~$150-300 upgrade (CPU and/or GPU)

[dyersituations]

So my girlfriend's PC chugs with Guild Wars 2, so I am going to upgrade my system and give her my old parts. Below are our current specs and what I'm thinking for an upgrade.

I am looking to make it a budget first step upgrade. Would she be alright with just a CPU or GPU? If GPU would help more, would her Earthwatts 380w be enough for the GTX 560? It looked like enough power using one of the online PSU calculators.

My current:
-i3 2100
-GTX 560
-8GB memory
-Earthwatts 500W

Her current:
-Pentium dual core E5200
-4850
-8GB memory
-Earthwatts 380w

Minor upgrade for my system:
-7850 - $150
and/or
-i5-3450 - $180
or
-AMD FX-8320 - $151

 

[Rockdpm]

I would upgrade her CPU. give her your motherboard and CPU. the 4850 is still a Ok card to hold her up until you get more money for a new graphics card and power supply. If it were me I'd give her the i3 and mobo and get me a I5 and a decent Motherboard

 

[dyersituations]

I would upgrade her CPU. give her your motherboard and CPU. the 4850 is still a Ok card to hold her up until you get more money for a new graphics card and power supply. If it were me I'd give her the i3 and mobo and get me a I5 and a decent Motherboard

Thanks for the reply. I was suspecting that the CPU might be the best first step but wasn't sure if the 4850 would hold up. It was surprising to see on the Anandtech bench that the i3 was around twice as fast as the E5200.

I'll plan on picking up an i5 (with mobo and memory) and giving her my i3 combo. After looking at the benchmarks, I was sad to see how consistently better the Intel chips were over the AMD chips.

Below is the CPU I'm thinking. When it comes to the mobo, I'm not sure how much I should go. After some quick Google searches it looks like the Z77 is the chipset to look for now? Newegg has many for around $90 from MSI, ASRock, and Biostar.

-i5-3450 - $180 after promo code @ newegg

 

[Rockdpm]

yea no one really needs 2011 except for extreme benchmarking or workstation stuff like rendering videos. I use the z77 platform and a ivy bridge my self and its a stable platform. The performance you get is amazing. I too was a AMD user since the Phenom until bulldozer come out then I went back to Intel. It is sad how bad amd is going down hill ever so slightly

 

[dyersituations]

yea no one really needs 2011 except for extreme benchmarking or workstation stuff like rendering videos. I use the z77 platform and a ivy bridge my self and its a stable platform. The performance you get is amazing. I too was a AMD user since the Phenom until bulldozer come out then I went back to Intel. It is sad how bad amd is going down hill ever so slightly

Thanks again. It sounds like Z77 is the chipset of choice for budget builds at the moment. Yeah I've gone back and forth between Intel and AMD through the years, and I always appreciated AMD for budget builds. Not so much lately.

I found a slightly faster i5 on Amazon for the same price: i5-3470 - $180.

Now I just need to decided on a Z77 mobo. Would it be safe to go with one of the below? Or should I go for the ASRock Z77 Extreme4 that you are running. I have an earlier chipset version of that board running my i3. Otherwise I am leaning towards the ASRock Pro3.

-MSI Z77A-G41 - $75
-BIOSTAR TZ77B - $80
-ASRock Z77 Pro3 - $90

 

[Rockdpm]

The Extreme4 is a great motherboard for the money id say it's a best seller

 

[dyersituations]

The Extreme4 is a great motherboard for the money id say it's a best seller

I've been happy with my Z68 Extreme3, so I might as well go with the Extreme4. Below is what I'm going with at this point. Comes out right at the $300 mark I was aiming for.

-ASRock Extreme4 Z77 - $120 @ Amazon
-i5-3470 - $180 @ Amazon

 

[dyersituations]

Best answer selected by dyersituations.

 

[Rockdpm]

Good to hear. If you need anymore help or have more questions. Let just let me know and I will try to help!. Glad we had a answer you were looking for

 

[dyersituations]

Good to hear. If you need anymore help or have more questions. Let just let me know and I will try to help!. Glad we had a answer you were looking for

Thanks again for the help. It's always nice to bounce ideas off people.