Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Hi,
I'm looking to upgrade the cpu, mobo and ram in the following PC
Coolermaster RC330 Elite Case
Corsair 650W 650HXUK 80 PLUS PSU
Intel i5 750
MSI P55-GD65
16Gb Ram
4GB EVGA GTX970 SC ACX2.0 PCIE
into the following spec
be quiet! Pure Base 600 B Case
Corsair 650W 650HXUK 80 PLUS PSU - no change use existing
Intel i5 10600K
Be quiet Pure Rock 2 or Shadow Rock 3 CPU Cooler
ASUS ROG STRIX B460-H GAMING or ASUS TUF Gaming B460-PRO (Wi-Fi)
16Gb Ram Corsair CMK16GX4M2B3200C16 or CMK16GX4M2D3000C16
4GB EVGA GTX970 SC ACX2.0 PCIE - no change use existing
What are peoples thoughts or should I go for anything different. For the choices of mobo, ram and cooler which would you recommend ?
The current build is about 10 years old with the exception of the GPU. I need to get it back to better performance so some of the more recent games like modern warfare will work much better on it. The CPU is the limiting factor at the moment so would like to upgrade that part of the system before looking into the GFX side, unless anyone can advise any other reason to do so now.
Thanks.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
You would need a Z series motherboard otherwise the RAM will run at a lower speed and the CPU can't be overclocked. TBF,with the consoles using Zen2,getting a Zen2 based CPU does make some sense,especially if you intend to keep the CPU for a very long time. A £150 Ryzen 5 3600 would be a big upgrade over what you have now. Also there are some good deals if you want to push things and get the Ryzen 9 3900 non-X.
You can get this Ryzen 9 3900 12C/14T CPU and MSI X470 motherboard bundle for £420:
https://www.awd-it.co.uk/amd-ryzen-9...pu-bundle.html
It includes the Wraith Spire cooler which should be fine,but you won't need an an excessive cooler for a Ryzen 9 3900 as it consumes less power than the 6C/12T Core i5 10600K.
If you want access to PCI-E 4.0 on the main graphics slot,and PCI-E 4.0 SSDs in the future,the same bundle with an X570 motherboard is £505:
https://www.awd-it.co.uk/asus-prime-...ocket-am4.html
I don't think a cooler is included with the second bundle.
Intel does not have access to PCI-E 4.0 with its current range. I would get 16GB of this 3200MHZ RAM as it uses Micron E-die:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-Bal...1913728&sr=8-3
32GB of 3200C16 RAM would be around £150.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Hi, thanks for the info.
My preference would be to stick with Intel. I could look at the Z490 board but I was not thinking about overclocking.
The processor, mobo, cooler, ram I can pick up from Scan for about 280 + 130 + 40 + 65 respectively.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Actually I looked at MW and MW2 performance on GameGPU. The first set of graphs are with the GTX1650 which is a close approximation to a GTX970 in performance and the second set is with an RTX2080TI.
https://i.imgur.com/W5vGYxS.png
https://i.imgur.com/uNgvxJn.png
https://i.imgur.com/PpsXXJV.png
https://i.imgur.com/9i6qui0.png
I would make an argument there is a possibly a GPU bottleneck,and interesting in the MW2 remasted results the Zen 2 CPUs have better minimums.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
pav
Hi, thanks for the info.
My preference would be to stick with Intel. I could look at the Z490 board but I was not thinking about overclocking.
The processor, mobo, cooler, ram I can pick up from Scan for about 280 + 130 + 40 + 65 respectively.
The Core i5 10600K will be limited to 2666MHZ RAM with a B460 motherboard hence making performance worse,and on a cheaper motherboard the CPU scores will be lower than the reviews using a Z series motherboard and an expensive cooler,as the boost will be lower.So you could spend between £140~£150 on a low end Z490 motherboard,but they are not fantastic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdgNEXpBrfg
You could be easily seeing upto 10% lower performance,maybe more with slow RAM and a non Z series motherboard. £450 isn't great value at all. If you want to gimp the CPU,by running it in a sub-optimal configuration,then get this and use a £25 Hyper 212 on it:
https://www.scan.co.uk/products/inte...12mb-cache-65w
Anything more is a waste of money if you want an Intel CPU in that configuration. However,with a B series motherboard the Core i5 10400 is locked to 2666MHZ RAM and losses to the Ryzen 5 3600 with 3200MHZ RAM,which you can run on a £60+ B450 motherboard:
https://www.techspot.com/review/2032...core-i5-10400/
Also look at the Ryzen 7 3700X against the Core i5 10600K,now imagine you are seeing a similar performance drop with slower RAM,and using a worse motherboard,it wipes out any potential performance lead,and those reviews are using very expensive coolers on the Intel systems. A Ryzen 5 3900 will have 50% more cores than the Ryzen 7 3700X.
