First time upgrading

[EmptyCoffin92]

Hi all!
(Sorry if this is the wrong place to post, first time posting)

I have had my current PC for about 7 years and it has started to struggle with newer games (main purpose). I am looking to upgrade a few components, but would love some advice on if the upgrades I am thinking about are worth it, need other parts need changing and where to source the upgrades themselves ?

Budget: £500-600 (but lower is always nicer )

Also I have never upgraded/built a PC before so any help with that is also appreciated.

Current Spec:
Case
Cyberpower ONYXIA Mid-Tower Black Gaming Case w/ USB 3.0, Front & Side Tempered Glass
Processor (CPU)
Intel(R) Core™ i3-8100 - 4-Core 3.60GHz, 6MB Cache + UHD Graphics
Motherboard
Asus H310M-K INTEL H310 Chipset, micro-ATX Mainboard w/ 2 RAM slots, HD Audio, GbLAN, USB 3.1, SATA-III, 1x PCIe x16, 2x PCIe x1
Memory (RAM)
8GB (1x8GB) DDR4/2400mhz Dual Channel Memory (HyperX Fury w/Heat Spreader)
Graphics Card
MSI GeForce(R) GTX 1060 3GB Video Card (Single Card)
HDD
1TB Seagate BarraCuda SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 7200RPM Hard Drive (1 Drive)
SSD
500GB WD Blue SATA III Gaming MLC Solid State Disk [+100] (1 Drive)
Power Supply
Cooler Master MasterWatt Lite 400W 80+ Power Supply
Extra Case Fans
Default Case Fan
Processor Cooling
Corsair Hydro Series H60 High Performance Liquid Cooling system w/ 120mm Radiator (Corsair CPU Water Cooling *** Extreme OC ***)
Sound Card
HIGH DEFINITION ON-BOARD AUDIO
Operating System
Windows 10 Home (64-bit Edition)

Upgrade thoughts:
Memory (RAM)
Corsair VENGEANCE LPX DDR4 RAM 32GB (2x16GB) 3200MHz
Graphics Card
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 WINDFORCE OC Graphics Card - 8GB GDDR6, 128-bit, PCI-E 4.0, 2475MHz Core Clock, 2x DP 1.4, 2x HDMI 2.1a, NVIDIA DLSS 3
Power Supply (Needs updating to support the graphics card, but I hope the pins fit)
MSI MAG A550BN Power Supply Unit, UK Plug - 550W, 80 Plus Bronze Certified, ATX PSU, 12V Single-Rail, DC-to-DC Circuit, 120mm Fan
SSD
I want to take this to 2TB, but I am unsure which one or where to source them

Any help would be amazing!

 

[Rob_B]

Depends what you need. Being on 8th gen I'd suggest a full platform upgrade but that's going to obviously be more expensive so it really depends what you NEED from the upgrade.

Assuming you don't want to go the full upgrade route:

Your motherboard supports up to a 9900K CPU but they're going for silly money so you could go for a 9600 which gives you 6 cores over your current 4 (~£60/£70)

As for the rest, I'll think, you MIGHT be able to get a good full upgrade for that budget-ish

 

[Tetras]

MSI MAG A550BN Power Supply Unit, UK Plug - 550W, 80 Plus Bronze Certified, ATX PSU, 12V Single-Rail, DC-to-DC Circuit, 120mm Fan

The 4060 is really low power (~120ish watts), so it doesn't need much, but I'd recommend you buy a decent 650/750 gold-rated PSU with a 10 year warranty. Just so that you can keep it for maybe another 7 years.

Processor (CPU)
Intel(R) Core™ i3-8100 - 4-Core 3.60GHz, 6MB Cache + UHD Graphics

8700/8700K or something similar would be a nice upgrade (they're 6 core, 12 thread). Alternatively, if you're happy to switch boards then maybe a i5-12400F with a H610/B760 motherboard.

Corsair VENGEANCE LPX DDR4 RAM 32GB (2x16GB) 3200MHz

Does your motherboard support XMP? From what I can remember, H310 does not support overclocking, so it is likely that your speed will be capped at 2666 with an i7/i5, or 2400 with an i3. If your motherboard doesn't support XMP, you could even end up with it running slower, since I think Vengeance tends to default to 2133 (you can check on Corsair's website). That said, 1x 8GB stick is going to do more harm to your performance than 2x16 even running at 2133.

 

[Gray2233]

You need a full platform upgrade tbh.

If you could save a bit more you could shift to AM5, I just about squeezed in an AM4 build with a GPU and 1tb NvME:

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x Corsair CV Series CV550 550W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (CP-9020210-UK) (SKU: CA-25C-CS) = £53.99
• 1 x Gigabyte B450M DS3H WIFI AM4 Socket Micro-ATXMotherboard (SKU: MOT-GIG-02687) = £72.95
• 1 x AMD Ryzen 5 5600X Six Core 4.6GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3CC-AM) = £99.94
• 1 x Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey (SKU: MY-0AJ-TG) = £56.00
• 1 x MSI GeForce RTX 4060 Ventus 2X OC 8GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GX-39A-MS) = £278.98
• 1 x Corsair Force MP600 CORE XT 1TB NVMe PCIe 4.0 M.2 Solid State Drive (CSSD-F1000GBMP600CXT) (SKU: HD-06U-CS) = £56.99

Total: £618.85 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

I'd personally aim for a better PSU too, although the above is at least serviceable as budget models go.

