Old Newbie Advice for Upgrading Gaming Computer

galadial · 26 Jul 2020 at 09:30

My son wants to upgrade his PC and whilst I've built several PCs over the years, I must admit, I'm not at all upto date with the current hardware or what represents a 'good' upgrade. He has about £500-600 (maybe could stretch to a little more) and wants to game at 1440p on a 144MHz monitor with a 1ms response time. He also wants to buy a bigger SSD (500Gb). Personally I don't think 144MHz or a 1ms response time is that important, but he seems to be enamored by the specs. He is running an older core i5 processor (probably 3 years old) with 8Gb RAM (so he might also need an extra 8Gb?) 250Gb SSD, 1TB HDD.

So what graphics card and monitor would you say go well together that gets close to these specs? Is 144Hz/1ms response time worth the extra money or could he get a slightly inferior monitor and look to invest elsewhere?

Finally, when will be the best time to upgrade - are graphics card prices likely to come down in price anytime soon?

Sparx · 26 Jul 2020 at 12:42

Can you find out what his exact spec is now? Mainly the CPU (i.e. i5 7600k), what RAM make/model he has, then what GPU he has now? If you could check his PSU make/model too would help, just to be sure it's nothing nasty.

Graphics card wise, if he can wait 6 weeks or so, Nvidia should be releasing their next gen GPUs mid-September time. Whether he invests in a next gen, or the previous gen should come down slightly at least.

1440p monitor wise - something nicer on the wallet would be the AOC Q27G2U @ £280. Another 8GB RAM prob be about £40, a decent 500GB SSD is about £50-60. At this point that's £370 gone with only £230 left for a new GPU

So may need to stretch a little to make the upgrade worhtwhile, but depends what his current GPU is and what his expectations are. You don't want it to be a side-grade, it wants to be a good upgrade to be worthwhile.

galadial · 26 Jul 2020 at 16:51

i5 8600 @ 3.1 GHz, 1050Ti, not sure about RAM

Gray2233 · 26 Jul 2020 at 16:57

A good monitor can make a world of difference.

If he's running an old 60hz 1080p TN screen without any sync tech a modern 1440p high refresh IPS/VA with freesync would be night and day.

Find out how much RAM he's running, it should be a minimum of 16gb. We also need to know what PSU he has before we can recommend a new GPU.

That aside, the 8600 is still a decent gaming CPU, the 1050 will be holding him back more than anything else. A nice new GPU and a monitor should be within budget, an NvME might be pushing things though.

Sparx · 26 Jul 2020 at 16:59

Yep agree with @Gray2233 - CPU is still good really.

Getting a better GPU and decent 1440p monitor will be a huge upgrade for him.

But yeah defo need PSU make/model if can check and how much RAM he has.