Pals, please help me choosing an upgrade for my CPU

[saib1]

hey friends, i got an oct 2009 custom made PC & its configurations are-

1. AMD Phenom II x2 550 B.E 3.10 Ghz Processor
2. Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-US2H Motherboard
3. 4 GB (2x2) Kingston DDR2 800Mhz RAM
4. 1 TB Western Digital Hard Drive
5. MSI Radeon HD4890 OC Edition 1GB Graphics Card @880/3996 mhz clock
6. CoolerMaster Exterme Power Plus 650W PSU
7. CoolerMaster Elite 334

i recently installed The Witcher 2, Saints ROW 3, Battlefield 3 & now NFS the Run, & except Saints Row 3, none of them is running smoothly on high, had to reduce the display settings to medium, resolution to 1600x900 to make them run smoother, the worst dissapointings are BF3 & NFS the Run which isnt going above 20 FPS even on lowest settings especially The Run @15-20FPS that really blowed my mind off & made me realised that now its time to spend for some new upgradation.. .. Basically i know that have to upgrade both Processor & Graphics card but right now i can only save for a new processor which will be AMD Phenom II x6 1100T 3.3Ghz. So will it be sufficient if i only upgrade my processor & not the graphics card at this time to make new & upcoming games to run on mid-high settings? please friend leave your valuable replies as soon as possible.
thanks in advance

 

[JRock247]

When it comes to gaming, the GPU is the most important. If you want to run your games at better FPS, upgrade your GPU 1st then your CPU. The reason your games are bottling, is because of your GPU and not your CPU. Offcourse your CPU will have an affect on games but your GPU has more!

 

[sosofm]

Better your GPU first. In that price range you can buy a good video card for your monitor resolution. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102908

 

[hang-the-9]

Better your GPU first. In that price range you can buy a good video card for your monitor resolution. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102908

He's already has a Radeon 4890 that's a pretty good card, but the Phenom is not a great gaming CPU. Video card is better than the CPU in your case.

Get a faster Phenom x4 or x6 or swap to an Intel i5 or i7. The video card is OK, CPU and maybe RAM are your issue here.

 

[saib1]

well mine is MSI Radeon HD4890 OC Edition 1GB Graphics Card @880/3996 mhz clock which is right now faster in benchmarking than radeon HD 5830.. & my processor is Dual Core which strike my mind to change my CPU at this point of time, so thats why i am a bit confused. so please help me with that with your advices.

 

[hang-the-9]

well mine is MSI Radeon HD4890 OC Edition 1GB Graphics Card @880/3996 mhz clock which is right now faster in benchmarking than radeon HD 5830.. & my processor is Dual Core which strike my mind to change my CPU at this point of time, so thats why i am a bit confused. so please help me with that with your advices.

Just because you have a dual core CPU does not mean anything. I am about to buy a phone with a dual core cpu, not about to play high-end games on it though.

 

[saib1]

Just because you have a dual core CPU does not mean anything. I am about to buy a phone with a dual core cpu, not about to play high-end games on it though.

because most of the games like on my pc like- witcher 2, saint row 2 get drops in a framerate even after having my GPU fulfilled just because they got bigger areas in-game to process & they do get processed smooth only if you got a good processor like quad core or more than that & mine is a dual core with high cache but its still a DUAL CORE, so i this logic of processing applies regarding BF3 & NFS The Run also because the Frostbite 2 engine got really big in-game area to process..so thats why my doubt of upgradation between Processor & Graphics Card arised.. correct me friends..

 

[Brett928S2]

Hi

The 4 series is NOT considered a good graphics card these days.... spend on a good card first, you will see most improvement from that rather than CPU...

All the best Brett

 

[esrever]

your cpu should be fine but a quad core is probably best.

A lot of games don't even use more than 2 cores even today. Some will use more but most don't use more. 4 cores is a lot of headroom and 6 core is overkill for gaming.

 

[jockey]

You could try unlocking the 555 to an X4.
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/258573-29-black-edition-overclock-guide-raising-multiplier

 

[fliptem]

you might be able to unlock the other 2 cores on that CPU if you had a motherboard that had the core unlocking feature.

You could get a current DDR3 board that you could try to unlock the cpu cores and get the best ddr3 memory you cpu can handle. There's no guarantee though. And if you went this way, you could easily go with and intel setup.

 

[saib1]

well, at this time i can only upgrade either my CPU or my Graphics Cards & both will be costing at the same price as one another (AMD Phenom II X6 1100T= Geforce 560GTX= Rs.10000/- (Indian Rupee)) so right now i got only 1 choice to make out of these two, & at every website like game-debate.com, i am getting 8 on 10 score on GPU & only 5 out of 10 on CPU on "NFS The Run system requirement meter" & after looking at that, i turn my side more towards upgrading Processor 1st & got so much confused..:\..!!

 

[JRock247]

Good points made guys.

Cheap option, would be to unlock cores to an x4 and just upgrade your GPU BUT your are still using DDR2 and not DDR3, so purhaps unlock and buy new m/board and RAM and GPU. Sorry guys but still think he needs to upgrade GPU, specially for BF2 with good FPS.

 

[saib1]

Good points made guys.

Cheap option, would be to unlock cores to an x4 and just upgrade your GPU BUT your are still using DDR2 and not DDR3, so purhaps unlock and buy new m/board and RAM and GPU. Sorry guys but still think he needs to upgrade GPU, specially for BF2 with good FPS.

how much is the performance difference between DDR2 & DDR3.. is it HUGE or just a bit? i have heard that its not that much to worry about, & like i said, i will do every upgrade (RAM, Motherboard blahh blahh) but later on.. so thats y i m emphasizing more on CPU & GPU at this time & that also either of those one's.