The new Intel GPU's might be better, but I'm not sure how they'll act with a 5600, let alone an old Intel chip.

@Tetras might be able to suggest an Intel alternative.

Edit: Beat me to it!

 

[EmptyCoffin92]

Hi @Gray2233, @Tetras and @Rob_B,

Thank you very much for your inputs. I would be quite happy to change my motherboard, I think I am just worried about my technical ability! It is also one of those things of maybe I can do things in parts, upgrade some components now and others in a couple of months

Would be happy to expand my budget to £900 if I can upgrade a number of components and have it work comfortably for a few more years.

 

[Rob_B]

For £900 you'll be laughing. If you're confident to build then:

Ryzen 7600 (comes with cooler) ~ £170
B650 motherboard ~ £130
32GB DDR5 6000MT/s ~ £90
2TB NVME ~ £100
decent 650/750W PSU ~ £70
Windows (depending on source ~ £20)
Keep your case (?)

Leaves you ~£300 for a GPU, wait for the new cards to release and you might be able to pick up a 7800XT for a little more than that, cut the 2TB to 1TB and you could just add more storage in the future. This puts you in a much better place for future upgrades as you're on AM5 and already have lots of faster CPUs you could upgrade to in a few year's time with zero other changes required (maybe a cooler if you get a better CPU)

Don't forget your old kit also has resale value so you can either spend less overall or increase the budget.

 

[Gray2233]

Hi @Gray2233, @Tetras and @Rob_B,

Thank you very much for your inputs. I would be quite happy to change my motherboard, I think I am just worried about my technical ability! It is also one of those things of maybe I can do things in parts, upgrade some components now and others in a couple of months

Would be happy to expand my budget to £900 if I can upgrade a number of components and have it work comfortably for a few more years.

Prices for components tend to fluctuate a fair bit over time, it's generally best to buy everything at once when doing a full upgrade. The below would have a lot of future upgrade potential, however, such as newer CPU's or GPU's.

You could go for a CPU/Mobo/RAM upgrade now, and then revisit the GPU and PSU later on, or vice versa, but that's the only way to really go about it that way.

Example build for you:

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x TeamGroup Vulcan EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C38 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (FLABD532G6000HC38ADC01) (SKU: MY-0B2-TG) = £79.99
• 1 x Phanteks AMP GH 750W 80PLUS Gold ATX Power Supply Modular - Black (SKU: POW-PHK-02517) = £84.95
• 1 x Asus Prime B650M-A WIFI II (Socket AM5) DDR5 Micro-ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6K6-AS) = £136.00
• 1 x AMD Ryzen 5 7600 Six Core 5.10GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DW-AM) = £199.99
• 1 x Corsair Force MP600 CORE XT 1TB NVMe PCIe 4.0 M.2 Solid State Drive (CSSD-F1000GBMP600CXT) (SKU: HD-06U-CS) = £56.99
• 1 x Aerocool Dryft Mini v2 Micro-ATX Case (SKU: CAS-AER-00607) = £54.99

Total: £612.91 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

I would pair this with an AMD 6750XT, which can be had for around £300 from elsewhere, the new Intel GPU's are also a consideration but I'd not spend more than £260 on one personally.

The reason I didn't recommend the 6750XT with my earlier build was due to it having higher power requirements, I wouldn't be comfortable running it on a budget 550W PSU, it's also quite beefy and I was unsure about whether or not it would fit in your case.

It's actually possible to get a 7500F CPU for around £100 also, but again OCUK don't stock that part, it's basically a slightly slower 7600 but without the onboard GPU.

 

[Tetras]

Hi @Gray2233, @Tetras and @Rob_B,

Thank you very much for your inputs. I would be quite happy to change my motherboard, I think I am just worried about my technical ability! It is also one of those things of maybe I can do things in parts, upgrade some components now and others in a couple of months

Would be happy to expand my budget to £900 if I can upgrade a number of components and have it work comfortably for a few more years.

Depending on the size and style of your case (this is a prebuilt, right?), then replacing the PSU can need a lot of work, to the point you're nearly there with taking the motherboard out.

Realistically, a 1060 3GB is pretty slow by modern standards, so anything faster than a RX 6600 will at least double your graphics performance. The CPU will still be a bottleneck in some games though.

You might be better off just doing everything at once, rather than having to pull it apart again.

 

[Gray2233]

Depending on the size and style of your case (this is a prebuilt, right?), then replacing the PSU can need a lot of work, to the point you're nearly there with taking the motherboard out.

Realistically, a 1060 3GB is pretty slow by modern standards, so anything faster than a RX 6600 will at least double your graphics performance. The CPU will still be a bottleneck in some games though.

You might be better off just doing everything at once, rather than having to pull it apart again.

I ended up googling the case, they apparently sell it separately as well as as using it with their prebuilds, it actually seems to be a standard form factor so might actually be worth keeping.

Worth double checking, however.