Is it worth it to upgrade existing components?

[fourty03]

Hello all...

I have a Biostar 785g motherboard, with an Athlon x2 250 cpu.

Over the weekend, I installed a Crucial C300 SSD and and replaced my 2gb OCZ ddr3 (1 stick) ram with Patriot 8gb ddr3 ram (2 sticks)

Saturday, I bought Crucial DDR3 8gb Ram and it failed memtest+ really bad, and microcenter did not have 4gb sticks of the ocz ram.. So I returned the defective memory and went with the Patriot..

basically the upgrades I just did on this did boost my performance some .. I use FSX a lot on here and I seen a little improvement on
most aspects.

I have a 4650 video card, and only one pci-e slot, so I cannot do crossfire
or anything like that, and video will be my next upgrade.

I am wondering, would it be a significant upgrade if I replaced the CPU with maybe a phenom II x4 or x2 and hope it unlocks? Or should I wait and get a new motherboard with new cpu?


My current setup is:
Athlon X2 250
Biostar 785g motherboard
8gb DDR3 "patriot" ram
Sapphire 4650
Crucial C300 64gb SSD
1TB Samsung F3


Thanks in advance!

 

[cusideabelincoln]

A Phenom X4 the upgrade you should consider; don't count on an X2 unlocking. An X4 would be a significant upgrade, and worth the money. However if you were to wait, and switch motherboard, it would be worth the patience for the fixed Sandy Bridge boards and/or to see what AMD's Bulldozer can do. I don't think you should switch boards and keep the same platform. A simple drop in upgrade to a Phenom II X4 is the most cost effective thing you can do.

 

[f4phantom2500]

i think you should upgrade the video card now, and overclock your current cpu until bulldozer comes out or sandy bridge is back. you can always reuse a video card.

 

[Maximilian]

Hmm why do you need 8GB of memory? Well whatever i think a significant upgrade would be to wait for bulldozer and see what that offers then a new mobo + cpu + graphics card would be a significant upgrade.

Depends on what you do though, a phenom II x4 would be a nice step up but i dont really see performance improving in anything if your current x2 handles everything fine. Games will be limited by the graphics card with an x4.

 

[wuliheron]

Just at a guess that mobo isn't terribly expensive, so replacing it is not a huge loss and certainly Sandy Bridge or Bulldozer would be a huge improvement if you can afford them.

That leaves the gpu which begs the question of what kind of power supply you have...

 

[Blitz KriegeR]

Depends what you do with it. You mentioned FSX; this program is extremely CPU hungry so in that case a faster CPU would show the biggest improvement. Computer (windows) responsiveness that SSD made the biggest improvement. A new GPU would also go a long way if you were playing other modern games.

Depending what you want to do with your PC, I'd suggest a PCIe GPU upgrade if/whenever you find a good deal, and a platform upgrade in the near future (bulldozer/sandy bridge?).

 

[RaistlinZ]

Ditto to the video card upgrade - you can transfer it to a new system later on. I also think it'd be worthwhile to pick up a cheap X4 to tide you over for a while. RAM is cheap, so I can't fault you for the RAM upgrade. 2GB isn't a lot in this day and age.

 

[nyker96]

I think get a PheII/x4 is a good upgrade option in your case.

 

[Texashiker]

A Phenom X4 the upgrade you should consider;

I think get a PheII/x4 is a good upgrade option in your case.

Considering we do not know what the system is used for, I can not be 100% sure adding 2 more cores will be of that much help. My son has an AMD 245 X2 at 2.9 ghz. I have an AMD 260 X4 at 2.6 ghz. When playing games like left 4 dead 2, my sons computer loads into the game almost always before mine does.

If anything I would upgrade the video card. The Sapphire 4650 is an old card, I retired mine in June of 2010 and gave it to my daughter.

If I was going to upgrade anything on the ops system, I would look at a better video card. The performance between that old 4650 and a newer video card should be well worth the investment. Also, when the motherbaord + CPU is upgraded, the video card should carry over.

 

[PopCulture]

It'a "ALWAYS" worth it to upgrade. If you have the spare cash. The upgrade will "ALWAYS" show it's value as use and time passes.

