Upgrade Advice, If you would be so kind :)

the_jinxster

the_jinxster

the_jinxster

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Joined
19 Jun 2012
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6
Hi, please forgive me if I've posted in the wrong section but couldn't find a place that seemed more fitting.

Looking for advice on what options I have or upgrading my hardware.

I bought this bundle from OC last year: Overclockers Dozer Bundle

+ OCZ ZS Series 550W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply

+ http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-121-KS

+AMD Radeon HD 6950 2GB OC Edition

I am a game artist/developer so I rely heavily on graphics and pocessing power, I don't want to replace any current hardware as I am still paying off the last lot. Upgrades/extra component info only please.

I understand I can Crossfire but I have no idea how or what I can crossfire with other than another 6950.

I am also unsure if I have affected any Overclocking done to the bundle by installing Windows 8.1 Industry Pro?

Thanks for the help in advance, I do appreciate it.
 
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Your power supply is going to be an issue for 2x 6950's in crossfire, it simply doesn't have enough grunt.

But having said that your screen res is 1360x768, a single 6950 should be fine for most if not nearly all games at that low res and crossfire might be a little overkill depending on what games you play.

Also it looks like you are still on a standard mechanical hard drive for your OS, one of the biggest upgrades you could do easily and cheaply is move your OS to an SSD of some sort.

Oh an W8.1 should not have affected you overclock. :)
 
Hi first can you get rid of that report. It means nothing really. And it took me 5 minutes to scroll to the bottom on my phone. :).

Your not gonna like what im going to say. You should replace your CPU. The 4170 is poor.
Really a 6300/8320 is needed but your motherboard may not be upto the job of over clocking them.
 
Thanks for your replies.
My Screen Res is usually 1920 x 1080, I've just switched to my TV for some gaming.
I have considered SSD's I understand the read write speeds are much better so will look into that. What would be the recommendations for compatible cpu with my motherboard? And also what power supply? If I was to replace, was really hoping I could push this a little more without replacing components.

Cheers Again

P.S I play most high end games, Bioshock Infinate, Skyrim Modded, Crysis, Farcry. The latter two being the ones that suffer most on ultra/high. I will need to push limits when developing for next gen (current gen?) game environments using cryengine and udk.
 
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There no point of even considering Xfire.

You're PSU isn't powerful enough and your CPU WILL bottlneck it massively.

The 8320 (and 6300 in some respects) pull a lot of power under load (especially when overclocked) and only higher end motherboards can deal with it. I've seen some posts on this forum where low end motherboards have been broken (and one even caught fire) when a 8320/8350 was ran at full load for extended periods.

I think you could get away with a FX 6300.

Why are you against replacing components? You're getting good advice here. You need a better CPU before you think about touching you're GPU..

An SSD is a good idea.
 
Thanks Dooms, I'm not against per say I'm just trying to avoid it and see what the most I can do with what I have. The main reason being finances and the fact I've only had the rig a year. The advice is good, I just wanted to see what I can expand to without having to replace. And if I must, maybe one component at a time. I am not a wealthy man at the minute. This was largely just for consideration.
 
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