Battlefield 4 system upgrade

1mm3

1mm3

1mm3

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26 Oct 2006
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EDIT: Decided to take the full system overhaul route (CPU, MOBO, RAM, GFX)
1mm3 said:
Ok, these items are for definite:

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £119.99
1 x Asus M5A99X EVO R2.0 AMD 990X (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £109.99
Total : £240.78 (includes shipping : £9.00).



1. CPU Cooler?
The Corsair Hydro H100 is too big to fit in my case (Antec Three Hundred).
Which CPU cooler would you recommend? Would be great if you could link to overclocking results people have achieved using similar specced cooler.

2. Power Supply?
I currently have a Corsair HX 520W, will this be sufficient for the build?
I have never done crossfire/ SLI and dont intend on this anytime soon.

3. Graphics card?
The 7970 Matrix Platinum is now back up at £299.99.
Which card would you recommend for running BF on Ultra 1920 x 1200 with all bells and whistles?

4. RAM?
The ram teppic (1866) linked is slower than that of scotsdragon (2400)?
Results (biased probably) from corsair show Battlefield 4 Loves high speed memory.
I dont mind paying a bit extra for a more reliable overclock/ faster speed memory/ more reputable manufacturer.
Obviously has to be compatible with motherboard/ CPU. Again - Would be great if you could link to overclocking results people have achieved using similar specced
Click to expand...

--OLD POST--
Current setup:

Intel Core i5 750 2.66Ghz (Lynnfield) (Socket LGA1156)
Gigabyte GA-P55M-UD2
Corsair 4GB (2x2GB) Dominator DDR3, PC3-8500F (533)
XFX ATi Radeon HD5850
Samsung 256GB SSD 830 Notebook/Apple Series SATA 6Gb/s KIT with Norton Ghost - (MZ-7PC256N/EU)
Corsair hx 520W PSU

The max resolution I can game at is 1920 x 1200.

I do NOT want to overclock the CPU/ GFX card as in my experience it always leads to stability issues and crashing especially in Battlefield.

Currently run win 7 64bit and hoping to upgrade to win 8.1 when I do the hardware upgrades as its clear bf4 benefits from win 8 over win 7.

I was hoping maybe just a ram (4gb more) and GPU (280X) upgrade would be enough to max the game at 1920 x 1200. I was hoping to do this within a budget of £300:
-would I be heavily bottlenecked by my CPU? If yes, could I upgrade my CPU only to the highest possible with my motherboard without having to upgrade everything?
-would my current PSU be able to power the new GFX card without any probs?

Alternatively (the route I ideally dont want to take) would be a full system overhaul including MOBO, CPU, RAM, GFX and may require PSU also.
 
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BF4 is really GPU intensive and favours AMD cards, changing CPU would not be worth it.
Your power supply is sufficient, all you need is to upgrade the to a 280x.
How long have you had your power supply for?
 
2.66 is pretty low

Recommended system requirements
The recommended PC system requirements for optimal visual quality and frame rates:
Quad core CPU (Intel Core i5 or i7) at 3 Ghz
4 GB memory (8 GB for 64-bit operating systems)
A modern DX11 graphics card with 2+ GB of video memory, GeForce 600 series or Radeon 7000 series
Windows 7 64-bit operating system (Windows 8 is supported as well)
30+ GB of free harddrive space
 
i7_860 said:
BF4 is really GPU intensive and favours AMD cards, changing CPU would not be worth it.
Your power supply is sufficient, all you need is to upgrade the to a 280x.
How long have you had your power supply for?
Click to expand...

Would the 280x not be heavily bottlenecked by the i5 750 CPU @ stock 2.66ghz?

Also is there no benefit in upgrading my ram to 8gb?

Had power supply since 2006 and never had any probs.
 
scotsdragon said:
2.66 is pretty low

Recommended system requirements
The recommended PC system requirements for optimal visual quality and frame rates:
Quad core CPU (Intel Core i5 or i7) at 3 Ghz
4 GB memory (8 GB for 64-bit operating systems)
A modern DX11 graphics card with 2+ GB of video memory, GeForce 600 series or Radeon 7000 series
Windows 7 64-bit operating system (Windows 8 is supported as well)
30+ GB of free harddrive space
Click to expand...

So you would suggest a full system upgrade? What spec would you suggest to fit in with what I already have?

Or overclock CPU/ upgrade ram to 8gb/ new gfx card?
 
End of the day if you have a cash for a full system rebuild i would sugest it even if you dont want to over clock or build it your self you can get good systems for about 1200 to 1400 which isnt cheap but will last you for a good few years somthing like

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-400-OE&groupid=43&catid=2475 as i said its not cheap but you will be able to play virtually any game on the market at good resolution and FPS

for your comp if you can over clocking would be a good idea but then you have to have a good cooler and 8gb is normally minium i recommend as these kits are cheap and good for multi tasking , and yes a new gfx would be a good start providing your cpu doesnt bottle neck it.
 