 

[mb103051]

Sandy bridge would be a giant leap over what you have..it gives you a month or 2 to save up some cash...honestly upgrading a phenom 2 now when bulldozer and SB are in the wings is kinda pointless..a waste of money IMO...
unless you are cash strapped and can only afford 1 piece of hardware then a p2 x4 cpu would be the answer and of course if your games warrant it a video card would be nice and would carry over to a newer system....sandy bridge is a very fast setup and o/clocks easily if you but the k model but if not any of the sb i3, i5 would be light years faster than what your running now and would be a very stout performer for years to come..you could even start with a lower line sb and upgrade the cpu as time goes by...

 

[Texashiker]

It'a "ALWAYS" worth it to upgrade. If you have the spare cash. The upgrade will "ALWAYS" show it's value as use and time passes.

I have to disagree with that statement. If you have a good parts, is it worth forking out hundreds of dollars just to get a few more frames per second in a game. Is it worth a few hundred dollars to shave a couple of minutes off video encoding?

There comes a point where minuet upgrades are not worth the financial investment.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Considering we do not know what the system is used for, I can not be 100% sure adding 2 more cores will be of that much help. My son has an AMD 245 X2 at 2.9 ghz. I have an AMD 260 X4 at 2.6 ghz. When playing games like left 4 dead 2, my sons computer loads into the game almost always before mine does.

If anything I would upgrade the video card. The Sapphire 4650 is an old card, I retired mine in June of 2010 and gave it to my daughter.

If I was going to upgrade anything on the ops system, I would look at a better video card. The performance between that old 4650 and a newer video card should be well worth the investment. Also, when the motherbaord + CPU is upgraded, the video card should carry over.

I was simply answering his question about whether a Phenom would be a good upgrade. And I believe it would be. He stated his usage is FSX, and that is a pretty CPU-heavy game.

But his 4650 is also pretty weak for that game. Ideally he would want to upgrade both CPU and GPU to see improvements. So he would see benefits from either.

 

[deimos3428]

The Phenom II X4 is a great chip but unless you're getting a really good deal on one, at this point I'd do the GPU upgrade and wait to see what Bulldozer does to the CPU market.

 

[fourty03]

A Phenom X4 the upgrade you should consider; don't count on an X2 unlocking. An X4 would be a significant upgrade, and worth the money. However if you were to wait, and switch motherboard, it would be worth the patience for the fixed Sandy Bridge boards and/or to see what AMD's Bulldozer can do. I don't think you should switch boards and keep the same platform. A simple drop in upgrade to a Phenom II X4 is the most cost effective thing you can do.

That is exactly my delimma .. basically its either jumping the gun and do a quick upgrade cpu, but then again that's where I would be limited as far as a path for future upgrades with the current board.

Hmm why do you need 8GB of memory? Well whatever i think a significant upgrade would be to wait for bulldozer and see what that offers then a new mobo + cpu + graphics card would be a significant upgrade.

I upgraded from 2gb ram to 8gb due to the availability and price of the ram at my local Microcenter. Since my motherboard only has 2 slots, and microcenter didnt have a single 2gb stick to add to my existing 2gb, I had to buy either 2 x 2gb sticks in pairs or 2 x 4gb sticks..

Other than that, no special reason... Just got tired of maxing out my 2gb all the time and didnt want to wait to order it online.

Just at a guess that mobo isn't terribly expensive, so replacing it is not a huge loss and certainly Sandy Bridge or Bulldozer would be a huge improvement if you can afford them.

That leaves the gpu which begs the question of what kind of power supply you have...

You are exactly correct on the assumption that it's a cheap motherboard.. lol.. Prior to building this system back in August, I stuck with Intel chipsets and cpu's and just wanted to try out AMD.. So far, I like it better. I think that if I do not do the Phenom upgrade, waiting for Bulldozer would be justifiable.

I have a no name power supply that I repaired (bulging caps) and had to add extra sata connectors too... It was more of a "Lets see if this works" than a money thing .. lol
I know that I would have to purchase atleast 500 + watt PS to support either cpu or gpu upgrade.

