Barebones upgrade advice please

Ozz55 · 2 Jul 2020 at 15:57

Hi

I'm currently looking for an in-expensive upgrade to my PC. I'm currently still running a very old Quad core, ABIT IP35pro system with 4gb corsair and a GTX 560ti gfx. I have a big old antec case which I'll keep along with some HDD's for storage. So i haven't built a PC in a while!

I'm looking for the following
CPU, Mobo, Mem, SSD, GFX

I don't do hard core gaming I'm just looking for a decent upgrade option that isn't too expensive. I appreciate my current rig is so old pretty much anything will be a boost!

I been reading a little on the forums and it seems Ryzen AMD and matching board and memory seem to be the way to go today. Apologies I'm not sure how to link the parts I've been browsing like I've seen others do.

In terms of price I'm not sure but would like to keep things in-expensive where possible.
Final question will I need a separate cpu cooler or are stock ones good enough these days?

Thanks in advance.

Tetras · 2 Jul 2020 at 16:06

What resolution and detail settings are you after? What kind of games do you play?

Do you do anything else with the PC (or would like to)?

Ozz55 · 2 Jul 2020 at 16:15

Tetras said:
What resolution and detail settings are you after? What kind of games do you play?

Do you do anything else with the PC (or would like to)?

Hi,

I don't game that much at all, played games like witcher 3 and oblivion in the past (on my current rig fine) but don't play COD or anything recently, may well won't to play things in future so some future proofing is probably wise. Other than that, browsing, office based app's, streaming, coding software etc.

Tetras · 2 Jul 2020 at 16:34

The requirements for Witcher 3 and their next game (Cyberpunk) are actually pretty darn high, you'd need a hefty graphics card for ray tracing and right now probably isn't the best time to buy, since the next generation are claiming a big improvement in price, power and performance.

Does your streaming and coding use multiple CPU cores, or do you use a capture card (or the graphics card)?

The minimum I'd go for would be a Ryzen 3700X and a 2060, with 16GB of 3000 or higher memory. You could drop down to a 3600 and GTX 1660 and get great performance in any older games (or most newer ones @ 1080p), but given your usage I'd be looking up to a 3900 more than down.

Ozz55 · 2 Jul 2020 at 17:23

Tetras said:
The requirements for Witcher 3 and their next game (Cyberpunk) are actually pretty darn high, you'd need a hefty graphics card for ray tracing and right now probably isn't the best time to buy, since the next generation are claiming a big improvement in price, power and performance.

Does your streaming and coding use multiple CPU cores, or do you use a capture card (or the graphics card)?

The minimum I'd go for would be a Ryzen 3700X and a 2060, with 16GB of 3000 or higher memory. You could drop down to a 3600 and GTX 1660 and get great performance in any older games (or most newer ones @ 1080p), but given your usage I'd be looking up to a 3900 more than down.

Many thanks for the advice, the coding i do is analytical rather than visual, that and streaming I don't believe require multi cores.

I was looking at a Ryzen 5 3600, MSI B450 tomahawk, 16gb corsair vengeance 3200, GTX 1660 and 1TB SDD. Which feels like it will be a huge step up from what I have currently.

Joxeon · 2 Jul 2020 at 17:37

I think that will be a solid upgrade which you could always add to in the future.

Could save £40 going with a B-grade tomahawk which is actually cheaper than they go for second hand currently.

My basket at Overclockers UK:

1 x **B Grade** MSI B450 TOMAHAWK MAX (Socket AM4) DDR4 ATX Motherboard= £75.00

Total: £85.50 (includes shipping: £10.50)

Ozz55 · 2 Jul 2020 at 17:42

Joxeon said:
I think that will be a solid upgrade which you could always add to in the future.

Could save £40 going with a B-grade tomahawk which is actually cheaper than they go for second hand currently.

My basket at Overclockers UK:

1 x **B Grade** MSI B450 TOMAHAWK MAX (Socket AM4) DDR4 ATX Motherboard= £75.00

Total: £85.50 (includes shipping: £10.50)

I didn't look in the clearance part, thanks! I'll have to see if there's anything else!

Ozz55 · 8 Jul 2020 at 16:53

So, in the end I've gone for Ryzen 5 3600, MSI B450 tomahawk, 16gb corsair vengeance 3200, GTX 1660 and 1TB SDD as mentioned above.

Is there anything specific I'll need to change in the BIOS for this all? I'm using the stock CPU cooler and I won't be overclocking this. Just thinking about voltages and RAM timings etc.

VortexA1 · 8 Jul 2020 at 19:06

Ozz55 said:
So, in the end I've gone for Ryzen 5 3600, MSI B450 tomahawk, 16gb corsair vengeance 3200, GTX 1660 and 1TB SDD as mentioned above.

Is there anything specific I'll need to change in the BIOS for this all? I'm using the stock CPU cooler and I won't be overclocking this. Just thinking about voltages and RAM timings etc.

Are you planning on overclocking the memory. I know you got 3200. Ryzen runs better on 3600MHZ?

Minimum is 3200 .

Ozz55 · 8 Jul 2020 at 20:17

VortexA1 said:
Are you planning on overclocking the memory. I know you got 3200. Ryzen runs better on 3600MHZ?

Minimum is 3200 .

Well at least I have the minimum then, didn't realise that when I bought the bits! I'm guessing O/C'ing the memory to 3600 should be too much of a problem, I do have a memory cooler from my current system I can put on it. Thanks for that though.