your gtx 460 to a 570.

^ +1

Great suggestions lilotimz. Before you spend money, try to play with what you have. If money is an issue though after you realize performance is lacking, you should upgrade your 460 to a 570 first, then the cpu. a triple core, especially if OC'd or even unlocked to a quad core should have enough "umph" to get you as far as you need to go cpu wise for games.

------------------------------ - Cooler Master HAF X
- Corsair HX750W
- ASUS Sabertooth 990FX
- Phenom IIx4 955BE
Reply to casualbuilder

Ask the community Add a reply

Related content

See all topics related to "Upgrade from AMD Athlon II X3 445?"

Tom's Hardware > Forum > CPU & Components > CPUs > Upgrade from AMD Athlon II X3 445?

Go to:

Help |
Forum rules

There are 1994 identified and unidentified users. To see the list of identified users, Click here.

Page generated in 0.420 seconds

Please mind

You are about to answer a thread that has been inactive for more than 6 months.
If you still wish to proceed, please ensure that your posting is original and does not duplicate or overlap any prior responses to this thread.

Add a reply Cancel