e3lndon

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I am currently looking to upgrade both my CPU and GPU on a budget of £400-500 for both.

Is there anything within that price range which will last the next 2-3 years?

Right now my CPU is an AMD Athlon II X3 440 and my GPU is a GT 430.

I am beginning to feel the need to upgrade these, I mainly need to upgrade for both gaming and video editing. With my current setup I can play most games (not on highest quality though), however my render time on video editing is far longer than I'd like it to be.

I would appreciate any advice on what to spend my money on.

Thank you in advance.
 

wr6133

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Your entire specs would be helpful if your board accepts it a Phenom II along with a new GPU is a cost effective way to gain some performance.

However on £500 assuming you have enough RAM and a decent PSU etc I would get a z68 or z77 motherboard, an i5 2500k (or IB equivalent) and a GTX670... should weigh in around £500 maybe a smidge over.
 

e3lndon

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Ah sorry for not giving all of my details.

My motherboard is an Asus M5A78LUSB3, it is AM3+ so would the Bulldozer CPU be worth it?

My memory is: 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3

And my PSU is a Corsair 650w
 

wr6133

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If you want to stay with AMD I would likely forget FX Bulldozer and get this

AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition 3.4GHz Quad Core Processor
http://www.cclonline.com/product/26600/HDZ965FBGMBOX/CPUs/AMD-Phenom-II-X4-965-Black-Edition-3-4GHz-Quad-Core-Processor/CPU1046/

Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO CPU Cooler
http://www.cclonline.com/product/76740/RR-212E-16PK-R1/CPU-Coolers/Cooler-Master-Hyper-212-EVO-CPU-Cooler/CLR0412/

Gigabyte NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 Graphics Card
http://www.cclonline.com/product/64334/GV-N570OC-13I/Graphics-Cards/Gigabyte-NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-570-Graphics-Card-Overclocked-1280MB/VGA0342/

Total - £356.32

Overclock the CPU as far as possible. Is a good setup and underbudget

However if you want to blow the entire budget

Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Processor
http://www.cclonline.com/product/73989/BX80637I53570K/CPUs/Intel-Core-i5-3570K-3-4GHz-Processor-6MB-L3-Cache-5GT/s-Bus-Speed-Boxed-/CPU0102/

Gigabyte GA-Z77-DS3H Motherboard
http://www.cclonline.com/product/81539/GA-Z77-DS3H/Motherboards/Gigabyte-GA-Z77-DS3H-Motherboard/MBD0390/

Palit NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 Graphics Card
http://www.cclonline.com/product/81816/NEX5X67001042-104F/Graphics-Cards/Palit-NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-670-Graphics-Card-/VGA0641/

Total - £555.50 ...... ok so a little over but that will kick the arse out of anything for a while to come.
 

gar9

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Dollar for dollar they currently fail to measure up to the Intel cpus.
 

wr6133

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Its not that AMD are bad it that the high end FX are scacely better in most uses than a older (cheaper) Phenom II.... Piledriver is due out near the end of the year so that may change the picture but as of now thats that. I use Phenom II myself I'm happy with it. The AMD parts I listed for you will do all you want fine, you could even pair them with the 670 GPU for a real kick ass setup under budget that should last a while and utilises your current mobo. The Intel setup I list though will be faster video editing, gaming faster in a benchmark probably not faster that your eyes will notice in real world gaming. It means stretching your budget a little but the end result is again a extremely kick ass system.

What would I do in your shoes? I would likely buy the AMD CPU, the cooler and the GTX670 overclock the CPU and be happy with the cash saved over an intel platform change. However if your video editing is time critical and you do alot of it I would then go for the Intel as this is where it would justify itself in your uses.
 

e3lndon

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Jul 23, 2012
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Thank you everyone so much for your help, wr6133 I am going to follow your advice and get a phenom + 670.

I am really curious though, is there actually any difference performance wise between lets say a gigabyte gtx 670 and a zotac?

Like is there a company which is best to choose from when buying a GPU.
 

wr6133

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If your buying reference models (stock design and speeds) then no difference (I linked a stock example). The overclocked and non-reference cooled designs add to performance some more than others.
 

magikherbs

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Hio :)

Here is my, highly recommended, Phenom II 960T unlocked to x6 @3.7ghz on stock 1.3 volts, holding its own with AIDA64. xD

As a quad, its stable @ 3.8ghz/ 1.3v and @ 4ghz/ 1.35v. 4.2ghz/ 1.4v seems stable but needs more testing.

--------[ CPU ZLib ]----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

12x Opteron 2431 2400 MHz Supermicro H8DI3+-F SR5690 Unganged Dual DDR2-800R 6-6-6-18 CR1 348.9 MB/s
6x Core i7-990X Extreme HT 3466 MHz Intel DX58SO2 X58 Triple DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR1 343.9 MB/s
8x Xeon X5550 HT 2666 MHz Supermicro X8DTN+ i5520 Triple DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR1 340.9 MB/s
4x Core i7-2600 HT 3400 MHz Asus P8P67 P67 Dual DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR1 275.9 MB/s
6x Phenom II X6 3700 MHz [ TRIAL VERSION ] AMD990X Unganged Dual DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR2 273.3 MB/s

--------[ CPU Hash ]----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

12x Opteron 2431 2400 MHz Supermicro H8DI3+-F SR5690 Unganged Dual DDR2-800R 6-6-6-18 CR1 4784 MB/s
6x Phenom II X6 3700 MHz [ TRIAL VERSION ] AMD990X Unganged Dual DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR2 3690 MB/s
8x Xeon E5462 2800 MHz Intel S5400SF i5400 Quad DDR2-640FB 5-5-5-15 3609 MB/s
8x Opteron 2378 2400 MHz Tyan Thunder n3600R nForcePro-3600 Unganged Dual DDR2-800R 6-6-6-18 CR1 3188 MB/s
6x Core i7-990X Extreme HT 3466 MHz Intel DX58SO2 X58 Triple DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR1 3132 MB/s
8x Xeon X5550 HT 2666 MHz Supermicro X8DTN+ i5520 Triple DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 CR1 3095 MB/s

 

e3lndon

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Jul 23, 2012
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I just wanted to post back to thank everyone for the help. I really appreciate you all giving me your time and knowledge.

I went ahead and ordered the i5, gtx 670 + mobo, the reason I changed my mind is because I'll use my old spare components to build a second pc for backup.

I'm not very knowledgable on OCing, so one last question :)
Would my Corsair H60 keep temps down low enough on the 3570k?
I also use this case which has quite a few fans:
http://www.xcase.co.uk/product-p/case-x-case-defender.htm

Thank you all

 
G

Guest

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+1

the only thing i have to add is:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163180

£516