[Crybertrance]

Hey there folks have just enough money to do an upgrade for either a GPU or a Processor.

My Specs:

Processor - AMD Phenom II X4 945 @ 3.00 GHz
Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H
RAM - 8 Gb @1333Hz
GPU - ATi Radeon HD 5770 1 GB (overclocked to 955/1350 Hz (core/mem)
No third party cooler of any sort.
(other specs not relevant. are they?)

Keep in mind that Im aiming for a mid-range rig, so nothing fancy there, will be mainly used for gaming. so, whaddaya say CPU or GPU?

[The E]

I'd go for the CPU. The 5770 is a solid card that should be able to handle most things.

[Fury]

Both are quite lacking in performance. I'd save the money.

[LHN91]

Considering that what you have is significantly better than my Athlon II x4 620, 4 Gb of Ram and s 4870, and I consider mine a reasonably capable midrange machine 3 years into its lifetime, I'd wait till the spring to do any upgrades. Primarily because right now, any reasonable CPU upgrade for your processor will likely require a new motherboard as well. And that 5770 is still a pretty solid midrange card

[Crybertrance]

I'd go for the CPU. The 5770 is a solid card that should be able to handle most things.

I was thinking that the nVidia cards with their CUDA and stuff might compensate for my proccy in games? I am not knowledgeable on this subject though.

Both are quite lacking in performance. I'd save the money.

Save the money for a future upgrade?

Considering that what you have is significantly better than my Athlon II x4 620, 4 Gb of Ram and s 4870, and I consider mine a reasonably capable midrange machine 3 years into its lifetime, I'd wait till the spring to do any upgrades. Primarily because right now, any reasonable CPU upgrade for your processor will likely require a new motherboard as well. And that 5770 is still a pretty solid midrange card

Even my machine is 3~3.5 years in service, and my mobo has an AM3 socket, so isn't that compatible with those hexa-core proccys (the x6 series, i believe)


Aarrgh, its so confusing

[LHN91]

I'd go for the CPU. The 5770 is a solid card that should be able to handle most things.

I was thinking that the nVidia cards with their CUDA and stuff might compensate for my proccy in games? I am not knowledgeable on this subject though.

Both are quite lacking in performance. I'd save the money.

Save the money for a future upgrade?

Considering that what you have is significantly better than my Athlon II x4 620, 4 Gb of Ram and s 4870, and I consider mine a reasonably capable midrange machine 3 years into its lifetime, I'd wait till the spring to do any upgrades. Primarily because right now, any reasonable CPU upgrade for your processor will likely require a new motherboard as well. And that 5770 is still a pretty solid midrange card

Even my machine is 3~3.5 years in service, and my mobo has an AM3 socket, so isn't that compatible with those hexa-core proccys (the x6 series, i believe)


Aarrgh, its so confusing

Yes, AM3 is compatible with Phenom II x6 processors. And yeah, that would be an upgrade, but if you're looking for more gaming ability those extra cores are still of negligeable benefit. Despite the fact that many games are making use of more cores, very few are capable of using more than 4, and a large number of programs are still using 1 or 2. In those cases, the slightly lower clock speed of most of the reasonably priced hexacore Phenoms would actually be a hindrance.

Personally, I would grab a decent CPU cooler and, since IIRC the 945 is a Black Edition processor, overclock it a bit. They're well known for being fairly easy to overclock, and that would give you a performance boost without the full cost of a CPU.

As for the GPU... There is very little reason, gaming-wise, to pick Nvidia over AMD or vice versa, with the possible exception of drivers and some issues with openGL on said AMD drivers. The 5000 series will also be supported under Windows 8, if that matters at all to you. My 4870 technically isn't, but runs fine with the 7 drivers installed using compatibility mode on the installer. Nvidia does support their older cards much better, so you might get a bit more longevity out of a newer Nvidia card, however.

[Bob-san]

I'd personally go with a better graphics card. A GeForce GTX 670 or even a Radeon HD 7800/7900 would be my choice.

[Klaustrophobia]

i just went from an unlocked/overclocked 6950 (making it effectively a 6970 that runs a little hot) to a GTX 670.  that was quite a nice upgrade, i was surprised considering the only one generation of difference, and going from the highest tier to the second-highest.  and a 6970 should also be a fairly big improvement over a 5770, though i skipped that generation.  however, 670's aren't cheap, definitely not mid-range.  you MIGHT consider the 660ti a midrange at ~$300 (wait for good sales and you might get it around $250 or so), and i hear it's not much of a slouch.  it's pretty much a 670 with less memory bandwidth.

i agree about the CPU, you're not going to be able to get much more performance there without changing sockets.  get yourself a $20 hyper 212 and overclock if you want to squeeze some more out.  hell, i've had good results overclocking AMDs even with stock cooling.