Depends what you do with it. You mentioned FSX; this program is extremely CPU hungry so in that case a faster CPU would show the biggest improvement. Computer (windows) responsiveness that SSD made the biggest improvement. A new GPU would also go a long way if you were playing other modern games.

Depending what you want to do with your PC, I'd suggest a PCIe GPU upgrade if/whenever you find a good deal, and a platform upgrade in the near future (bulldozer/sandy bridge?).

Ditto to the video card upgrade - you can transfer it to a new system later on. I also think it'd be worthwhile to pick up a cheap X4 to tide you over for a while. RAM is cheap, so I can't fault you for the RAM upgrade. 2GB isn't a lot in this day and age.

Yea, I am a student pilot, and I've used Flight Sim for a decade.. I do mainly run Flight Sims and I do find my girl getting on this while im working to play sims 3 and what not.

I also bought 3 4650's from an ebay auction a year ago before I even thought about building this system. When I bought this motherboard, I did not even think about crossfire support until after the fact. The bad thing is the board only has one PCI-e and 3 standard PCI slots..

I understand this is a budget board, and if it makes sense to just buy a gpu and wait until a new board comes along, I can take all my components and re use them ..

Considering we do not know what the system is used for, I can not be 100% sure adding 2 more cores will be of that much help. My son has an AMD 245 X2 at 2.9 ghz. I have an AMD 260 X4 at 2.6 ghz. When playing games like left 4 dead 2, my sons computer loads into the game almost always before mine does.

If anything I would upgrade the video card. The Sapphire 4650 is an old card, I retired mine in June of 2010 and gave it to my daughter.

If I was going to upgrade anything on the ops system, I would look at a better video card. The performance between that old 4650 and a newer video card should be well worth the investment. Also, when the motherbaord + CPU is upgraded, the video card should carry over.

It seems like I use a lot of cpu intensive games.. GTA 4, Cities XL, FSX, DCS Black Shark, DSC A-10 .. IL2 Sturmovik <spelling?>, COD series...

I have to agree that the 4650 is an old card. I overclocked it, and cannot push the memory clock pass 500mhz due to artifacts and BSOD.. I have the core speed at it's highest at 712mhz...

The Phenom II X4 is a great chip but unless you're getting a really good deal on one, at this point I'd do the GPU upgrade and wait to see what Bulldozer does to the CPU market.

This was the main reason for asking for advice.. The cheapest I found the X4 for was $120 ... I know for a gpu, to make it worth my while, is to get the ATi 5800 / Nvidia 450 series or higher for future gaming and performance.


Thank you everyone for the great advice and I really do appreciate the feedback here.! If anyone has any more feel free !! Thanks!

 

[SickBeast]

With an X4, you're going to be extremely GPU limited in games. If you need the CPU power for your general applications, then fine, but otherwise I think you need a whole new computer (CPU and GPU).

I would wait a month or so before doing anything. At the very least you should be able to get an X6 for around $150 at that time.

 

[Blitz KriegeR]

Yea, I am a student pilot, and I've used Flight Sim for a decade.. I do mainly run Flight Sims and I do find my girl getting on this while im working to play sims 3 and what not.

I also bought 3 4650's from an ebay auction a year ago before I even thought about building this system. When I bought this motherboard, I did not even think about crossfire support until after the fact. The bad thing is the board only has one PCI-e and 3 standard PCI slots..

I understand this is a budget board, and if it makes sense to just buy a gpu and wait until a new board comes along, I can take all my components and re use them ..

Speaking as a fellow pilot running a dual monitor 3840x1200 FSX setup, I would say both a GPU and CPU would help you out. As I've already said FSX is a compute monster that brings my 3.2Ghz Q66 to its knees as well as some i7s. A new CPU would go a looooong way here. Personally, depending on urgency, I'd wait & save then get a SB on Z68 when it launches. FSX doesn't need too powerful of a modern GPU in the core/shader area, but it eats memory alive with my dual screens. It uses between 10-60% of my GTX280's core resources. Memory is another matter; 600MB minimum when I'm nearly alone at FL360. It Reaches my GPUs cap of 1GB around 10000ft, and I can tell it's looking for more on approach or when on the ground in a larger airport. {I sim mostly into Intl airports!}

Oh and don't forget FSX doesn't play with SLI, period. Hopefully the new MS Flight will, but I'm still waiting to see how much they've changed the core of the sim before I even decide to try it.

