Hey guys was wondering if anyone could recommend any potential upgrades for my system. I've noticed its not as nippy as it used to be and the hard drive is also close to being full. I've been looking at a Samsung HD204UI 2TB Spinpoint F4 Hard Drive SATA II 3Gb/s for a new hard drive, but was wondering if anything else is worth upgrading or if I need to start saving for a new machine. Here is the current spec: Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 CPU - AMD Phenom II X4 940 Black Edition Memory - 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX DDR2 XMS2 Case -Antec 300 PSU - Corsair 450W VX Series PSU GPU - Sapphire HD 4670 HD - 1TB (1000 GB) Hitachi 0A38016 Deskstar 7K1000.B, SATA 3Gb/s, 7200rpm, 16MB Cache Optical - Samsung SH-S223B/BEBE 22x DVD±R Cooler - Akasa Nero Intel Socket 1366, 775, 939, AM2, AM2+ Processor Cooler Any help is appreciated.
The F4 runs at 5400rpm. Are you planning to use it as a boot drive? The big question is, what do you use your PC for? And what monitor resolution do you run?
The F4 was going to be used to store all my Music and Videos on as a second drive. Keeping the Hitachi as the boot drive. Current resolution is 1440 x 900 as I'm using an old LG TV/Monitor. Getting a new monitor is something I've been looking at though. PC is mainly used for general everyday stuff. The most gaming it really sees is Football Manager and Minecraft.
If the HDD is near to it's max capacity, it will run slower. The 2 TB storage drive will allow you to offload the majority and do an OS reinstall, which will probably help. For the kind of work you're doing on it, I wouldn't rush out and spend oodles of cash. Maybe an SSD, if you're feeling prosperous; that'll make a huge difference, but you'll still probably need the 2TB for storage anyway.
Crucial have a sale on at the mo - resuming at 3pm today. Great prices on refurbished C300 SSDs - around £92 delivered for a 128GB drive - perfect size for a boot drive, in my opinion. As stated, they are refurbished and only have a 30 day warranty. However, if can live with that, they are an absolute steal. I picked up a 64GB model for my laptop. Clicky
i was gonna say a new gpu but since you don't game much there's no point. A big 2tb hard drive to store things on would be good also an ssd would be a nice choice he you have extra cash
Cheers guys. The 2TB is definitely first on the list and once I have some spare cash a SSD will be added
So rather than make a new thread I thought I would bump this one. I still have the same set up just with a new 2TB hard drive. I have some cash to do some upgrades but was wondering if its worth it or if I'm better off investing in building a new machine?
It would be easier to build a new machine if you're really after more performance. Most of what you have there would need to be replaced (GPu, CPU, Motherboard, PSU, RAM.) in order to really boost performance out of what's left. You could Cyborg it and get a new GPU and PSU now, but a new case probably wouldn't go amiss. Then replace the Motherboard, Processor and Memory when you've got the funds.
Agreed. I would upgrade the HDD now if its getting full. Keep your 1TB in there as well as a 2TB (or whatever you decide to go for). An SSD will make the biggest difference in percieved speed boosts. Everything starts silky smooth. You can also upgrade the GPU, case and PSU in stages. If you cant shell out for a new system now, then upgrade in parts. The CPU/board/RAM need to be bought together but all the other parts can be added into your current system and then just moved across later.
I bought a 2TB Seagate a few months back to stick all my media on, which has improved performance slightly. With the price of SSD's getting low I am very tempted to get a 128GB M4 next week. I will then start looking at an i7 CPU, Motherboard and RAM combo for the future. Although I am guessing beefing up that aspect of my system will mean needing to get a bigger PSU?
Depends on what GPU you get really. It has been proved the a GTX 480 (one of the most power hungry single GPU cards) can run off a 480W PSU, and the newer cards are extremely efficient. Although if the PSU is a few years old then it might be a good idea to look into a decent 500-600W PSU And for what you're doing, an i5 will do plenty for you. The hyperthreading in the i7 isn't really worth it in your case.
If only for security's sake. Upgrading to a 600W power supply, even if it's just one of the Corsair Builder series, would really give you a lot of headroom. While you could run an i7 SB or IB processor on 450w; it doesn't leave you much room for a good GPU.
Thanks for the replies Final noob question, are we at the stage where the built in graphics on say the new i7 IB chips are as good if not better than my old Sapphire HD 4670?
