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Time to upgrade... need some help!

689 Views 13 Replies 8 Participants Last post by  elson, 
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So, I'm looking into getting a new graphics card around the holidays... and after lots of research, I think I've narrowed it down the the Radeon 4890, 5770, or 5850. But I have some questions, mainly, which card would be best for me (more on that in a bit) and whether or not I should just upgrade my whole system (not sure if my processor will hamper a powerful graphics card).

My current system is:

CPU: Intel E2160 dual core 1.8 ghz
MoBo: PCI-Express, 2 slots for RAM
RAM: 2 GB
Video Card: ATI X1650 ( <---- I'm right in believing this is ancient, right?
)

My monitor is a 25.5" Samsung, and I want to run games at 1900 x 1200.

Games I would play include Modern Warfare 2, World of Warcraft, Grand Theft Atuo IV, Borderlands, Mass Effect and Dragon Age. But, I'd also like to prepare for the future (Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic, etc) so would investing in DX11 be the way to go?

I'm leaning towards the 5850, as I figure the extra money is worth the extra performance. Plus DX11. Or will the 5770 be good enough for games at 1900 x 1200?

Or, would the rest of my comp hamper such a powerful card? Should I just upgrade everything? Maybe a motherboard with two PCI-E 2.0 slots for crossfire capability...or more RAM slots. Also, is my processor really bad? I haven't really researched them much... most of my time has been dedicated to video cards. It is a 1.8 ghz dual core... so does that mean technically it is a 3.6 ghz? I've seen specs for 2.6ghz quad cores... does that mean they are essentially 10.4 ghz?!?

Plus, I plan to get windows 7 (still running XP), plus I MAY need a new power supply, I haven't popped it out yet to check the wattage, but it may not be enough for a new graphics card. So maybe I should just start over?

Any help/opinions would be greatly appreciated. My computer's future is in all of your hands!!
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C
TBH, the system isn't what I would class as a high spec machine, if you give us a price we can probably give you a more detailed spec on what to get with your money.

Do you want to replace mobo/proc and memory?
Any newish card would probably bottleneck on that current setup. Especially a 5850

EDIT - I was running WoW on an 8800GT on max settings and it chewed it up and spat it out. Any of those cards would butcher WoW
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R
I would oc your proc first off. Depending on your motherboard, you should be able to reach 3ghz no problem. Otherwise, any of those cards will be bottlenecked. I would say go with the 5850, but that's just my
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JKBenchmarks
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Quote:


Originally Posted by Coult17
View Post

So, I'm looking into getting a new graphics card around the holidays... and after lots of research, I think I've narrowed it down the the Radeon 4890, 5770, or 5850. But I have some questions, mainly, which card would be best for me (more on that in a bit) and whether or not I should just upgrade my whole system (not sure if my processor will hamper a powerful graphics card).

My current system is:

CPU: Intel E2160 dual core 1.8 ghz
MoBo: PCI-Express, 2 slots for RAM
RAM: 2 GB
Video Card: ATI X1650 ( <---- I'm right in believing this is ancient, right?
)

My monitor is a 25.5" Samsung, and I want to run games at 1900 x 1200.

Games I would play include Modern Warfare 2, World of Warcraft, Grand Theft Atuo IV, Borderlands, Mass Effect and Dragon Age. But, I'd also like to prepare for the future (Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic, etc) so would investing in DX11 be the way to go?

I'm leaning towards the 5850, as I figure the extra money is worth the extra performance. Plus DX11. Or will the 5770 be good enough for games at 1900 x 1200?

Or, would the rest of my comp hamper such a powerful card? Should I just upgrade everything? Maybe a motherboard with two PCI-E 2.0 slots for crossfire capability...or more RAM slots. Also, is my processor really bad? I haven't really researched them much... most of my time has been dedicated to video cards. It is a 1.8 ghz dual core... so does that mean technically it is a 3.6 ghz? I've seen specs for 2.6ghz quad cores... does that mean they are essentially 10.4 ghz?!?

Plus, I plan to get windows 7 (still running XP), plus I MAY need a new power supply, I haven't popped it out yet to check the wattage, but it may not be enough for a new graphics card. So maybe I should just start over?

Any help/opinions would be greatly appreciated. My computer's future is in all of your hands!!


1. Yes, the x1650 is ancient.

2. Investing in DX11 is the way to go.

3. 5770's are widely available, and 2 of them beat out 5850's at 1920x1200.

4. Yes, your CPU is your bottleneck. It will bottleneck any modern card.

5. No. You do not multiply frequency by the number of cores to get your speed. An E2140 @ 1.6 GHz does not equal a Single core @ 3.2 GHz.

I would go with an i7 920 for your build. It has 4 hyperthreaded cores, resulting in 8 threads. With a good cooler, most reach 4 GHz or higher.
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C
Hmmm I figured as much. If I got a new processor, I'm assuming I would need a new motherboard as well? Would I be better to just buy a whole new system, since I would need more RAM and the video card itself... possibly a new power supply, and Windows 7. Seems like the only good thing about my comp is my case and my screen


Price wise...I don't really know yet. If the 5850 alone is going to set me back 350ish, what would I be looking at for an entirely new system, roughly?
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JKBenchmarks
The system in my sig costs about $1500 (monitor and case not included).

EDIT: I'll see how much my rig is on Newegg.

