Bad upgrade order

What are your current PC's specs.

if u upgrade ur video card now. even if it is a little limited by ur cpu, that will be sorted when u upgrade that later on anyway.

Antec Truepower 550w
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400 2.66 stock
AMD HD 4870 1 GB
4 Gigs of DDR3 1333 memory G-Skill Pi
windows 7 32-bit on a 160 gig 7200 SATA

already have a 64 gb SSD for which im gonna install 64 bit windows 7 ultimate. and i got hand me down 4x4 GBS of Corsair so i'll have 16gbs of RAM which i'm sure is totally unnecessary but its a hand me down and im not gonna complain about have a silly amount. I'd like to upgrade everything but I don't have enough money at the moment my max budget is like $300. I was waiting for the new 7000 series to come out next month but I'm no expert so i don't know if bottlenecking will be a problem with my current CPU or what i should do as far as upgrades other than what i already have.

thanks for any help or advice you have to offer

You system is still very good... if you need to reinstall the OS try to do a clean installation of the OS... after that install all the driver ... and try couple of GAME to see is the performance already increase.... Most people just want to overclock to have a fast system... but they forget how many junk program and software add on running on the background...

and you need to talk why you plan to this kind of upgarde .... is it because of you can not use Ultra Setting in most of the new game.... what is the problem you have to make you think you need to upgarde then we can know what the bottle neck is....

I would say if you want to play most game on Ultra Setting you need to upgarde the Video Card...

My plan is to install the new OS on the solid state drive im getting to get the most out of it then eventually wipe one of my other hard drives to put all my caching files on or whatnot, i have a few guides im reading about optimizing installing your OS on a SSD for the fastest speeds and loading times.

And im upgrading to run a few games at better framerates. Up untill end of last year ive had 0 problems with anything i threw at my 4870 but now regardless of quality setting im starting to notice lower framerates which bothers me. So being able to play higher quality at a better framerate is what I'm trying to achieve.

Chances are the cards I'm looking at are definitely overkill for what i want, the specs on the 7850 and 7870 look incredibly good and it's more than i need but, if i were to get one of those and then later on get a better mobo/cpu and probably a PSU if need be i'd be a planning for the future. When i built my current system i went with the 775 and the 4870 instead of getting a lower end 1150 and a slightly less GPU which was a pretty bad decesion IMO but.


TL;DR I want to get better framerate at higher quality for a handful of games, nothing that appears to be incredibly demanding but its stuff that my 4870 can't do 60 fps @ Max currently. I'm concerned my CPU might not be good enough if i upgrade my GPU but i have no idea.

Thanks for the help so far guys any other advice and help will be very helpful

Q9400 is no slouch for gaming, especially if you can overclock it a bit.

Unless you're going for super high-end GPUs (or crossfire/sli) you'll be just fine.

Ya it's been very good to me so far, i've had zero complaints. Sadly i'm not knowledgeable in overclocking, but I do have some guides and I know i just gotta take my time and step up my speeds in small increments and test. I did try once using some software that my motherboard provided for overclocking but things did NOT end well so, not gonna do that again. I have read that Q9400 can get up to 3.2ghz pretty comfortably but with 4 sticks of DDR3, a new GPU, i hope a 550w PSU is enough. Ive used some calculators and they all say i should be OK but i dunno how much it'll be with overclocking but i guess i'll need to look into it more.

And i'm not looking to buy a $500+ dollar card or SLI/crossfire but still right now i think my best options are waiting for the next 7000's to come out in march and see how those perform.. like ive mentioned the 7850 2gb looks real solid to me but i'll wait and see. Another option is to buy something current i could get a 6850 for close to $100, while it's not something better for the long run it be better with my current CPU? Not sure here.

If gaming is your priority (or maybe even only concern) then by far and away, the biggest baddest upgrade you can make it to your GPU. 2 of Tom's Hardware's recent articles should be read by you in their entirety --

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-fx-pentium-a...

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fx-4100-core-i3-210...

What you should take away from those articles is that your CPU is only a limiting factor in a select few games (the Star Craft 2's of the world), and in games like Battlefield 3 and Elder Scorlls IV, it doesn't matter if you have a Celeron or an i5 at 4 Ghz, you're only going to see your average FPS go up from 0-10 fps and your minimum hardly move at all. Meanwhile, an upgrade from a 4870 to 560 Ti would see an increase in the 20-30 fps range. With your current graphics card, i don't think too many games would see an appreciable increase in FPS from a CPU upgrade. They're sort of matched well.