 

[JRock247]

DDR3 offers faster speeds, which offers more bandwidth for your CPU, thus giving better CPU performance. DDR3 also runs at lower voltages than both DDR and DDR2. I think DDR3 is cheaper as well.

 

[saib1]

Just because you have a dual core CPU does not mean anything. I am about to buy a phone with a dual core cpu, not about to play high-end games on it though.

hey, just now i had run the "System Requirement Test" for NFS The Run on gamedebate.com, & interesting CPU, GPU & RAM rating out of 10 with respect to NFS The Run showed up-

Rating with my Dual-Core Processor i.e- AMD Phenom II x2 550 3.1 Ghz keeping the GPU & RAM same as the exiting one's-

Rating with the Six-Core Processor i.e- AMD Phenom II x6 1100T 3.3 Ghz Keeping the GPU & RAM same as the existing one's-

so see these results & rating & then give your valuable suggestion that finally should i upgrade Processor or GPU 1st.?

 

[JRock247]

Your spec will run NFS The Run easily but with medium settings/low resolution. If you want high settings/resolution with good fps, then your gonna need to upgrade, specially for BF3 on high. Start with the GPU and then CPU, you can always overclock your CPU for the meantime, just ensure you have good cooling. I had the same CPU and reached 3.9GHz easy.

 

[hang-the-9]

If those stars go higher is better.. as you can see the video card is an 8. Your current CPU is a 5, the new X6 is an 9. Kinda easy to see where the upgrade is. Like I said card is OK, CPU could use work

 

[saib1]

Your spec will run NFS The Run easily but with medium settings/low resolution. If you want high settings/resolution with good fps, then your gonna need to upgrade, specially for BF3 on high. Start with the GPU and then CPU, you can always overclock your CPU for the meantime, just ensure you have good cooling. I had the same CPU and reached 3.9GHz easy.

bro, if u could check my 1st post on this page, you will that i have wrote "So will it be sufficient if i only upgrade my processor & not the graphics card at this time to make new & upcoming games to run on mid-high settings?" thats my main question right now because at this i am running BF3 at mid & the Run at lower setting, so will upgrading the CPU to 6-cores one's can run these games on medium-high setting till the time i upgrade my GPU..? thats my main question of dilemma right now bro..!!

 

[saib1]

If those stars go higher is better.. as you can see the video card is an 8. Your current CPU is a 5, the new X6 is an 9. Kinda easy to see where the upgrade is. Like I said card is OK, CPU could use work

yea bro.. read my post just below your last one..you will get a clear idea about my concern....!

 

[hang-the-9]

To run "any" game at over mid, at your resolutions you will need to upgrade both CPU and GPU by a bit. But your GPU right now is over your CPU, an upgrade to a CPU will help you more now than a GPU upgrade, now to see an increase in frame and maybe enable you to up the detail level. But you can't get past medium settings on high resolutions on new games without a bit of a bump in the video card even after a CPU upgrade.

The issue is that some game engines like a fast CPU, some like a fast GPU, some need top in both. Hard to make a call. If you want faster over-all, new CPU and new GPU. For something that will help with many things now, CPU will be better than a GPU.

 

[saib1]

To run "any" game at over mid, at your resolutions you will need to upgrade both CPU and GPU by a bit. But your GPU right now is over your CPU, an upgrade to a CPU will help you more now than a GPU upgrade, now to see an increase in frame and maybe enable you to up the detail level. But you can't get past medium settings on high resolutions on new games without a bit of a bump in the video card even after a CPU upgrade.

The issue is that some game engines like a fast CPU, some like a fast GPU, some need top in both. Hard to make a call. If you want faster over-all, new CPU and new GPU. For something that will help with many things now, CPU will be better than a GPU.

yep i will upgrade my current GPU with Geforce GTX 560 later after few months because i know that my existing GPU has now started to get old but my CPU have already became much OLDER than my GPU, so for now ill go for a CPU upgradation & after few month of giving my dad a sigh of relief..ill upgrade my GPU also.. .. will it be good..?
i can't be able to upgrade both of them at the same time because in September i bought a Samsung Galaxy S2 which costed me hell lot..so if i bothered my dad with a bulk expense..he'll kick me out of the home..so i m talkin careful steps & planning to upgrade in parts.. .. so hang-the-9 bro.. how's my planning according to you?

 

[hang-the-9]

Sounds good to me, although in a few months, you may have better options than the 560. Or maybe get a second identical 4890 to run in crossfire, you'll probably get much better results than upgrading to a 560 from that.

 

[saib1]

Sounds good to me, although in a few months, you may have better options than the 560. Or maybe get a second identical 4890 to run in crossfire, you'll probably get much better results than upgrading to a 560 from that.

yeaa bro.. you are right, that after few months, more higher series will be available at cheaper prices, so now finally taking a safer step, i will going to choose this x6 processor 1st.. thanx a ton bro.. you exactly thought in the same way i did before i started posting this..again thanx for your valuable time & suggestions. i'll definitely goin to bothering you in future also regarding my upgradations & all if u don't mind about that.. .. take care bro, god bless you..

 

[icantw82makeadatum]

6 cores does nothing for gaming you could save a little and get better performance with an phenom II X4 BE with a good heat sink so you can overclock it (X4 and X6 have nearly identical gaming performance and costs like $70 less). So I would recommend either getting an X4 like this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103894 or getting a new motherboard and ram and bumping up to an i5 2500k as Intel is leagues ahead of amd when it comes to gaming processors