Upgrade HP p6754y

[dmwhiteman]

A friend of mine bought an HP p6754y to play games on. It was a fail haha. He is now looking at what to upgrade in order to play games on a higher setting than Ultra Low. He already upgraded the video card which helped a little.

His system is as follows

CPU: AMD Athlon II X4 640
RAM: 4 gigs
GFX: ATI Radeon HD 5450


Windows 7 64bit

We are thinking that the CPU could be upgraded, but after looking at charts on here it is only the tier below what I use (AMD 955 Black Edition) and I can run most games on high settings. So now we are unsure what the next step to take is. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[k1114]

The issue is the graphics card, it's just too weak to game on. The graphics card is the main part of a gaming pc as it's the graphics card handling the graphics. As well as the cpu hierarchy chart, there is a gpu hierarchy chart. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fastest-graphics-card-radeon-geforce,3067-7.html As you can see the 5450 is only 1 tier above the integrated that came with the computer, so he wasted money for not much of an upgrade. The cpu is plenty power for a decent gaming rig. You will need to upgrade the psu for any gpu upgrade as that stock 250w is just not enough. I would suggest a 6870 with a 450w psu but what is your budget?

 

[dmwhiteman]

Thanks. I told him in the beginning that the card he choose wouldnt be enough haha. Broke the news to him that he should spend about $200 if he wants improvements. He was not to delighted haha. Thanks for your help!

edit: His budget was what he spent on the HP and the card. Rushed into things instead of waiting and saving a bit. And he is very against ordering online, so instead went to Best Buy. He will learn haha