What should I buy for my next upgrade?

Kuga

Kuga

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Hi guys,

Just thought I'd get some input.

At the moment I am running :

AMD 4600+ X2 (AM2) OC'd to 2.85 GHz.
On a GA-M57SLI-S4 Mobo
Asus GeForce 8600GT (512 MiB)
2 Gigs of RAM.

My budget to upgrade my PC is around R3500.

I wanted to get the Inno3D GeForce GTS250 (1 gig)(R1850) to replace my current 8600gt and an AMD 6000+ to replace my 4600+.

I have been buying from the same PC shop for the past 10 years, so the owner said he'd trade in the GFX card and the CPU for R500. He also informed me that AMD doesn't make the 6000+ anymore and it has been replaced by the AMD 7750+ (AM2+)(R825) Prices in brackets are his retail price at the moment.

Which leads me to another problem. I am pretty sure my current motherboard will not run AM2+. Would it be better to go Intel route? Or stick with AMD?

Any advice/input would greatly be appreciated as I want to upgrade on Monday :D
 
with the budget you mentioned I would first upgrade the gfx card, add more memory and the CPU if the mb allows it.
 
1.Look on gigabyte's website first might only need 2 do bios update i bought my PCB+CPU in 2006 and did bios update everything working fine wit new CPU.
 
Doesn't look like the 7750+ is in your mobo's cpu support list, so it might work or it might not.

R3500 is not a lot to work with when upgrading cpu, mobo and gfx. I would suggest buying the gfx card now (and maybe even another couple gigs of ram) so you can at least game properly while you save a little more for an AM2+ mobo and maybe a phenom tri-core.
 
Yea go for an amd tri core plus a 4850 that would be a massive improvement.

AMD Phenom II 920 , 8MB, 2.8GHZ L2 Cache Quad Core (Black Edition) R 1,699 excl. R 1,936 incl.
HD 4850 512MB GDDR3 PCI-E DUAL DVI-I / TVO LITE R 1,620 excl. R 1,846 incl.

www.pcint.co.za, add in about 300 extra bucks and you will have a good system :). If you can push your budget to 4k you can get that quad plus the 4850 and add in another 2gb memory. Assuming your mobo supports the cpu of course.

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Support/Motherboard/CPUSupport_Model.aspx?ProductID=2287#anchor_os your mobo does support the 920.
 
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Don't go for the x2 7750, rather go for the Intel E5200 and a cheap G31 mobo (the E5200 outperforms the 7750 and since it has a 800MHz fsb and G31 Mobos support up to 1333MHz fsb, you should be able to oc it nicely on a G31 board without the mobo being a limiting factor) this should all come to ~R1200

instead of the GTS250, i would get the Force3D 4850 thats going for ~R1.3k at prophecy shop

For ~R500 you can get a cooler master 460W power supply which should be fine for powering your rig.

all this should amount to ~R3000, you can decide what you want to do with the R500 that left over...

you can reuse the ram, case, and hard drive in your current rig.
 
Ok. It's not worth getting a new cpu or mobo with that budget. Don't what the guy before me has been smoking but the 7750 and the E5200 perform about the same.

If i was in your position i'd get a 4870 and more ram. Nothing else. You can upgrade the rest at a later date.

What i suggested will definitely see you getting the best bang for buck and thie biggest performance increase.
 
For gaming (not sure what you want to do with your PC), the biggest improvement, as correctly stated above, will be to upgrade your Display card. Upgrading your CPU/MOBO might increase FPS by a few % points. Upgrading your display card will double FPS....
 
ATM Very few games use multi-core and are a lot more gfx card bound... Get a good 3d card and more ram... Maybe a better heatsink for the CPU and overclock it a bit more? (Dont know the CPU) But AMD is very good overclockers...
 
Thanks for the input. This PC is mainly going to be used for gaming.

@SlyFly : I have a Zalman Cooler and already overclocked my CPU from 2.4 gHz to 2.85 gHz. Can't squeeze any more out of it as my system becomes unstable then.

@Qwikslver : How big should my PSU be in order to run one of these? At the moment I have a 500w PSU.

@killadoob : It says there that my HT 3 will be reduced to HT 1 if use an AM2+ core. Would this greatly affect performance or only slightly affect it?

So basically I have 2 options : Get a really good GFX card and nothing else, maybe more ram. Or get a slightly less powerful GFX card, upgrade CPU (AMD Tricore) and more ram.

*goes off to ponder about it*
 
I would say don't trade - sell. You'll be able to get probably 8-900 for the cpu and gpu on gumtree or prophecy.
 
You can get a XFX GTX260 896MB for R1999 from pc zone. Just get a courier to collect it.
 
I will say it again. The BIGGEST fps increase will be from a 4870 and more ram.

You can get a better processor later on. It's really not necessary for you.
 
I'm gonna take Qwikslver's advice and go for a 4870. I would want to get more ram but the problem I have is that I don't have a router, only a USB POTS Modem from Telkom, and there's no drivers for Vista. So getting another router, more ram and the 4870 is out of my budget..

Unless of course I get a 4850 + ram + router? What would give me the biggest FPS boost? A 4850 and 4 gigs of ram or a 4870 and 2 gigs of ram?

*edit*

Saw on www.pcint.co.za a HD 4870 2GB GDDR5 PCI-E DVI-I / TVO HDMI (Vapor X Cool) for R 2,199

I thought these cards were in the R3000+ range? That card seems a bit too cheap for some reason to me.
 
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2 x 1GB DDRII-800 (Kingston/Samsung) R136ea / R 272(x2)
HD 4870 2GB GDDR5 PCI-E DVI-I / TVO HDMI (Vapor X Cool) R2,506
AMD Phenom 8650, 3.5MB, 2.3Ghz , L2 Triple Core , 2.7Ghz R850

After browsing PCint.co.za, I can get the following items listed for R3628. Which is R128 over my budget, but will ask parents for a small loan. :P

Think this is a good upgrade vs cost wise ?

*edit* When I have enough I'll upgrade the motherboard to support the tri-core properly, but for the time being from what I've read it my current m/b will support it, albeit the HT speed will be reduced.
 
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I would not upgrade the CPU now. Rather save the money until you can buy both (cpu&MB) as prices will come down in time and you will probably get something better.
 
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