Need help with an upgrade.

Chris.

Chris.

Chris.

Associate
Joined
3 Oct 2010
Posts
477
Currently have a 3 year old spec As in my sig and I think it's starting to struggle. Getting BSOD's during games (funnily enough seemingly only eidos games haha) and its not running benchmarks as well.

I have considered two things

Replacing the motherboard and basically building a new rig in the case, however this will call for the need to repurchase games etc and relicence program's including a fresh install of windows. I wanted to do this as I'm on a daft Matx board so cannot sli etc and its not very future proof.

Second option is to replace ram with something a bit quicker and get a beast of a single graphics card to replace the tired 460, but I have a feeling that while cheaper this will only delay the inevitable, unless you can suggest a single card good enough to pull this off?

Stuck on what to decide so what would you guys do? And I take it there's no way to change hardware as extensive as mobo and processor etc without a clean hdd, windows install and a hell of a lot of relicencing?

Also how does my processor stand against new tech in terms of gaming, do I really need something quicker?

Sorry for all the questions, have been out of the game for a good few years now, a bit shocked how much things have moved on :O Anyone who can help me out of my current confusion deserves 100 Scott mills points lol
 
What is your budget?

If you want to upgrade, you could upgrade the CPU & Mobo for just under £300 and £450 ish with a new g/card.
 
Budget varies depending on what I do but 450 ish sounds about right. Could go higher if I can get a decent system out of it.

Miss maxing out games tbh :(
 
Why would you need to repurchase games?

I doubt changing your RAM will do much although is it 1333MHz or 1600?
 
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With Haswell just around the corner i would not be upgrading the cpu and mobo right now. I don't see any point in moving to a dead socket (if going Intel) that is soon to be replaced. You have a good cpu already. All i would do is try a fresh install of windows and buy a new graphics card and a SSD if you don't already have one.
 
Have you checked the temp of your card? From what I recall the cooler for Zotac AMP GTX460 was kinda pants...temp was worse than even the stock cooler if I remember correctly from the review I read.

May be try dropping the overclock a bit as well? Not all GTX460 can manage 900MHz stable...many top out at around 850-875MHz.
 
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