As far as GPUs now and keeping it for a later system rebuild, I'd suggest these:

-2GB GTS450 if you can find one for ~$150 (recycled 8800GT core iirc) <-- Great for FSX
-2GB GTX460 for ~$220 if you have a larger budget and want the upgraded core power of nvidia's newer architecture.
-2GB AMD 6950 for ~$250-$280 if you can afford it, that's a baggin' GPU all around!

 

[fourty03]

Not until last week, I was running only a single display. Now, I have two displays and running each at 1280x1024 ...

About FL50 or so, in the clouds I get stuttering.. I have to turn off weather completely in most flights.. and I am assuming the gpu is to blame.

and winter on 19L (or any runway lol) taking off, with the landing gear rolling,
I get stuttering sometimes if I do a spot view direclty behind the plane.

Other than that, I dont have many problems. I do get a crash to desktop everyday. I replaced the UIautomation.dll and it dosnt happen much after doing that.

When I use PDGM 747 or the MD11, I get some stuttering.

I've never used Nvidia gpu's before and I am so tempted to get a GTX460 tomorrow. I've read tons of good reviews on it. I've always used ATI in every build.. Any reason to not get it ? I do plan on purchasing a 800 watt power supply just incase when I switch boards in the future. I want to get another ssd and raid0 it. Then again, I understand this is off topic for my thread here, but instead of raid0 on the ssd, should I just do a raid0 on a samsung f3 1tb?

Currently, I only have Win7 and FSX on the SSD and nothing else. It's a Crucial C300 64 gb. I also have a 1tb Samsung F3 which has 50+ gigs of FSX addons

 

[beginner99]

if you have the money and find it at a reasonable price I would get a GTX 560 Ti. Probably the best option right now.

Do you have 64-bit win 7?

 

[Blitz KriegeR]

Hehe mr student, if it's below transition altitude (18000ft in the US) it doesn't count as a Flight Level!

Anyway that stuttering could really be either the CPU having to load the textures or the GPU having to render them. As I said, anything will help you a lot.

You running any frame rate apps (google "fraps" for a free one)? If not, try. An ok frame rate (about 20fps is great for FSX) with a sudden drop when the stutter happens would lead me to say CPU bottleneck. In my system when I'm capped at 1GB GPU memory and I suddenly look around the models will instantly be there but the textures take time to load. That's a {my} GPU issue. Try climbing up to a cruise of FL300-400 and have a look at your FPS up there. Much less CPU workload. Or all around low frame rates which I think you will find is the case would lead me to say both!

Anyway, I've always favored Nvidia GPUs because AMD/ATI drivers are shit. I've owned 5 Nvidia cards and 2 ATI cards. They have improved in recent years but in all the time it took them to get it right I've become an nvidia fanboy! Also, Nvidia GPUs are compute giants if you can make use of things like CUDA/Physics/F@H. On the flip side, AMD/ATI GPUs tend to be cooler, lower power, and quieter.

Also, if you are only at 1280x1024 a 2GB GTX460 would be massive overkill. Can get a stock/mild OC'd 1GB 460 for $130-160 bucks, or a superclocked one for ~$200. I suspect you'd be happy with a GTS450 (reboxed 8800GT) for FSX. Check out that 2GB 450 for $150. Or, if you are looking to branch out into other newer titles have a glance at these:

this

with this promo code. VGA5546

Awesome find. This is also a fair deal in that price range: Evga GTX460 SSC+ (850/1700/3900)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-596-_-Product

That 460 should perform just shy of a 560 Ti. Though it is already clocked to the max, so overclocking is out. I'd also expect heat to be high and noise moderate.
Again, that 6870 is a steal too.

Oh, and random comments: I fly the Level-D Boeing 767-300ER and I'm trying to get into the PMDG 747 but its seems so dated compared to the LevelD's FMC and cockpit systems.

 

[Blitz KriegeR]

Sorry I completely forgot to address your other question.