It's $1700, but that's with an SSD. Remove the SSD and 5400 RPM Caviar blue and get a Caviar Black and it only costs $1300.

EDIT2: Forgot OS price, add $100 for W7 Home Premium.
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Dpak
imo you should just buy a totally new computer. Yes you would need a new motherboard as well. You need to have the same socket on the mobo with the processor that you're getting e.g. If you get a intel 775 socket, you'll need a intel 775 socket on the mobo.

You would probably save a lot of money just building the computer yourself, or changing a lot of parts with the computer you already own. Btw do your research on these kinda things, i'd be happy to help with any questions you may have. Though i'm not exactly pro, I know a couple of things that can help you build your own computer.
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Yeah, I'm probably going to end up just buying a whole new rig then... but I live in Canada, so I don't know what shipping and whatnot would be, or what sites are the best, etc.. Any recommendations for motherboards/cpus/ram/etc? Is that i7 920 like the best processor out right now? Is there one a bit cheaper that would still be an improvement over what I have now? Just looking to save a litle money haha.
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JKBenchmarks
Quote:


Originally Posted by Coult17
View Post

Yeah, I'm probably going to end up just buying a whole new rig then... but I live in Canada, so I don't know what shipping and whatnot would be, or what sites are the best, etc.. Any recommendations for motherboards/cpus/ram/etc? Is that i7 920 like the best processor out right now? Is there one a bit cheaper that would still be an improvement over what I have now? Just looking to save a litle money haha.

The i5 750 (LGA 1156) is very good as well. It would be cheaper than the i7 920 (LGA 1366), but the P55 chipset (all LGA 1156 processors use the P55) only does x8 x8 crossfire unless another chip is on the motherboard for more bandwidth.

You could do an i5 750, some motherboard, 4 GB of DDR3, and a 5850. It would be cheaper than my planned upgrade, and still perform admirably.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128401 Gigabyte UD3R

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115215 i5 750

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-857-_-Product 5850

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-316-_-Product 4GB DDR3

Then you can add whatever you need.
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Dpak
The i7's are the best processors out now I think. I think I'll just tell you what I'm going for, it may help.

I'm going for intel processors, the core 2 quad processors. I'm still trying to decide but it's either between Q6600, Q9400, and the Q9550. I don't want i7 since they're too expensive for me and I just wanna have a mid range computer, most likely overclock these processors to around 3.5ghrz.

I'm gonna go for two ati 5770's in crossfire.

The Asus Rampage Formula motherboard (X48 chipset). Now if you don't know, before buying a motherboard look at the chipsets, there are intel chipsets, nvidia chipsets and I believe there are AMD chipsets. The main thing when looking for a chipset is if it supports overclocking in the bios, and also look at how many PCI-Express slots it can use. The X48 can support two PCI-Express in x16/x16 (Full GPU power is at x16, some chipsets can only do x8/x8 or x16/x8 etc so pick wisely and to your budget).

3 or 4GB ram, this is still not decided but I'm hoping 4, I'm on a budget.

750 watt PSU to help with them two 5770's.

Windows 7 Home premium.

I'll stop there but there is other stuff like CPU cooler etc.

That i5 750 processor is nice, would be a good CPU Coult17, just get the right mobo to go with it.
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Quote:

Originally Posted by JKBenchmarks View Post
The i5 750 (LGA 1156) is very good as well. It would be cheaper than the i7 920 (LGA 1366), but the P55 chipset (all LGA 1156 processors use the P55) only does x8 x8 crossfire unless another chip is on the motherboard for more bandwidth.

You could do an i5 750, some motherboard, 4 GB of DDR3, and a 5850. It would be cheaper than my planned upgrade, and still perform admirably.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128401 Gigabyte UD3R

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115215 i5 750

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-857-_-Product 5850

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-316-_-Product 4GB DDR3

Then you can add whatever you need.
That looks pretty good. I might swap out the 5850 for the 5770 though, since that mobo is crossfire compatible. That way, I'd save some money, and be able to pick up another 5770 some day when I have more money and need the power. With all that, on the Canadian newegg site, it all comes together to be $668 - not too shabby. And then I guess I'd just need a new PSU, right?
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-iceblade^
go corsair if you want a new PSU. corsair or antec.
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xdanisx
Quote:


Originally Posted by JKBenchmarks
View Post

The i5 750 (LGA 1156) is very good as well. It would be cheaper than the i7 920 (LGA 1366), but the P55 chipset (all LGA 1156 processors use the P55) only does x8 x8 crossfire unless another chip is on the motherboard for more bandwidth.

You could do an i5 750, some motherboard, 4 GB of DDR3, and a 5850. It would be cheaper than my planned upgrade, and still perform admirably.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128401 Gigabyte UD3R

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115215 i5 750

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-857-_-Product 5850

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-316-_-Product 4GB DDR3

Then you can add whatever you need.


This is a pretty good list, but I'd wait for the core i9 to come out and see if the core i7 will drop at all.

EDIT: I would suggest getting the 5770 like you have said. It's not a bad card in any way and you will have the option to use Crossfire in the future (when the card's will drop in price).
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E
For Canadians.
www.ncix.com

www.directcanada.com

www.newegg.ca Beware shipping/handling from here is a bit higher as its shipped out of New Jersey where as the other 2 above come from BC.

www.memoryexpress.com
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