Upgrade from q6600?

mr1000

mr1000

mr1000

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Joined
7 Dec 2007
Posts
412
Hi,

Its been a while since I have done a major upgrade, and with Elite: Dangerous around the corner, i'm back in the market.

I currently have:

cpu: q6600
Motherboard: ASUS P5KC
Graphics card: Asus 8800GT 512MB GDDR3
Power supply: Corsair HX 520W modular
Memory: OCZ Gold Edition 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C5 Dual Channel

I am looking initially at just upgrading the Graphics card, from what I can tell best price / performance would be around the R9 280 range?

2 things though - will my power supply have the right cables to power a modern card, and will it be held back too much by the CPU?

I dont really want to spend any more that £200 on a card, I usually aim for £150, but I am years out of touch!

Any advice appreciated.

Thanks.
 
The Q6600 is a solid chip for sure but is a little dated. Putting money into a better GPU will see the moat performance, would you stretch to a 970? If not 680/780's are selling for cheap but I'm not 100% sure your PSU will hold its own. Try a second hand 770 as they're cheap or a 280x.
 
to be fair i would get a second hand card, something along the lines of a r9 270x for 1080p gaming then save up and buy a new board, chip and memory in a couple of months
 
I'm in the process of doing the same thing - I ended up going for a GTX 460, paid £40 for it

But as the others have said there's some second hand bargains out there at the moment
 
Thanks for the tips. Had a quick look on ebay, what sort of prices should I expect to pay for a 2nd hand 670 or a 770? much difference in performance between them? If I can get away with just upgrading the GPU for now, that's great, much easier to get that one by the missus.... Plan to upgrade the whole PC early next year, but very keen to be able to play Elite, that game took hours of my life as a kid!
 
I know I'm overshooting your budget but the Geforce 970 is a relative performance bargain for the £250 you can pick them up for. If you bought that then upgraded your system next year sometime you'd have a setup that would last you years.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8568/the-geforce-gtx-970-review-feat-evga/7

Otherwise a Geforce 770 would be good and can be had for around £170 new or cheaper if you're willing to buy second hand. The Geforce 970 is worth the extra £70 IMO though.
 
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Thanks for all the advice. I'm going to upgrade the GPU first, seeing as I dont actually need it till Elite comes out, I'm going to start putting some money aside and see whats best at the time. I'm guessing it will be out December time, fingers crossed for some price drops in the next couple of months!
 
I just upgraded my sons PC .. same system as yours with a GTX670 and an SSD for a very cheap and notable performance leap. His got the CPU running 3.4 on air. Runs bf4 fine.
 
I got an SSD last year, best upgrade I have done on the system, and my motherboard wont even let it unleash its true potential...

Considered a cheaper card, but I dont upgrade very often, better to get the best I can afford at the time. Was the 670 2nd hand, or new?
 
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