Intel CPUs perform best when tweaked and if you CBA overclocking or tweaking,the Ryzen CPUs out of the box on the stock cooler will boost to near max performance.
All the consoles will use Zen2,specifically 8 Zen 2 cores. I wouldn't be going under 8 cores,if you intend to use a system for 10 years like your current one. If you intend to keep your next system for 10 years,you will be dumping that Core i5 10600K much quicker than the Ryzen 9. Once the new consoles are out,every single AAA game with console versions,will be developed with Zen2 and 8 cores in mind!
Also the 400/500 series motherboards have compatibility with Zen3 too. Also,the fact is the Intel platform is getting outdated. The next generation consoles use high performance SSDs,and B550/X570 will support PCI-E 4.0 SSDs. Also many of the Intel motherboards with 2.5GbE have a bug which means they won't achieve full speeds and needs a fix in hardware in the next couple of months.
In the end if you really want Intel wait until next year,the current generation of Intel CPUs are overpriced for what they are.
Edit!!
That is the other problem here. You could upgrade both the CPU and GPU for not much money. If you are happy with 6 cores,which the Core i5 series has,then the Ryzen 5 3600 does most of the job at stock clockspeeds.
This is what you can get:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/AMD-Ryzen-3...1963319&sr=8-3
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-Bal...1963330&sr=8-6
https://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-B450M-M...1963443&sr=8-5
A Ryzen 5 3600 will be significantly faster than your Core i5 760,and that setup comes to around £328. You can get a GTX1660 Super for £220 or an RX5600XT for around £260. So for around £550~£600 you can get a newer graphics card. A GTX1660 Super is between 50~55% faster than a GTX970 and a RX5600XT between 80~90% faster than a GTX970.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Thanks for the very detailed message. Very interesting reading. I'll take a look, especially at the GFX card also.
Out of interest, if Intel, would a H470 be better than the B460 board I mentioned ? e.g https://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus...usb-32-gen-2-a
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Quote:
Originally Posted by
pav
Unless you can run the RAM at full speed,and if the H470 can't do that,it has to be a Z470. In the end,as I showed you a lot of these reviews only are showing the Intel systems in the best light with good motherboards and excessive cooling. Since the days of your Core i5 750,Intel has become utterly greedy and segmented every little feature,into more and more expensive motherboards.
The platform is what is holding back the Intel CPUs now. This is why in the end I don't find the Intel systems that great now,because it's no point if you need to spend so much more on a motherboard and a CPU cooler to get optimal results. I personally find the AMD systems,less of a faff now - I know they will get most of their performance on the stock cooler,or not an expensive one,I set the RAM to 3200MHZ and you are good to go. For example the top end AMD stock coolers are equivalent to Hyper 212 for example. Intel doesn't even supply a good stock cooler anymore.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
I know that your graphics card will probably become the bottleneck if you do as you said, but IMO there's no harm in trying it with your old GPU first and seeing how well things run, then upgrading afterwards if there's a problem. It's very easy to swap graphics cards out after all.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Update. I went ahead with the following build.
be quiet! Pure Base 600 B Case
Corsair 650W 650HXUK 80 PLUS PSU - no change use existing
Intel i5 10600K
Be quiet Pure Rock 2 CPU Cooler
ASUS TUF Gaming H470-PRO (Wi-Fi)
16Gb Ram Corsair CMK16GX4M2B3200C16
4GB EVGA GTX970 SC ACX2.0 PCIE - no change use existing
The install took time moving components across from existing case to new one, etc and then had the issue of the windows requiring reactivation.
COD Warzone apears to be running fine now.
One thing I didn't realise was that the motherboard has RGB lights on it, yet my case is windowless. Anyone know where I can get the window side panel for the Pure Base 600 case ?
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Quote:
Originally Posted by
pav
One thing I didn't realise was that the motherboard has RGB lights on it, yet my case is windowless. Anyone know where I can get the window side panel for the Pure Base 600 case ?
https://www.aquatuning.co.uk/cases-h...t-base-600/800
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/be-qu...ca-100-bq.html
Both out of stock, though.
Re: Upgrading Long Time Old PC
Unfortunately they are for a different case.