Long story short I'd say No, RAID is hardly a viable option anymore. Modern high density hard drives have become fast enough that the overhead and increased risk of data loss/failure makes RAID0 impractical. That switch to an SSD made 100x the difference RAID0 would have.

As far as RAIDing SSDs, that is something I would research carefully. It introduced lots of problems such as alignment issues, and the inability to pass the TRIM command to a RAID array. Pure synthetic transfer rates do show fair gains on RAIDed SSDs but overall and actual performance would be intangible.

Oh and an 800w power supply would most likely be overkill even for a new system. better going with a quality 600-750 model I'd say. There have been some deals lately on Corsair's 620HX which anand reviewed recently. I own one of those on my other PC and its great. the 750W model is good too. Just make sure you know what you are buying and the cost is justifiable!

 

[fourty03]

Sorry I completely forgot to address your other question.

Long story short I'd say No, RAID is hardly a viable option anymore. Modern high density hard drives have become fast enough that the overhead and increased risk of data loss/failure makes RAID0 impractical. That switch to an SSD made 100x the difference RAID0 would have.

As far as RAIDing SSDs, that is something I would research carefully. It introduced lots of problems such as alignment issues, and the inability to pass the TRIM command to a RAID array. Pure synthetic transfer rates do show fair gains on RAIDed SSDs but overall and actual performance would be intangible.

Oh and an 800w power supply would most likely be overkill even for a new system. better going with a quality 600-750 model I'd say. There have been some deals lately on Corsair's 620HX which anand reviewed recently. I own one of those on my other PC and its great. the 750W model is good too. Just make sure you know what you are buying and the cost is justifiable!

Thank you so much for your response. Is it obvious im a student ? lol good catch hehe ...

I really want to pull the trigger on the video card upgrade and get a gtx 460 ..
Being an avid ATI fan for life, I am really hesitant on the purchase.

I have to go back to Microcenter tonight because, again, I have to take back RAM that they recommended was compatible with an AMD system. They had the GTX 460 for sale with MIR and instant savings.

I already took back a pair of corsair, now I have to take back the Patriot. I looked the patriot up after seeing that it's not running to spec, and see that's its for an Intel system. I went into the BIOS and tried to force the correct timings, and the system hangs and wont even make it into windows.

I cannot even overclock because it will hang. If I adjust the voltage on the ram to spec 1.65, it hangs. It's running @ 1.50v at 466mhz with 7,7,7,24 timings where it should be 1.65v, 1333, 9,9,9,20 ...

Thanks for all the advice everyone.

 

[tweakboy]

Give us information in your signature. How can we help you if we dont even know what it is

 

[fourty03]

Hello all...

I have a Biostar 785g motherboard, with an Athlon x2 250 cpu.

Over the weekend, I installed a Crucial C300 SSD and and replaced my 2gb OCZ ddr3 (1 stick) ram with Patriot 8gb ddr3 ram (2 sticks)

Saturday, I bought Crucial DDR3 8gb Ram and it failed memtest+ really bad, and microcenter did not have 4gb sticks of the ocz ram.. So I returned the defective memory and went with the Patriot..

basically the upgrades I just did on this did boost my performance some .. I use FSX a lot on here and I seen a little improvement on
most aspects.

I have a 4650 video card, and only one pci-e slot, so I cannot do crossfire
or anything like that, and video will be my next upgrade.

I am wondering, would it be a significant upgrade if I replaced the CPU with maybe a phenom II x4 or x2 and hope it unlocks? Or should I wait and get a new motherboard with new cpu?


My current setup is:
Athlon X2 250
Biostar 785g motherboard
8gb DDR3 "patriot" ram
Sapphire 4650
Crucial C300 64gb SSD
1TB Samsung F3


Thanks in advance!

First post This ram failed in memtest with 1 error just now ... No overclock currently since installing this ram (unable to due to system freezing @ windows 7 logo), when I had my 2gb stick of OCZ 1333 I could get my X2 to about 3.6 ghz from the stock 3.0 ghz

I think I might just get the HD 6850.. looks like I got some more reading to do

 

[tweakboy]

That will be a good upgrade. Youll never look back.. gl