Advice needed on upgrading an 9yr self build

[funkyCable]

Hi,

I need some advice on upgrading an 9yr self build which I did way back in 2011 (https://www.cableforum.uk/board/show...php?t=33668732). This machine has now been passed down to my 11 yr old son. The machine itself is still going strong but its obviously not up to scratch for playing games on it and can be a bit laggy. He would like to play fortnite on it without it lagging or being blocky. I dont have a lot of money to upgrade it so trying to work out the cheapest way of updating it.

Here are the current specs:
Intel i5 760 2.8GHz
Asus P7P55D-E LX
AMD Radeon 5670 512MB GDDR5 (HDMI, DVI & VGA)
1TB Harddrive
1x 8GB DDR3-1600
2 x 2GB DDR3-1333

I know the current motherboard supports up to 16GB memory. The monitor isn't brilliant and still uses VGA.


Any advice really appreciated it

[mrmistoffelees]

The first thing is take the machine to 16Gb that will see an improvement
2nd if the drive isn’t an SSD which I suspect it’s not put a 256GB SSD resinstall the OS in that drive use the existing drive for storage

Look at your antivirus settings look to exclude certain directories etc

[djmagnifique]

You might be able to get away with just upgrading the graphics card, it depends on how much you have to spend in it. Have a play around with this to get an idea of what could possibly work.


https://www.game-debate.com/games/in...te#systemCheck

[Carth]

I'd also go down the 'upgraded GFX' route

probably something fairly simple like a GTX 750 . . . if you can find one . . which won't hammer your PSU either

[damien c]

The cpu will be alright I suspect.

I would upgrade the GPU to this:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/power...gx-18l-pc.html

With that if you was to buy it whilst the offer is on, you will get 2 games that you could easily chuck the game codes on Ebay and get £40 to £60 back and you get a free 240Gb SSD.

Then swap the ram to this:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team-...my-034-tg.html


If you did want to upgrade the cpu then you could look on Ebay for a I7 860 or I7 870 probably only cost around £50

[Hom3r]

Originally Posted by mrmistoffelees

The first thing is take the machine to 16Gb that will see an improvement
2nd if the drive isn’t an SSD which I suspect it’s not put a 256GB SSD resinstall the OS in that drive use the existing drive for storage

Look at your antivirus settings look to exclude certain directories etc

What folders are.best to no scan?

[funkyCable]

Hi All,

Thanks for the comments. Great to see it doesn't look like i have to completely scrap the machine and could reuse some of the existing things.

Sorry something I forgot to mention is that i do have a 600W modXstem-pro modular PSU in the box too.

I don't have a big budget and so looking for something under £100 at the moment. I've seen quite a few 2GB graphic cards for under £50 (eg. https://www.ebuyer.com/645225-asus-r...5230-sl-2gd3-l) . are they worth it?

Should I upgrade the RAM to 16GB? a work colleague had a 8GB module laying baout this is why there are 2x2GB and 1x8GB.

[djmagnifique]

Originally Posted by funkyCable

Hi All,

Thanks for the comments. Great to see it doesn't look like i have to completely scrap the machine and could reuse some of the existing things.

Sorry something I forgot to mention is that i do have a 600W modXstem-pro modular PSU in the box too.

I don't have a big budget and so looking for something under £100 at the moment. I've seen quite a few 2GB graphic cards for under £50 (eg. https://www.ebuyer.com/645225-asus-r...5230-sl-2gd3-l) . are they worth it?

Should I upgrade the RAM to 16GB? a work colleague had a 8GB module laying baout this is why there are 2x2GB and 1x8GB.

Looking at the Toms Hardware GPU hierarchy chart, that card could actually perform worse then what is currently in your pc https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...rchy,4388.html . It's ok to get an older card but you need to make sure that it is one suitable for gaming.



I currently play Fortnite with a 2gb graphics card, it's a MSI GTX670 and with lowering some of the settings in game I am pushing 150fps in the Team Rumble mode.


I'd sugest maybe something like these as they are close to what I currently have https://www.ebuyer.com/809178-sapphi...d-11267-19-20g or https://www.ebuyer.com/770442-asus-p...-ph-gtx1050-2g



Your power supply should be fine and if you can upgrade the ram it wouldn't hurt it.

[Carth]

I'd certainly steer clear of the 'lower end' budget cards, as said above you could end up with worse than what you have

The two linked above seem pretty good for Fortnite gaming, check out youtube for examples of how they perform . . example:

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...0+2gb+fortnite

If anything decent is getting to be over budget, have you thought of maybe a good second hand card?

[funkyCable]

thanks, its a good thing I didn't just go out an buy a budget card then ��

I have thought about possibly buying a good second hand card as this machine I have isn't brand new and if I bought the latest I know the motherboards doesn't support PCI-Express 3 (they would still work but I wouldn't get the full benefit). Would ebay/CEX be the best place to look for good second hand cards or are there other places? Is there some sort of "league table" of cards and performance. What should I look out for? At the moment I've just been looking at the cards memory size.

[mrmistoffelees]

Originally Posted by Hom3r

What folders are.best to no scan?

All depends, in the business world we use exclusions for things such as SQL etc.

[djmagnifique]

Originally Posted by funkyCable

Is there some sort of "league table" of cards and performance. What should I look out for? At the moment I've just been looking at the cards memory size.

Closest thing I know of is this.


https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...rchy,4388.html


If you scroll down a bit there is a table of older graphics cards, the higher up the list the better the performance.

[Matth]

GPUBOSS, or Userbenchmark
The R5 230 is junk, the £35 CEX HD7870 2GB will run rings around it - also more powerful than the more expensive GTX 750Ti, but uses a lot more power, no problem with a 600W though.
The GTX670 at £40 does have the edge on it - and then it's really hard to find price/performance until quite a bit higher.

12 to 16GB probably won't be a huge difference, but pairing a second 8GB 1600MHz in the proper memory banks (the 2 blue, if it's the same rule as my Asus board), may improve memory performance - the CPU officially supports 1333, but it looks like the board can run it higher and make use of 1600.

With the latest BIOS, it might be able to take a Xeon X3470 (equivalent to i7-870 but cheaper), but the hyperthreaded quad doesn't have that much over a plain quad in most games

[Jimmy-J]

Your 8gb DDR3 will not be running at 1600 it will default to the lower speed of your 2x 1333.

[funkyCable]

This afternoon I thought I would take a look at Task Managers Performance tab......

It seems to register that there is 12GB DDR. However it seems to think I'm using around 85% of mermory and showing the chart as 2GB.

Why has the hardware reserved 10GB?

See the attachment