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For now if you are only doing a slight upgrade. Get an 8gb kit of ram, a decent cpu cooler and something like a 7850/ 7870.

I know you said you don't want to, but....

You need to overclock that CPU, there is extra performance waiting for you.

That will be the difference in my opinion between a £150 upgrade now, ram, cooler and 7850 (or similar)

and a more expensive system which is unnecessary really.


My 7850 gets me enough frames for decent settings on BF4.
 
1mm3 said:
Would the 280x not be heavily bottlenecked by the i5 750 CPU @ stock 2.66ghz?

Also is there no benefit in upgrading my ram to 8gb?

Had power supply since 2006 and never had any probs.
Click to expand...

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=25213652

Although this GPU is an Ares II in this chart, there will be a slight bottleneck with the i5 750 with a 280x, but changing the GPU in this case would benefit more. If you went from the AMD route, you could have upgraded your CPU without having to change motherboards.

However, main point is if you had a £300 budget
i5 4670k + motherboard + 7850 (£375)
< FX8350+cheapest motherboard+7850(£300)
< r9 280x (£230)

The best option would be to just change GPU, it isn't worth upgrading CPU at this time unless you have a higher budget.
EDIT:4GB RAM is enough but BF4 recommends 8GB for 64-BIT systems.
 
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OK, I already have the below CPU cooler:

Titan Fenrir TTC-NK85TZ 120mm PWM 17dBA+ "HDT" CPU Cooler

Current shopping cart:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Dual-X OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £227.99
Total : £238.79 (includes shipping : £9.00).



Which 8gb RAM would you buy to be compatible with my motherboard and try achieve a good stable overclock ? I cant get hold of the same RAM I had before (most people recommend using the same ram again?)
 
i7_860 said:
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=25213652

Although this GPU is an Ares II in this chart, there will be a slight bottleneck with the i5 750 with a 280x, but changing the GPU in this case would benefit more. If you went from the AMD route, you could have upgraded your CPU without having to change motherboards.

However, main point is if you had a £300 budget
i5 4670k + motherboard + 7850 (£375)
< FX8350+cheapest motherboard+7850(£300)
< r9 280x (£230)

The best option would be to just change GPU, it isn't worth upgrading CPU at this time unless you have a higher budget.
EDIT:4GB RAM is enough but BF4 recommends 8GB for 64-BIT systems.
Click to expand...

his 4670k plus gfx would yield the best results for you budget :)
 
scotsdragon said:
one thing I notice when I searched for your cpu is its not a k class cpu which means overclocking probally isn't supported :(
Click to expand...

this is a first gen i5 (socket 1156), there were no k processors during this release. K processors were introduced to sandybridge during (1155) second generation of i5.


edited: for mistake
 
I would go for the Asus 7970 Matrix Platinum at £240ish. It's faster than a standard 280X, and runs silently.

If you want to update the rest of your system, the cheapest ideal BF4 one would be an 8320 + Asus 970 (£200 total), but you'd want 2x4GB DDR3 really, another £65.
 
teppic said:
I would go for the Asus 7970 Matrix Platinum at £240ish. It's faster than a standard 280X, and runs silently.

If you want to update the rest of your system, the cheapest ideal BF4 one would be an 8320 + Asus 970 (£200 total), but you'd want 2x4GB DDR3 really, another £65.
Click to expand...

+1 for the matrix platinum, i have it and its an epic card!!
Plus - OCUK have it at a crackin price, so why not :D
 
that i5 is still ok as shown by the bf4 cpu measure chart in the cpu forum even at stock but i would clock it to about 3.3 ghz which you should be able to do on near stock voltage for a few extra fps and get the best gfx card you can afford then you should be ok. oh and another 4gb of ram!
 
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my i5 760 (overclocked to 4ghz) is running BF4 fine with my 7990.

BUT.... it dips into 50's when online, so if you go for a 7990, i would strongly suggest getting a i7 machine, i know for a fact my 7990 can hold a lot more FPS than that, just my CPU cant match it :(

have you got a budget for a new build?
 
OK, say if I had a budget of £600-£700. What would you spec including mobo, CPU, ram, gfx and PSU if required?

Please try to keep best value for money/ bang-for-buck.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x HIS HD 7950 IceQ BOOST 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (H795QC3G2M) **FREE SHIPPING** £185.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £185.99
1 x Gigabyte Z87X-OC Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £158.99
1 x Antec High Current Gamer 750W Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (0-761345-06223-7) £89.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £83.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £65.99
Total : £770.93 (includes shipping : FREE).



If your case supports it id maybe throw in a h100 refurb at 45 pounds you could get a very good over clock going on your processor the 750w is alittle over kill but you could get another 7950 later and crossfire easily :) its alittle over your budget but if your set on 700 just drop the sdd
 
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