Upgrading on a tight budget. Some questions.

[therealkingg]

Hey guys,

Well, school's coming to an end soon, and I've decided to play video games!

I've got an existing computer which I plan on upgrading, and I've chosen some parts to upgrade.

Please, take note that I am from Australia, and I plan on ordering parts from http://www.pccasegear.com/

My budget is roughly $650Aud, but shipping is about $25

My PC atm

CPU: Wolfdale c2d e7200 @2.53ghz (Stock cooler)
RAM: 1x2gb Kingston value ram 2gb DDR2 800mhz
MOBO: Gigabyte GA-G31M-S2L
HDD: 1x 80gb IDE hdd (OS), 1x 250gb sata WD, 1x 1tb sata Seagate
ODD: Some LG DVD drive.
CASE: Super generic cream-coloured case
PSU: Super generic 350w-ish thing
Monitor: Some no-name 17" 4:3 1280x1024 vga thing

My current plan is to keep the mobo and cpu, get a 7850 gfx card, 2tb WD hdd, new case, new monitor, and new psu.

Parts list:

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=wish_lists&wlcId=43621&action=wish_lists



MONITOR: Samsung S22B350H 21.5in Widescreen LED Monitor $135
http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=19767

CASE: Silverstone TJ08-E Black M-ATX/ITX Case $99
http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=17904

PSU: Silverstone Strider 500W ST50F-ES $59
http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=15319

GFX: MSI Radeon HD7850 Power Edition OC 2GB $235
http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=21559

HDD: Western Digital WD Green 2TB WD20EARX $99
http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=17282

Total: $627



Now, I'm getting that 2tb hdd instead of an ssd, since i'm currently quite low on hdd space, and my os is on an 80gb ide hdd, so it shouldn't be too hard to upgrade to an ssd in the near future. I'm also not too fussed about boot up speeds right now because I honestly don't see any issues with my current OS HDD.

I want to get a 7850 since it will last me a good while later on, and I plan on a larger upgrade early-mid 2014.

I plan on taking my pc over to friends' places to LAN and stuff, and i like the small size of the case.

Since I'm running Windows 7 32-bit, is it worth buying 2x2gb of DDR2 800mhz ram for $50, since i can't seem to find matching ram for my existing stick, or will my game performance be mostly unaffected?

Would it be possible to get an aftermarket cooler and overclock my cpu? or is my mobo bad with O.C. or will there be only a minor difference when it comes to gaming?

Any suggestions for different parts? or maybe a different approach to part selection?


Your time and patience is greatly appreciated, and I thank you in advance

-Keane

 

[strife_ff7]

I think you should build a whole new system. Your cpu I'm pretty sure will bottleneck that hd 7850. This is what you should get http://pcpartpicker.com/au/p/lxnH
You could leave out the monitor for now to get the total in your budget and just get one later. This build would be much better now and in the long run.

 

[therealkingg]

Will that cpu be much of an improvement over my current one, or will it only act as a temporary replacement before i upgrade to a cpu i can afford in the future?

 

[strife_ff7]

Will that cpu be much of an improvement over my current one, or will it only act as a temporary replacement before i upgrade to a cpu i can afford in the future?

That cpu is way better than your old one look at this http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/404?vs=62 It beats it in every test.
Also you could upgrade to an i5 later if you wanted to but you should be ok for a while with with it.

 

[therealkingg]

Best answer selected by therealkingg.