Mid range/casual gaming upgrade advice

Stoddy

Stoddy

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Hey everyone. Sorry this another advice thread but I am looking for some advice on an upgrade. Looking at a mid range/casual gaming rig as I don't play games on PC as much as I used to but would like something that could run the newest games at a decent standard and also make my rig more current. Current rig is an overclocked bundle I got from OcUK back in 2010 so I am due one by now (have upgraded GPUs though since purchase). I am looking to keep my dual R9 280x so not looking to upgrade GPU. Just looking at upgrading Mobo/CPU/Ram and keeping everything else. May stretch to a new M.2 HDD if the new mobo supports it as well

Budget wise it is hard to say as I live in Australia so, unfortunately for OcUK, will have to source my parts here. I am just looking for suggestions from you far more knowledgeable guys if you can help? Thanks.
 

StarShock

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A ryzen system would likely offer you the best bang for your buck, something like a 2600x 6 core 12 thread, fairly cheap, then maybe hold our for one of the new B450 motherboards meant to be available in the next few weeks. Would need to buy some quick ddr4, 3200mhz tends to be the sweet spot price to performance wise, but ram is still very costly right now :(

This would give you decent longevity at a decent price and the scope to upgrade the CPU in a few years time without having to change the whole thing. :)
 

lltfdaniel

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StarShock said:
A ryzen system would likely offer you the best bang for your buck, something like a 2600x 6 core 12 thread, fairly cheap, then maybe hold our for one of the new B450 motherboards meant to be available in the next few weeks. Would need to buy some quick ddr4, 3200mhz tends to be the sweet spot price to performance wise, but ram is still very costly right now :(

This would give you decent longevity at a decent price and the scope to upgrade the CPU in a few years time without having to change the whole thing. :)
Click to expand...

Exactly what he said above, also the amd option is more future proof because amd will support the am4 socket until 2020.
 

Stoddy

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lltfdaniel said:
Exactly what he said above, also the amd option is more future proof because amd will support the am4 socket until 2020.
Click to expand...
StarShock said:
A ryzen system would likely offer you the best bang for your buck, something like a 2600x 6 core 12 thread, fairly cheap, then maybe hold our for one of the new B450 motherboards meant to be available in the next few weeks. Would need to buy some quick ddr4, 3200mhz tends to be the sweet spot price to performance wise, but ram is still very costly right now :(

This would give you decent longevity at a decent price and the scope to upgrade the CPU in a few years time without having to change the whole thing. :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice. Been thinking about this since I posted on Friday and been thinking I might push the boat out more and go for a higher spec upgrade. Would you still recommend going the Ryzen route with one of the higher spec motherboards that are available now?

To throw in a curve ball I actually have a 3rd R9 280X GPU (I had a go at crypto mining a few years ago). I know there are some extended ATX boards that can take 3 GPU - would this be something worth looking at too? An eATX board should fit my case as I have a Coolermaster Stacker STC-101 which is a full tower. It is old now but I still love it!!
 

orbitalwalsh

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My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £961.03 (includes shipping: £11.10)​
​

Two killer combo deals, got the cash push 8 Pack ram on the latter .

Ryzen does have better upgrade path - but worth googling about Bios Space issues with ryzen boards . Seems gigabyte already taking steps with X470 of not supporting A chip APUs .
Also AMD and intel have same ball part of 2020, before magor change because of DDR5 .
Intel could eek out another stock for 10nm node which I think they will .
 

Stoddy

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orbitalwalsh said:
My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £961.03 (includes shipping: £11.10)
​

Two killer combo deals, got the cash push 8 Pack ram on the latter .

Ryzen does have better upgrade path - but worth googling about Bios Space issues with ryzen boards . Seems gigabyte already taking steps with X470 of not supporting A chip APUs .
Also AMD and intel have same ball part of 2020, before magor change because of DDR5 .
Intel could eek out another stock for 10nm node which I think they will .
Click to expand...

Thanks for that advice. I like the look of the 2nd bundle you linked with the 2700X in it. I am having a nightmare though trying to source everything locally here in Perth. I am struggling to find an X370 motherboard but can get an X470. Bit more expensive but would the X470 board still work well with that CPU and memory? Saying that, and I did expect this, I cannot get the 8 Pack version of the Dark Pro memory here (will have to have it shipped from UK or US). I can get a non 8 Pack version of the Dark Pro but on looking at the memory timings it is different. I am not planning on overclocking anyway so would you still go for the 8 Pack ram or look at one of the other options with that bundle that I should be able to get here? Something else I have thought about this morning is if I want to run the 3 GPU I am going to need a new PSU as well. Need to check tonight but pretty certain I only have an 850W which isn't going to be able to power it all. Can't believe I forgot about factoring that in :(

I might just have to get all the parts from different places here which I didn't really want to do. I have contact pre sales at OcUK to find out if I will need to pay GST and import taxes if I get it from there. Should have just looked at Google though first. Anything under $1000AUD when buying from the Internet isn't liable to GST/import duty. Problem is that bundle from OcUK will be over so by the time I have paid tax on it I can get it cheaper here. Plus I need to take into account if something fails I will need to ship it back to the UK.
 

orbitalwalsh

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ah yes true. If you can get X470 mobo for roughly the same price or a little bit more then do that. Not a huge jump in tech but naturally VRM has been upgraded and the boards ram pathways have been better designed, but your still at the mercy of the PCU IMC and Infinity Fabric for ram speeds, but 3200 should work fine :)

If you can track down Samsung B-Die memory - of any brand, that should help!
 

orbitalwalsh

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jabbz said:
Hold on a nother few months and hope that the price of RAM comes down, as it is said to at the start of 2019.
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If op is going to hold on to 2019.. might as well wait for Q2 and Zen2...

Must people don't mind holding out for a Quarter but 6+ month for price of a component to fall , what will have biggest impact on ddr4 is DDR5 when all phone will jump to it for power saving and node shrink hopefully
 
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