Upgrading/rebuilding a 6 year old machine

matt2k7

matt2k7

matt2k7

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Joined
28 Mar 2023
Posts
19
Location
Hertfordshire
Hi!
I built the following machine around 6 years ago and feel now is the time to invest a little in what is going to be my main computer, I had a mac mini which I used for work, but it has since been bricked with a faulty logic board so rather than give apple more money I'll now invest that money on this upgrade...

My current build looks as follows

  • Operating System: Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
  • CPU: Intel Core i5 6600 @ 3.30GHz 31 °C Skylake 14nm Technology
  • RAM: 16.0GB Dual-Channel DDR4 @ 1066MHz (15-15-15-35)
  • Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S (CPUSocket) 33 °C
  • Graphics: BenQ XL2411Z (1920x1080@144Hz) 4095MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 (MSI) 45 °C
  • Storage: 447GB SanDisk Ultra II 480GB (SATA (SSD)) 26 °C 930GB Microsoft Storage Space Device (TMax )
  • Optical Drives: No optical disk drives detected
  • Audio: ASUS Xonar DSX Audio Device

I have a budget of around £1000, and I'm quite happy to use my current GPU and upgrade later. I'd be grateful for any input or ideas as to where to start :)
 
sell it and restart with a new build
you're limited to a 7700k which is still a 4c8t cpu, which is anaemic by today's standard
 
I was looking at getting a new, PSU, Motherbaord, CPU, case just to start with, using the storage, RAM and GPU I already have, I realise I might need to stretch the budget much further, though I would like this upgrade to last me another 5-8 years and be future proof, allowing me to upgrade the GPU & RAM at a later date.

I've not really looked into selling any of my components, presume the GPU will be worth something and the market for the rest less so?
With all the above being the case what suggestions are out there?
 
full new build:

My basket at OcUK:

Total: £948.83 (includes delivery: £7.99)​



​


reuse your 1070 (will need to upgrade at some point):
My basket at OcUK:

Total: £846.88 (includes delivery: £8.00)​



​
 
AMD Ryzen 5 5600 Six Core 4.4GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail
CP-3D2-AM
£170 (incl. VAT)
£90 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
Gigabyte B550 Gaming X V2 (AMD AM4) B550 ATX Motherboard
MB-594-GI
£100 (incl. VAT)
£90 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Kolink Observatory Lite Mesh ARGB Midi Tower Gaming Case - Black
CA-04S-KK
£63 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
Kolink Citadel Mesh RGB Micro-ATX Case - Black
CA-052-KK
£65 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
I use it mainly for work, email, browsing, office suite, as well as gaming, would like to add VR capability at some point, streaming and also some file hosting to local network.
 
matt2k7 said:
I've not really looked into selling any of my components, presume the GPU will be worth something and the market for the rest less so?
With all the above being the case what suggestions are out there?
Click to expand...
check prices on the bay and then list on FB marketplace
 
tamzzy said:
full new build:

My basket at OcUK:

Total: £948.83 (includes delivery: £7.99)​

​
​
​


reuse your 1070 (will need to upgrade at some point):
My basket at OcUK:

Total: £846.88 (includes delivery: £8.00)​

​
​
​
Click to expand...
Could I not reuse my current storage?
With the case I notice that it has RGB already which I don't think can be changed on that case? Otherwise the bundle looks great!
 
AMD Ryzen 5 5600 Six Core 4.4GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail
CP-3D2-AM
£170 (incl. VAT)
£90 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
Gigabyte B550 Gaming X V2 (AMD AM4) B550 ATX Motherboard
MB-594-GI
£100 (incl. VAT)
£90 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Kolink Observatory Lite Mesh ARGB Midi Tower Gaming Case - Black
CA-04S-KK
£63 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
Kolink Citadel Mesh RGB Micro-ATX Case - Black
CA-052-KK
£65 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
You can reuse old storage but it will be considerably slower than new stuff (outside of hard drives, they're faster but not by much)

I put together a build for another thread which will work here too (I'm in the total rebuild camp too)

I haven't changed stuff but you can change some stuff like double the ram and remove the monitor.

lsg1r said:
My basket at OcUK:

Total: £1,042.62 (includes delivery: £11.99)​

​
​
​
Click to expand...
 
