£300 upgrade

NathanT

NathanT

NathanT

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11 Jun 2009
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MY brothers pc is running fine as it is in most applications, but its starting to struggle on some of the newer games (bfbc2 for example). Performance in game is mostly fine, its just lacking any guts.

Current specs on the machine

XFX ATI Radeon HD 4850 "XXX Edition" 512MB GDDR3
Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 6400C4 800MHz Dual Channel
Gigabyte GA-M61PME-S2P nForce 430 (Socket AM3/AM2+) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 7850+ Black Edition 2.80GHz (Socket AM2+) (at stock)

Running with a Corsair CX 400W ATX Power Supply (CMPSU-400CXUK) with a 1920x1080 24" monitor


Now I'm a tight fisted git, so I've got £300 to lend him to spend this time round, he's got about £600 coming in when he finishes Uni for the term as he's selling his junk heap motor.. so he can pay me back and then upgrade another £300 then.

I'm thinking the order in what I would probably upgrade if I had to stagger it would be mobo/ram/processor now, then hopefully a new PSU, GPU and case/SSD or whatever the next time around.

Looking at keeping to the AMD route, purely for bang for buck. 955/965 on a decent mobo is what I'm thinking, although I'm a little worried about the PSU being able to cope with the upgrade tbh. I don't think there will be any room for any overclocking.

Any suggestions to point me in the right direction would be great, it it was me or a customer I'd suggest saving the cash and spending a larger lump in one hit, but he's adamant that he wants a little upgrade now and one later.
 
i'd say a phenom quad core on the current motherboard and a 5770 just now and then when he gets his money maybe a new motherboard, memory, bigger psu and another 5770 for crossfire
 
The motherboard only has a 3+1 phase VRM it seems:

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=3009

OTH,the 95W Phenom II X3 720 should work fine in the motherboard at stock speeds:

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Support/Motherboard/CPUSupport_Model.aspx?ProductID=3009#anchor_os

The PSU can actually supply upto 480W it seems and is made by Seasonic:

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/750

Hardware Secrets considers that the PSU should have been actually labelled as a 450W one!

Here is the X2 7850+ when compared to the X3 720:

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=90&p2=83&c=1

The X3 720 is a 95W TDP processor like the X2 7850+ too!!

The 95W version of the X4 945 is also compatible with the motherboard.

Here is a comparison of the X2 7850+ and the similar 125W X4 940:

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=90&p2=80&c=1

The X4 940 is basically an X4 945 with a higher TDP,no DDR3 and a reduced HT speed IIRC.

The X3 720 is around £100 on OcUK:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-238-AM

The 95W version of the X4 945 is around £120 to £130.
 
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according to the cpu support list for that motherboard the phenom 2 x4 925 and 945 will also work in that board although i dont think you'd have any headroom for an overclock with them.
 
Hmm, didn't think of re-using the old board, that would save him enough for a decent GPU, no point the old 4850 bottlenecking his nice new CPU.

Looking at some of those benchmarks i'm now wondering if the small(ish) increase in performance is worth going for a 955/965 on a newer board afterall, the difference between the 965be ddr3 set-ups and the 940 on ddr2 are really not that large.

I guess I'll check on the MM to see what he could fetch for his current bits, could push it to a slightly larger budget. If I can squeeze a new GPU and new board/ram/chip then it might just be worth lending him a few more quid.
 
NathanT said:
Hmm, didn't think of re-using the old board, that would save him enough for a decent GPU, no point the old 4850 bottlenecking his nice new CPU.

Looking at some of those benchmarks i'm now wondering if the small(ish) increase in performance is worth going for a 955/965 on a newer board afterall, the difference between the 965be ddr3 set-ups and the 940 on ddr2 are really not that large.

I guess I'll check on the MM to see what he could fetch for his current bits, could push it to a slightly larger budget. If I can squeeze a new GPU and new board/ram/chip then it might just be worth lending him a few more quid.
Click to expand...

I still think that the HD4850 should be fine for most modern games. I would do the CPU upgrade first and measure the framerates in games. It could be that the existing CPU is holding back the HD4850 so it would be better to make sure first before spending £100+ on a new graphics card.

Of course if you do intend to upgrade the processor get the 95W X4 945 and not the 125W X4 940.
 
Think I'm going to suggest the 945 95w route. He's really after a quad and as nice as the 720BE is, I dont think I can convince him otherwise as much technical jargon I can throw at him.
I know there is a possibility of unlocking the forth core, but he'll need a better board to stand a chance.

With a decent aftermarket cooler on the 945 I should still be able to OC it to 3.6 ish even though its a locked multiplier.

He can look at a new mobo and ram when the usb3 tech becomes more mainstream.
 
Yep I would go with the 945, I heard that BFBC2 plays a lot better on quad cores, so that explains why the current build is strugling, the 4850 seems fine for most games atm.
 
Any suggestions on an aftermarket cooler? Worth shelling for the h50-1 as I'm restricted somewhat to how I'm having to overclock it?
 
sell the psu and graphics card buy a 4870x2 and upgrade your psu the psu and graphics card can be used in the next upgrade and both are needed. If you have more money to spare buy a am2+ mobo and keep your current cpu this will allow you to upgrade to a phenom later on
 
chaosquall said:
sell the psu and graphics card buy a 4870x2 and upgrade your psu the psu and graphics card can be used in the next upgrade and both are needed. If you have more money to spare buy a am2+ mobo and keep your current cpu this will allow you to upgrade to a phenom later on
Click to expand...

What the heck? The PSU is fine, the 4870x2 is old and not worth buying and he already has an am2+ board!

Get the Titan Fenrir for the cooler.
 
I've managed to get a 2 week old h50 from a mate who was using it as a stop gap when his custom wc was being completed, so when he gets a better board he can buy himself a new cooler and I can use the h50 in my htpc.

Yeah the graphics card should be fine for the while, it may sound sad but the main reason for his upgrade is to make the use of quad core games, he's fallen in love with bfbc2 and hates the fact that it runs so much better on quads

I'll tell him to wait for usb3 and the new GPU lines..if nothing much new then takes his fancy he'll probably get a new mobo/ram and x-fire 5770s when his money comes through.
 
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