Upgrading My Stock HP Computer For Gaming

[Dyrotek]

Hi, so I got a HP desktop about a year ago and I want to be able to play games on it now. I honestly have no idea what I should put in it or what I can put in it. It is the HP p7-1534
Any help would be great.

 

[RCFProd]

Product specifications: http://h20564.www2.hp.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=emr_na-c03673337

A8-5500 (Good enough)
8GB RAM DDR3-1600 (Very good)
Integrated graphics (Not good enough)
300W Power supply (Not good enough)

Necessary upgrade: Graphics card, power supply

Case depth: 409mm minus 88.9mm for HDD drive bays = 320mm room for graphics card (Let's keep this at 280mm maximum)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R7 265 2GB Video Card ($140.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: EVGA 600B 600W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($44.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $185.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-02 21:55 EDT-0400

What's your budget exactly? And at which resolution are you planning to play games?

 

[Dyrotek]

Product specifications: http://h20564.www2.hp.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=emr_na-c03673337

A8-5500 (Good enough)
8GB RAM DDR3-1600 (Very good)
Integrated graphics (Not good enough)
300W Power supply (Not good enough)

Necessary upgrade: Graphics card, power supply

Case depth: 409mm minus 88.9mm for HDD drive bays = 320mm room for graphics card (Let's keep this at 280mm maximum)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R7 265 2GB Video Card ($140.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: EVGA 600B 600W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($44.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $185.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-02 21:55 EDT-0400

What's your budget exactly? And at which resolution are you planning to play games?

I only need to play at 720p and I'd like to keep it at around $150 IF possible

 

[RCFProd]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R7 260X 2GB Video Card ($114.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($39.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $154.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-03 07:16 EDT-0400

This is all you need for 720p.

 

[Dyrotek]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R7 260X 2GB Video Card ($114.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($39.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $154.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-03 07:16 EDT-0400

This is all you need for 720p.

So..I upgraded to the EVGA 500w psu and the Sapphire Radeon r7 260x.
For some reason I am not getting the fps most other people are getting in certain games. Ive been watching videos and people are playing games like bf4 and dayz on high settings and still gettings like 60 fps at 720p. I am not seeing these results though..Im kinda wondering why this is.

 

[RCFProd]

DayZ is very CPU intensive. The A8-5500 is not so powerful for games like that.

For BF4 this is important: Make sure to set Battlefield 4 to MANTLE instead of DX11. You should see significant improvement in FPS.

I'm very interested in seeing how your performance will be with mantle.

Make sure to disable the onboard graphics of the A8-5500 completely.

 

[Dyrotek]

DayZ is very CPU intensive. The A8-5500 is not so powerful for games like that.

For BF4 this is important: Make sure to set Battlefield 4 to MANTLE instead of DX11. You should see significant improvement in FPS.

I'm very interested in seeing how your performance will be with mantle.

Make sure to disable the onboard graphics of the A8-5500 completely.

How would I go about disabling the onboard graphics completely. I just installed my new card and thought Thats all I had to do.

 

[RCFProd]

In Bios there is a section where you can boot to discrete and disable the iGPU, depending on the motherboard the options are titled differently but essentially the same thing.

Normally your graphics output is set to auto, change it to discrete and your iGPU should be switched off, alternatively with Asrock a hidden bios option will appear which you can switch of the iGPU completely.

Source:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-1708507/disabling-apu-graphics.html

 

[Dyrotek]

In Bios there is a section where you can boot to discrete and disable the iGPU, depending on the motherboard the options are titled differently but essentially the same thing.

Normally your graphics output is set to auto, change it to discrete and your iGPU should be switched off, alternatively with Asrock a hidden bios option will appear which you can switch of the iGPU completely.

Source:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-1708507/disabling-apu-graphics.html

Could you recommend me a decent cpu that would be good for running games like DayZ?

 

[RCFProd]

Your motherboard uses the A75 Chipset and doesn't really support any better cpu's.

You would have to upgrade your motherboard entirely. Not sure if that's worth it with a stock PC.

 

[Dyrotek]

Your motherboard uses the A75 Chipset and doesn't really support any better cpu's.

You would have to upgrade your motherboard entirely. Not sure if that's worth it with a stock PC.

So I should just save some money and buy the rest of the parts needed to build a pc? If this is the case. Could you possibly suggest me a decent build, excluding the graphics card and power supply that I just bought since I can just use those parts in it.

 

[RCFProd]

For CPU intensive games this would be a good improvement:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4460 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($178.89 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($83.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Case: NZXT Source 220 ATX Mid Tower Case ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-14 DVD/CD Writer ($13.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $426.82
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-10 06:37 EDT-0400

You sure you need it though? Are you still not getting the right performance in BF4?

 

[Dyrotek]

For CPU intensive games this would be a good improvement:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4460 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($178.89 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($83.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Case: NZXT Source 220 ATX Mid Tower Case ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-14 DVD/CD Writer ($13.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $426.82
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-10 06:37 EDT-0400

You sure you need it though? Are you still not getting the right performance in BF4?

Yeah, I'm still not getting good frames on bf4. Even using Mantle. I planned on using this setup. http://pcpartpicker.com/p/pF3fjX
There isnt a optical drive, ram, or hard drive in that part list because Im going to use my old ones from my hp, one of the moderators on here said it would work fine. I'm still iffy on the case though. I might get the one you suggested instead. I need a decent mid case for around $30-40.

 

[RCFProd]

4GB RAM is not good enough and would give you equally bad performance in Battlefield 4.

For games like DayZ and Arma you want an Intel processor and nothing else. Those performs best with it.

You really want a better case, I'm sure you can afford the NZXT Source 220 I posted above.

I'd suggest this build depending on your budget:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor ($103.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-E34 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($49.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($53.10 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Source 220 ATX Mid Tower Case ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $252.06
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-10 11:34 EDT-0400

 

[Dyrotek]

4GB RAM is not good enough and would give you equally bad performance in Battlefield 4.

For games like DayZ and Arma you want an Intel processor and nothing else. Those performs best with it.

You really want a better case, I'm sure you can afford the NZXT Source 220 I posted above.

I'd suggest this build depending on your budget:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor ($103.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-E34 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($49.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($53.10 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Source 220 ATX Mid Tower Case ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $252.06
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-10 11:34 EDT-0400

I was really trying to stay under $200. I guess if its required to get the performance Ill have to do it.

 

[RCFProd]

You are definitely forced to spend over 200 dollars to expect quality in return.

Alternatively you could just swap the RAM from your HP PC to your new system?

That brings you back to 200 dollars.

 

[Dyrotek]

You are definitely forced to spend over 200 dollars to expect quality in return.

Alternatively you could just swap the RAM from your HP PC to your new system?

That brings you back to 200 dollars.

Yeah. Since my hp does have 8gb. Its only 1 stick but it will do until I can get the money for better RAM.

What does this mean? "Some Intel H81 chipset motherboards may need a BIOS update prior to using Haswell Refresh CPUs." Its on that part list for compatibility check.

 

[RCFProd]

PCPartPicker just uses that as a general hint. It will actually work just fine.

 

[Dyrotek]

PCPartPicker just uses that as a general hint. It will actually work just fine.

Okay cool. Thanks