AMD Ryzen 7 5700X Eight Core 4.6GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail
CP-3D1-AM
£330 (incl. VAT)
£140 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Logitech Wireless Desktop MK270 Wireless Keyboard and Mouse (920-004523)
KB-252-LG
£30 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Kolink Citadel Mesh Micro-ATX Case - Black
CA-051-KK
£46 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Zotac GeForce RTX 3060 Twin Edge LHR 12GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card
GX-12G-ZT
£270 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Arctic P12 PWM PST Black Fan - 120mm
FG-04H-AR
£6 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
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Intel alternative, if you don't want the storage I'd switch to a 13700 non-K or 13700F.

Intel Core i5-13600K (Raptor Lake) Socket LGA1700 Processor - Retail - £320.00
Gigabyte B760 GAMING X AX (LGA 1700) DDR5 ATX Motherboard - £199.99
TeamGroup Vulcan 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-44800C36 5600MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (FLBD532G5600HC36BDC01) - £119.99

WD Black SN770 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T3X0E) - £69.94

Cooler Master MasterLiquid Lite 240 AIO CPU Cooler - 240mm - £62.99
MSI MPG A850G PCIE5 UK PSU 850W 80 Plus Gold Modular Power Supply - £129.95
Lian Li LANCOOL 215 Mid-Tower aRGB Tempered Glass Black - £89.98

Grand Total: £1,004.83 (includes delivery charge, £11.99)
 
Tetras said:
Intel alternative, if you don't want the storage I'd switch to a 13700 non-K or 13700F.

Intel Core i5-13600K (Raptor Lake) Socket LGA1700 Processor - Retail - £320.00
Gigabyte B760 GAMING X AX (LGA 1700) DDR5 ATX Motherboard - £199.99
TeamGroup Vulcan 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-44800C36 5600MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (FLBD532G5600HC36BDC01) - £119.99

WD Black SN770 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T3X0E) - £69.94

Cooler Master MasterLiquid Lite 240 AIO CPU Cooler - 240mm - £62.99
MSI MPG A850G PCIE5 UK PSU 850W 80 Plus Gold Modular Power Supply - £129.95
Lian Li LANCOOL 215 Mid-Tower aRGB Tempered Glass Black - £89.98

Grand Total: £1,004.83 (includes delivery charge, £11.99)
Click to expand...
This I like the look of a lot, SSD are getting so cheap too, when I was building my current machine the performance difference was unbelievable, now that the cost per gig has come down it would be nice to get a larger drive, is it still recommended to put games on one drive and have the OS boot from a sperate drive? Previous thinking was that the performance of some SSD starts to dip the more data it holds?

Also, I've not looked into it at all, but where do I start with AMD v Intel, is there a reason people have a preference?
 
lsg1r said:
You can reuse old storage but it will be considerably slower than new stuff (outside of hard drives, they're faster but not by much)

I put together a build for another thread which will work here too (I'm in the total rebuild camp too)

I haven't changed stuff but you can change some stuff like double the ram and remove the monitor.
Click to expand...
Looks good, especially for the price, I think personally I would like to spend more on the motherboard and have it DDR5 compatible, particularly as I'll not be spending a fortune on a GPU initially.
 
matt2k7 said:
is it still recommended to put games on one drive and have the OS boot from a sperate drive? Previous thinking was that the performance of some SSD starts to dip the more data it holds?
Click to expand...

I prefer to do this, partly because I usually buy a more high-end and durable drive for the OS than for games and storage. I don't think modern SSDs lose that much performance, IF they have enough free space to operate their cache, which is not common that you'd fill them that much.

matt2k7 said:
Also, I've not looked into it at all, but where do I start with AMD v Intel, is there a reason people have a preference?
Click to expand...

The 13600K or 13700 non-K/F have higher productivity performance than the 7600/X and the 7700/X, but their gaming performance (with DDR5) is similar. AM5 is supposed to be supported through several generations (AM4 lasted a very long time), but Intel 1700 is thought to have a minor refresh of 13th gen (rumour is higher clocks and more cache, but same core counts) and then that's it. I think you'd get a decent life out of whatever system you buy before it needs upgrading, but the AM5 system might have a much faster CPU available when end of life.
 
