Bottlenecking computer?

[Brianbrain]

Hi, I'm planning on upgrading my graphics card but I am worried that there will be a bottleneck. I want to upgrade the video card to a Sapphire 7870 OC edition. I've also looked at the 7850 but it's only around $20-40 to upgrade from 7850 to 7870.
Here are my current specs:
- AMD 9850 Quad core @ 2.5ghz
- 8gb Memory Corsair @ 800 mhz (DDR2)
- ATI 5770
- 650w Power Supply
- 1TB Hard drive 7200 rpm

Thank you =D

 

[beeding]

It will bottleneck... just overclock

 

[lazyboy947]

What motherboard do u have? certain am2+ boards can take am3, if u can going to a phenom ii x4 965 wouldnt be a bad choice. I ran a 9650 x4 @2.3 it ran great with a 9800gt like they were meant to run together lol but if u can reach 3.0ghz running a 7850/70 wouldnt be bad, but i still think it'll still def hold u back along with ddr2, but it will still be better than the 5770.

 

[Brianbrain]

My motherboard is Asus M4A785-M which is compatible with AM3 cpu. So if I were to upgrade to a AMD phenom II 965, would it improve the system more compared to getting the graphics cards or should I get a new cpu and video card?

 

[lazyboy947]

well the 5770 is not a terrible gpu, my 6770 is a rebranded 5770 and plays bf3 on high at 1080p at 30fps so u could keep it or go with a 7770 or 650 ti, but its not much of an upgrade id say. Getting a new cpu like the 965 or lets say a 1045t, and a 7850/70, the only thing holding u back would be the ddr2, which requires a motherboard change for ddr3, but not rlly worth it unless u see the performance decrease but shouldnt be that bad.

I would def go cpu/gpu not just a gpu upgrade, if anything just a cpu upgrade

 

[Brianbrain]

Best answer selected by Brianbrain.