Is my CPU bottlenecking my new graphics card?

exhashdotdot · 16 Mar 2013 at 12:49

I was planning on upgrading my whole PC anyway since it's getting on about 4 years old now. Here are the specs

cpu: q8200 2.33Ghz
ram: 4gb DDR2
gfx: AMD 7950 3GB

It's an upgrade over my old HD4850. Like I said, I was planning on upgrading to a new cpu anyway, but is it reasonable that I'm not really seeing that big of an improvement? I mean, the benchmarks seem to show that this card can run pretty much anything at 1080p/60fps but I still get framerate dips playing Crysis and Borderlands.

It's better than my old card, but not by much, so is this a classic example of a CPU bottleneck?

Thank you

Incrauze · 16 Mar 2013 at 12:51

Yes, your graphics card is being bottleneck by your CPU

areksnumbr1sxylady · 16 Mar 2013 at 12:56

not even by cpu alone... your ram 4gb is very low, you need 8gb for decent gaming these days and its DDR2... it is slow, what does it run at 667??

snips86x · 16 Mar 2013 at 13:30

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £82.99
1 x Avexir Core Blue Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U16000904G-2CW) - Blue Light £37.99
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 612S CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £32.99
Total : £165.37 (includes shipping : £9.50).

This would be the basics of the upgrade you would need. Depending on how much you can spend, chuck in one of these:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Intel Core i3-3220 3.30GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £92.99
Total : £283.78 (includes shipping : £9.00).

dacads · 16 Mar 2013 at 13:52

Try OCing your CPU?

exhashdotdot · 16 Mar 2013 at 14:01

snips86x said:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £82.99
1 x Avexir Core Blue Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U16000904G-2CW) - Blue Light £37.99
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 612S CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £32.99
Total : £165.37 (includes shipping : £9.50).

This would be the basics of the upgrade you would need. Depending on how much you can spend, chuck in one of these:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Intel Core i3-3220 3.30GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £92.99
Total : £283.78 (includes shipping : £9.00).

How overclocker friendly is this set up? Does the motherboard support it? Thanks for the product recommendations

Lazder said:
not even by cpu alone... your ram 4gb is very low, you need 8gb for decent gaming these days and its DDR2... it is slow, what does it run at 667??

The RAM is PC8500 capable of 1066mhz. Again, like I said, I'm planning on upgrading in the week anyway, I was just curious

Incrauze · 16 Mar 2013 at 14:19

exhashdotdot said:
How overclocker friendly is this set up? Does the motherboard support it?

With this, you will be able to overclock to around 4.5GHz,

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £82.99
1 x Avexir Core Blue Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U16000904G-2CW) - Blue Light £37.99
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 612S CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £32.99
Total : £345.36 (includes shipping : £9.50).

snips86x · 16 Mar 2013 at 14:21

exhashdotdot said:
How overclocker friendly is this set up? Does the motherboard support it? Thanks for the product recommendations

Yes, you can overclock on this board. It's the best budget board and has been given awards for just this.

You also get UK RMA.

Just make sure you have a decent PSU otherwise you could take all the components out if it blows

areksnumbr1sxylady · 16 Mar 2013 at 14:36

snips86x said:
Yes, you can overclock on this board. It's the best budget board and has been given awards for just this.

You also get UK RMA.

Just make sure you have a decent PSU otherwise you could take all the components out if it blows

Well if his system handles q8200, it should handle 3570k with no problems since i5 is less power hungry than Q series.

snips86x · 16 Mar 2013 at 14:40

Lazder said:
Well if his system handles q8200, it should handle 3570k with no problems since i5 is less power hungry than Q series.

It was more to do with the make & model over the wattage. If it's a cheap PSU, it's obviously not going to last much longer.

exhashdotdot · 16 Mar 2013 at 21:55

snips86x said:
Yes, you can overclock on this board. It's the best budget board and has been given awards for just this.

You also get UK RMA.

Just make sure you have a decent PSU otherwise you could take all the components out if it blows

I have an Antec 550watt powersupply. It's been very very reliable for the last 4 years. I think it was a great buy.

That motherboard recommendation sounds great. Could I perhaps ask for a recommendation for a m-ATX alternative if possible? I'm considering building a smaller PC this time.

Bacon? · 16 Mar 2013 at 22:00

M-ATX:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-394-GI&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=2261