Tetras said:
I prefer to do this, partly because I usually buy a more high-end and durable drive for the OS than for games and storage. I don't think modern SSDs lose that much performance, IF they have enough free space to operate their cache, which is not common that you'd fill them that much.



The 13600K or 13700 non-K/F have higher productivity performance than the 7600/X and the 7700/X, but their gaming performance (with DDR5) is similar. AM5 is supposed to be supported through several generations (AM4 lasted a very long time), but Intel 1700 is thought to have a minor refresh of 13th gen (rumour is higher clocks and more cache, but same core counts) and then that's it. I think you'd get a decent life out of whatever system you buy before it needs upgrading, but the AM5 system might have a much faster CPU available when end of life.
Click to expand...
Thats great, I would think that I would look to buy a whole new set up by the time the machine is coming towards its last years, rather than only upgrade the CPU. I'm surprised by how well my current machine has held up, I do think that the jumps in performance are much less notable now, unless we use specialist equipment and benchmarking with tools that capture things that the eye can't see!
I'm going to have to do a checklist of things I need, but very much looking forward to getting started on this.

Very helpful, thank you :)
 
matt2k7 said:
Looks good, especially for the price, I think personally I would like to spend more on the motherboard and have it DDR5 compatible, particularly as I'll not be spending a fortune on a GPU initially.
Click to expand...
To be fair I would too if I was buying for myself right now but that was within a 1k sort of budget like you originally mentioned, if you want to up the budget a little you could go am5/intel 13th (no 'upgrade' route with intel though) or skip out on the gpu and add that later.
 
lsg1r said:
To be fair I would too if I was buying for myself right now but that was within a 1k sort of budget like you originally mentioned, if you want to up the budget a little you could go am5/intel 13th (no 'upgrade' route with intel though) or skip out on the gpu and add that later.
Click to expand...
Yeah skipping out the GPU is what I'm looking at right now, though I am tempted to lift the budget further still it just starts getting silly as there must be an end point before you end up with a lot of machine that you'll never make the most of :cry:
What do you mean regards to the no upgrade route if going with intel?
Also, rookie question, If I were to go ahead and buy the suggestion offered by @Tetras would I need to add thermal paste, or anything else not on that list?
 
matt2k7 said:
What do you mean regards to the no upgrade route if going with intel?
Click to expand...
Current Intel socket will be replaced with next gen, am5 'should' be around for several more releases of cpu as long as the mb manufacturer updates bios etc.

Also, rookie question, If I were to go ahead and buy the suggestion offered by @Tetras would I need to add thermal paste, or anything else not on that list?
Click to expand...
The suggested AIO cpu cooler will come with thermal paste, either already applied or a small tube, personally I usually grab some (or have some already), it's pretty cheap, in case I need to remove the cooler or screw up the first install etc.
 
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I think I'm getting myself in a bit of a muddle with this, so the motherboard choice is key here, as if I choose a AM5 motherboard then the likelihood is that I will be able to upgrade to next gen AMD CPU at a later date, whereas if I choose an LGA 1700 MB then I won't be able to upgrade the CPU as the next gen is changing socket?

Sorry for needing the Janet and John explanation :cry:
 
matt2k7 said:
I think I'm getting myself in a bit of a muddle with this, so the motherboard choice is key here, as if I choose a AM5 motherboard then the likelihood is that I will be able to upgrade to next gen AMD CPU at a later date, whereas if I choose an LGA 1700 MB then I won't be able to upgrade the CPU as the next gen is changing socket?

Sorry for needing the Janet and John explanation :cry:
Click to expand...
correct, which is why i don't routinely recommend intel anymore except for specific use cases
for gaming, the current 13th gen intels and ryzen 7000 chips perform neck and neck or thereabouts...so i can't fathom why one would want to buy into what is effectively, a dead platform with no route for upgrades
AM5 is the way to go, imo
 
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matt2k7 said:
With the case I notice that it has RGB already which I don't think can be changed on that case? Otherwise the bundle looks great!
Click to expand...
the rgb can be changed (has an integrated controller) or turned off if you don't like rgb
or just pick a different case, whichever you prefer
 
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