All that being said -- what games are you underwhelmed with the performance with your current rig? I upgraded my PC from a Q6600 (2.4 Ghz quad core) and ATI 5770 to an i7-860 and GTX 560 for Battlefield 3, and I still can't get that game to run as smoothly as I'd like with everything on. It's an improvement, to be certain, but some games just hurt your and your computer's face.

Luckily Nothing i want is too demanding... like No metro 2033, BF3, Crysis.. i'm not looking for 60 fps on those bad boys.. right now my #1 concern is Tera Online, which i can currently run but not at max and not 60 fps.. which i would really like to be able to because that game runs on UE3 and looks amazing. Even some higher end gaming computers force AA to make it look even better. In an ideal world id love to be able to force some AA or something and still get 60 FPS stable during a fight but i am more than willing to settle for max in game settings @ 60. It's recommended specs are pretty low so, i just wanted to make sure that upgrading my GPU would be a worthwhile investment FIRST and that later on getting a better motherboard and CPU when i need to would be acceptable.

Other games i'd like to play at the higher settings and stable frame rates probably Skyrim. I would love to be able to play Skyrim maxed with mods and added visual effects. Other than those two major games, Diablo 3 and Guild Wars 2 when they come out.. and Borderlands 2 im going to preorder so. Lucikly i don't think any of those are too demanding on the CPU but i will read those articles wildside50 i just wanted some expert advice on my CPU in regards to upgrading and wether or not it was neccessary.

Looks like i'll stick to my plan and wait to see the reviews on the next 7000's next month and make a decesion then.

Wait, I am confused. I thought Tera wasn't out yet. Are you talking the beta? Then I would take your performance with somewhat of a grain of salt. It WILL improve upon release, and likely continue to improve through patches.

However, MMO's, by their very nature, are NOT very CPU intensive. I would be curious to have you load up your CTRL-SHIFT-ESC task manager and watch your CPU usage during play. I would venture to guess you hover around 50%. Unless you're pegging 90-100% during gameplay, you can rest assured your CPU is not the bottleneck, and again only a GPU upgrade would make any difference whatsoever.

Sounds good.  

Q9400 would easily get to 3.2ghz IMO. My Q9550 gets to 3.6ghz with zero voltage increases.

Overclocking is very simple once you learn the ropes. It gets even easier on today's CPUs as they have overclocked multipliers. It's a good skill to have.  

Well, now Skyrim is known to be very CPU intensive --

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2011/11/just-how-cpu-melting-i...

A little over half way down that page you'll see a section where, with a GTX 580, a very very fast card, there is quite a difference between an i7-2600k running at 2.0 ghz and one at 4.0 ghz. Most games would see no improvement from an i7-2600k at stock speeds and one overclocked to 4.0 ghz, but as you can see, Skyrim sees significant gains under those conditions.

That being said, we are talking about a $500 video card on a $400 CPU/Mobo combo to get 60+ fps with everything maxed in that game, so maybe lowering your expectations to match your budget is required in some games. For what it's worth, Diablo 3 will also probably be somewhat CPU dependent, but not nearly as much so as Skyrim or Starcraft 2, and Guild Wars 2 even less so. So with 3/4 of the games being almost entirely GPU bound, your best bet is still GPU.

ya like i said my plan in the future is to upgrade the whole system, skyrim ive actually been more than OK playing with medium/high settings getting about 40-55 FPS and no complaints. I just got some money and want to upgrade for better performence. Looks like i'll stick to getting the video card first and then upgrade to a better motherboard and CPU later!! currently i think my best bet is a i5-2500k but i'll have to see if that changes between now and probably sometime this summer. Thanks for all the helpful replies!

*edit and ya i was just saying it would be nice to have but it's not a goal of mine to be able to have 60 FPS maxed moded skyrim, just any improvement from my current state would be great. I'm even more concerned about stable frame rate then the maxed settings. but Tera is my #1 game im probably going to play so, Getting that looking best at the best rate is my goal! Thanks again!

As you will see in the link below, your cpu is still quite good!
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/gaming-cpu-review-overclo...
I would say another 4GB Ram, a new GPU and maybe an SSD if you can.
If its not a hassle, install Win 7 64Bit to get the most of your Ram.