Budget Upgrade - What to do?

Meetgrinder

Meetgrinder

Meetgrinder

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16 Nov 2002
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223
Hi all, my son's birthday round the corner. He plays Minecraft (obsessively) and has got it into his head he wants it with shaders and all the other laggy stuff turned up to max.

His computer (his first, bought 2nd hand last year to start him off with) is an old Q6600, P5N-D motherboard, 4gb ram. I put in an SSD (128GB Samsung) and my old HD6870 video card.

I'd have thought that would be enough but my computer (see sig) with a GTX660 struggles (less than 30fps occasionally) with Minecraft turned up as far as it can go with every option put to full.

Obviously a new m/board, cpu, memory, cooler would speed things along in games to a big degree, but would I be better off with an R9 280x or (if I can scrape the cash up) an R9 290?

I figure go for the video card, overclock (from stock) the processor to 3ghz or a bit more and see about sorting the cpu etc at xmas. Only thing I need to check is the power supply.

Or am I better off the other way round (keep video card and upgrade the other bits?). Budget is 2-250 quid.

Thx for any advice...
 
It's a toughie. How about a new Intel mobo/CPU and buy a second hand 660 for SLI? It would be £250 for mobo/CPU and then whatever deal you find for a 660 (around £50 would be good).

Would mean you'd be sorted mobo/CPU-wise for a few years, and you only spent £50 on GPU. Get 8GB fast RAM at xmas maybe.

Between the more powerful processor and the second 660, you should see a considerable improvement over 30 FPS.

Or go for an AMD mobo/CPU to stick to £250 budget. Or for £300 get the RAM as well:

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £99.95
1 x Gigabyte 990XA-UD3 AMD 990X (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £79.99
1 x Avexir Core Blue Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U21331104G-2CI) - Blue Light £71.99
Total : £261.53 (includes shipping : £8.00).




EDIT: Nevermind, Minecraft doesn't natively support SLI and you'd have to faff about a lot to get it working, if it'd even be possible.
 
Last edited:
Danny75 said:
It's a toughie. How about a new mobo/CPU and buy a second hand 660 for SLI? It would be £250 for mobo/CPU and then whatever deal you find for a 660 (around £50 would be good).

Would mean you'd be sorted mobo/CPU-wise for a few years, and you only spent £50 on GPU. Get 8GB fast RAM at xmas maybe.

Between the more powerful processor and the second 660, you should see a considerable improvement over 30 FPS.
Click to expand...

he has a 6870 not 660.

Go for a R9 280X if you can first GPU is the major issue in games.

Then if it still not playing go for the CPU, Mobo & 8GB RAM.
 
Yeah, the GPU was my gut feeling, but wondered if the cpu/memory would hold back the existing card and be the bottleneck.

Will scout about for a used 280x or 290. Been out of the upgrade game for a year or two so now need to find out the issues with various cards (290=run hot?)

Also seem to be more AMD cards for sale 2nd hand than Nvidia. Team Green on top at the moment?
 
Meetgrinder said:
Yeah, the GPU was my gut feeling, but wondered if the cpu/memory would hold back the existing card and be the bottleneck.

Will scout about for a used 280x or 290. Been out of the upgrade game for a year or two so now need to find out the issues with various cards (290=run hot?)

Also seem to be more AMD cards for sale 2nd hand than Nvidia. Team Green on top at the moment?
Click to expand...

A custom 290 will have fine temps on air if your ejust running one card. And that is because the mining craze.
 
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