Upgrade Path

[Epiccat]

I have recently (2/3months ago) completed my first system build. I chose a very cheap graphics card (EVGA GTX550ti bought for under £75) to keep the budget down and have now decided to start looking for and considering my upgrade paths. The currents specifications are as follows.

Motherboard:

CPU: Intel 2600k @3.4Ghz (looking to overclock in future to around 4.5-4.8ghz and obviously will need to get a decent heatsink for this. am thinking of getting Noctua C14 because of the tall RAM.

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 2x 4GB I noobishly went for the extra tall ones because they looked good (big mistake)

PSU:OCZ 650W

GPU: Evga GTX 550ti SC

SSD: Corsair Force 3 128gb

HDD: I have several normal HDD's all of varying size and age at the moment because the recent hike in prices prevented me from getting a single larger one.

I am thinking upgrade path of:

Graphics Card - CPU cooler/OC - HDD
I'm considering either a single Asus 1280MB GeForce GTX 570 DirectCU II NVIDIA Graphics Card or SLI 560's.

I normally play simulation games such as Flight Simulator however am also experimenting with BF3 and other FPS's.

Be gentle please guys, First post and first ever complete build.

 

[ariscov]

Simple suggestion - will you upgrade AGAIN later on? Then go for the 570. And pick up another when they drop in price. The CPU cooler s great. And hard drive I would DEFINITLY wait, But samesung spinpoints are the way to go :3 you MAY want to upgrade your PSU as well, or do it later, if you plan on getting SLI 570's.

Man, all these people with 580's and 570's.... Im still on crossfire 6850's haha

EDIT: You may even want to make your own water cooling circuit.

 

[jgutz2006]

I would personally go with the single 570 over the SLI'd 560's as with the single 570, at least you have the option to SLI that card down the road, I will always go with the single card over SLI.

How about the Radeon 6950 that can be unlocked to a 6970 which is superior to the 570?

Last SLI cards i had were Geforce 6800 GTX's and then 7800 GTX's and i remember disabling SLI frequently due to not being able to use all of my monitors when in SLI mode

 

[Epiccat]

@Ariscov I really like your Idea og the single 570 but which one to go for? If I go with the ASUS 1280MB GeForce GTX 570 DirectCU II is a triple slot and there for would put future SLI out of the question. Any suggestions?

I am kind of steering away form water cooling, It looks cool but something would go wrong if I tried to do it....

Also would a PSU swap be important or should the current one suffice its not like its being strained, wattage calculators suggest that it wont be reaching anywhere near capacity until I go for SLI 570's...


@jgutz2006 I value your opinion however I am really the kind of person that stick to one main brand and at heart I'm an Intel and Nvidia person. But i also value your point about the SLI performance and it certainly seems like SLI compatibility (games) is a little hit and miss.

Ok thank you guys, I still have a little while to wait till I shall be in a possition to make a purchase, and might wait to see if anyone else will cast a few votes.....

 

[jgutz2006]

I too am loyal to my brand of preference but switched to ATI and have the 5870 2gb Currently, I RMA'd an older 280GTX GPU and PNY sent me a 580GTX as replacement, though the 580 is more powerful, i chose to stick with my Radeon and was able to sell the 580 for $430 as i thought the $430 was more worthwhile in my bank when compared to how much of a boost i would've received from the upgrade. I'm going to be upgrading to a 7000 series Radeon soon.

So that said, I always thought of Nvidia at upgrade time automatically, regardless of what ATI had to offer, i'm so glad i decided to kick the tires as the card i have supports the eyefinity6 which i make use of all of the time

 

[ariscov]

Personally, NVIDIA beats the enthusiast market. Budget wise, AMD is the victor.

Anyway, just grab a 2 PCi slot card. Such as MSI Twin Frozr.

Get a new power supply for SLI's. Now or later is your choice.

Water cooling isnt nearly as dangerous as it seems, as I have put it in a couple PCs I've built (It's become a hobby as i sell them haha) but personally dont use one, as my air cooler runs just as fine. Just thought it would be a cool idea.