[Rodo]

If gamer profile, go for GPU.

If worker / office profile go for CPU.

[Al-Rik]

Why do you want to upgrade ? 

I have a similar PC, with a 5830 instead the 5770, and Games like Battlefield 3 or Diaspora are running well, even in 1920 x 1200 resolution.

Changing the GPU Card to an actual model from ATI or nVidea may give some extra FPS in Games and lower power consumption / noise in desktop mode...
 

[Hellstryker]

LHN's post looks about right. you've got a pretty solid rig there already. Grab a cooler and overclock if anything, though I'd just save the money.

[Zacam]

I'm still solidly rocking an AM2 6400+ (Dual Core, 3.2 Ghz per) with 8gb DDR2-800 and a 1GB 8800 GT. This machine was sourced and built when AM2 was still brand new, so it is very long in the tooth but still perfectly capable in many situations.

So, don't feel you HAVE to upgrade just because "it's old". If you want to go that route, then start pricing out an entire rig replacement box to last you another 3-5 years with whatever budget you can allocate to it over, say 6 months or so of saving. That will do you a LOT better in the long run than trying to piece meal upgrade your only existing system.

[Crybertrance]

Hmmm, I guess you guys are right... I guess I should stick onto my rig as it is. I guess I could OC my CPU to give better performance (btw, the 945 is not a BE CPU [955 is a BE] so my multipliers are locked, so ill have to OC via FSB, right?).

However, my temps on full load (Prime95) are somewhere arround 70C on stock cooler and no OC. And I just put some thermal paste (Noctua NT-H1. Arctic Silver was not available anywhere here). So can you guys recommend some good third-party coolers?

[zookeeper]

Since presumably you want to get a rather good cooler, better make sure it's compatible with whatever socket you might want to upgrade to in the future (or that there exists a separate mounting kit for it) so that you can (probably) keep using it even if you do a complete system upgrade.

[pecenipicek]

Since presumably you want to get a rather good cooler, better make sure it's compatible with whatever socket you might want to upgrade to in the future (or that there exists a separate mounting kit for it) so that you can (probably) keep using it even if you do a complete system upgrade.

considering any coolers worth their salt come with brackets for everything since before s775 and am2....


I am of a mixed opinion over wether or not to reccomend Scythe as a manufacturer however as i have no idea how their coolers are doing these days. i've had damn good experiences with them, but i also know people who didnt but methinks thats mostly related to the relative lack of quality on the fans that come with the coolers, as there's no "graceful failure" in them. also, if getting any of the larger ones, dont, under any circumstance get hit by its blades. at best it'll hurt your finger, at worst, it will fly apart.


Also, i personally found Arctic Silver MX3 to work gloriously. Could be colored a bit by the fact that one of them syringelets costs about $10 and i'm still trying to chew down the fact i had to use the whole thing on my gpu when i was replacing the stock gunk... (nv gtx260)

[Crybertrance]

dont, under any circumstance get hit by its blades. at best it'll hurt your finger, at worst, it will fly apart.

  the fan blade, or your finger?

Also, i personally found Arctic Silver MX3 to work gloriously. Could be colored a bit by the fact that one of them syringelets costs about $10 and i'm still trying to chew down the fact i had to use the whole thing on my gpu when i was replacing the stock gunk... (nv gtx260)

Ah, I would love to try those Arctic Silver TIMs but I dunno why no-one keeps 'em in Mumbai! And to order online would be like spending 70~80% of the price on shipping 

[pecenipicek]

dont, under any circumstance get hit by its blades. at best it'll hurt your finger, at worst, it will fly apart.

  the fan blade, or your finger?

the blade
your finger might be a smidge worse for wear but i was more pissed off that my $20 fan fell apart that easily.

Also, i personally found Arctic Silver MX3 to work gloriously. Could be colored a bit by the fact that one of them syringelets costs about $10 and i'm still trying to chew down the fact i had to use the whole thing on my gpu when i was replacing the stock gunk... (nv gtx260)

Ah, I would love to try those Arctic Silver TIMs but I dunno why no-one keeps 'em in Mumbai! And to order online would be like spending 70~80% of the price on shipping 

ebay might be your friend?

[Klaustrophobia]

if it fits the socket, cooler master hyper 212+/evo are the best bang-for-buck coolers i've ever heard of.  $20-$30, and mine (212+) is keeping my 2600k oc'd to 4.6 at 70-71 degrees under torture testing.

[Zacam]

I've always had good results and nothing in the way of issues with Zalmans CNP series cpu coolers.

[Crybertrance]

OK, thanks guys ill check in with my retailers about the coolers. Thanks for the help!