Completely out of the loop with today's tech - upgrade advice

Soldato
Joined
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Lincoln, Uk
I'm possibly looking to upgrade the PC in the comming few months, I'm not into games much (or certainly not the ones that tax the hardware), but Its storting to feel slow when doing normal everyday tasks, dealing with bigger PDFs, etc. but I think I'm completely out of the loop with it all, its been a few years since I did much with it, the last full upgrade I was back in summer 2007. According to the Invoice it was a core2duo E4300 on an Abit IB9, 2x1GB memory, 7800GT 256mb, 430w antec PSU, all in the windowed case retained from the previous upgrade in 2002. Its actaully showing as having an E6700 processor, and I seem to remember changing this about 2010. The Graphics card is showing as a GTX260 and I don't remember changing this, but must have done, probably a cast off from my brother who was into his games at one point. A further 2X1GB memory seemed to have appeared too. but I dont remember puting it in!. A year ago I put in a 250gb SSD as the boot drive and this sped it up a bit, kept the old 1TB hard drive as data storage. So TLDR... its now

E6700, Antec 430W, ABIT IB9, 250GB SSD, 1TB HDD, GTX260, Win 7, 4x1GB RAM

Now I'm guessing this is probably all very pre-historic these days :D, I'm guessing the only thing I'd be able to save is the 1TB drive with the data on it, and probably not even the case as the PSUs now all seem to be at the bottom. So I guess I'm starting from scratch to build a new system unit?

This is very much about trying to understand whats what these days, rather than comming up with an exact spec, because I haven't set a buget or anything yet. Whatever I come up with I'm likely to stick with it a very long time..... (I do this with cars too!)

I think I'm tempted by the Ryzen range of CPUs, possibly something in the range of the 3600. Am I better looking at the X570 chipset rather than B450 as I have heared the B450 is being discontinued soon? Memory, I think I'd probably look along the lines of 2x16GB,so that when it gets long in the tooth as long as there are four slots then I'd be able to add another lot in 5 years time... I see memory is described as Intel optimised or AMD otimised, obviously you pick the right one, but unsure why memory should be specific to one or the other?, How do memory speeds work these days, I imagine its not just matched to the FSB.

What size PSU do you generally need these days?, Cases, why do a lot of them not have 5.25" Bays, where do you put your optical drives? I'm guessing no one bothers with a floppy drive anymore (cant remember last time I used it), Does the SSD plug straight onto the motherboard these days, do you still get SATA connectors?

How does all this RGB stuff with the coloured LEDS work? Do you need a special controller for?

I'm guessing not being a gamer I could just pick up any cheapish graphics card off MM?

Like I said, This is more about me understanding whats avilable these days, rather than coming up with an exact spec, as it'll probably be at least a few months anyway before I do anything. I just feel hopelessly out of date with it all!!
 
I probably won't be too much help, but I just did an upgrade from pretty much an identical set up as you have. I went for a Ryzen 5 3600, X470 MB and 2x8GB of 3200Mhz RAM, plus a RX580 GFX card, which is the last generation.

I have to say it is so so much faster now. I'll give you a bit of reasoning as to why i went with the bits and pieces:

- CPU - i was considering the new Ryzen 3 3100 or 3300X, but i was swayed into getting the Ryzen 5 due to the 6 cores rather than the 4 on the other two. They are otherwise similar in spec, but the additional cores adds some future proofing.
- MB - AMD have I believe now said that they will make their latest CPUs compatible with the B450/470 so that gives me another upgrade path in the future
- RAM - still not quite sure i understand it, but I think some of the MB's / CPUs are quite sensitive so need manual adjusting / fiddling to get to work at advertised speeds - the optimised RAM just appears to be 'pre-setup'
- GFX - if you're not gaming, not really and issue, but I picked up the 580 and it runs on ultra high settings at 1080p flawlessly on the few games I've tried so far.
- I also bought a 500GB M2 hard drive to go with it - not installed yet but I'm hoping this will be a big jump in tech from my previous budget 120GB SSD.
 
If you're ready to exclude games completely, take a look at the Intel NUC boxes.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £595.86 (includes shipping: £15.90)​

A bit expensive, though, for what you get. That said, my mother loves hers.

I'm guessing not being a gamer I could just pick up any cheapish graphics card off MM?

Save yourself the bother and go for a CPU with an integrated GPU. On the Ryzen side that would be the 3000G and the 3200G. All Intel CPUs that do NOT have the F suffix have integrated GPUs.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £472.05 (includes shipping: £11.10)​


Add in the case of your choice.
 
why not look at a asrock desk mini a300?, couple with a 3400g, 16gb ram and a m.2, yes you'd need a older cpu to flash the bios but afterwards a tiny pc capable of 1080p gaming with a few settings lowered.

i thinking of a a300 for everyday use, prime video and YouTube
 
Must admit that I'm not keen on the idea of small form factor, they just seem a bit limiting, that intel NUC box doesn't seem to have anywhere to put an optical drive, and it mentions HDMI out, but I assume its just the one, and I run dual monitors, doubt it would have room to put a second drive in as a data drive either. I have plenty of room for a tower, where as I think the desktop SFF units would jet get in the way on the top of the desk
 
that intel NUC box doesn't seem to have anywhere to put an optical drive

When was the last time you used an optical drive?

and it mentions HDMI out, but I assume its just the one, and I run dual monitors,

Some NUCs and USFF boxes support multiple monitors, others do not.

doubt it would have room to put a second drive in as a data drive either.

Do you actually need more than one drive?
 
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