My bottleneck?

[spncrmoo]

Ok so a couple of years ago I built a new pc and at the time it had decent specs. Don't get me wrong it still copes now, but in all my Skyrim playing I miss being able to crank up the settings to the highest.

So, I figure it's time for an upgrade, but since I built it I haven't really kept up to date with the tech and I'm not sure what I should be upgrading etc. Dunno whether I should be upgrading to an i5/i7, or if my 1055T is actually OK and it's the 460 GTX letting me down.

Some help please! Possible upgrade options? Recommendations? Thaanks

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 AMD 770 Socket AM3
Processor: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T 2.8GHz 6MB L3
Memory: 8GB (4x2GB) DDR3 1600MHz Kingston HyperX 1.65V CL9
Graphics: GeForce GTX 460 (768M GDDR5) Palit
Hard Drive: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB SATAII 7200rpm 32MB Cache
PSU: XFX 650W XXX Edition Single Rail Modular PSU

 

[Corporate Thug]

the 1055T performs slightly slower than an i5 in most cases but that should be good enough. If I were to upgrade, I would upgrade the 460.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

2500k, z68 motherboard, 8 more gb ram, and a gtx 570.

 

[tweakboy]

2500k, z68 motherboard, 8 more gb ram, and a gtx 570.

Good call,

But 8GB more RAM for what ? can I ask, Are we doing triple tasking gaming here ? where we have 3 games launched at the same time along with premiere rendering ni the background lol

Yes its nice to have 16GB ,, but you dont need it unless you do 1 of the following two things.

User Adobe Premiere
Use DAW Sonar X1 Producer

If you dont use those two, that 16 is just to look cool , u will never use it. YOU WILL NEVER EVEN USE 8GB of ram. As far as your skyrim the GPU is fine, the CPU is bringing it down a bit. You can OC those 460 like monsters,, have you OCed your video card, Have you OCed this AMD CPU you have ? gl

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I don't really know if 8gb more ram helps but I know when I look at memory usage on my system I'm usually using 4-6gb and windows has like 7gb cached. I have 16gb. Why or if it is even helping my system I don't know. I do know you'd be future proofing your rig especially when we start getting 3gb and 4gb cards coming up with the next gen graphics cards.

 

[Ken g6]

in all my Skyrim playing I miss being able to crank up the settings to the highest.

Skyrim, I hear, needs two things: a couple fast cores and high GPU memory bandwidth. You're lacking in both areas. I would tend to agree on upgrading the 460 mainly because it's a 768MB model, with 3/4 the bandwidth of the 1GB model. Then overclock the 1055T, disabling cores if it helps!

 

[spncrmoo]

Hmm well the 1055T is overclocked to 3.2, don't really wanna push it further than that. Thinking of going for a 1 or 2GB 560ti, they have a sweet price, though I hear it's due to drop again?.

"2500k, z68 motherboard, 8 more gb ram, and a gtx 570"

Yeah in an ideal world I would upgrade every part of it. But obviously I have a budget, hence I'm asking which part is my bottleneck. I really want to know which single upgrade (let's say below £250) will bring me the most improvement.

Thanks though

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

Don't want to push it further than 3.2? Why? I don't know amd at all but from what others say a 4ghz overclock is pretty common on those cpu's. If you're on a tight budget than why not take the free performance boost?

 

[spncrmoo]

Hmm it's just that I'm no overclocking expert. I know a bit and I'm comfortable getting a littl e boost, but anything more intense and I'm just worried about frying it or making things worse. Can I get much more push with my Xigmatek HDT-S1283 cooler?

It's expensive kit to replace if I break it, as a university student! Aha.

It's seeming like maybe the best thing to do then is go for more overclock on my CPU and go for a 560ti ?

 

[coolpurplefan]

I don't know what to say because I read some messages by someone on hardforum saying he overclocked an Intel CPU and used two video cards in SLI to play BF3. The result? It looked to me that if you wanted to run one single CPU and single video card at stock speeds you'd need to get the next generation CPU and GPU. But, this is my opinion from what I read.

 

[mfenn]

I don't know what to say because I read some messages by someone on hardforum saying he overclocked an Intel CPU and used two video cards in SLI to play BF3. The result? It looked to me that if you wanted to run one single CPU and single video card at stock speeds you'd need to get the next generation CPU and GPU. But, this is my opinion from what I read.

I thought we were talking about Skyrim here.

 

[mfenn]

Hmm well the 1055T is overclocked to 3.2, don't really wanna push it further than that. Thinking of going for a 1 or 2GB 560ti, they have a sweet price, though I hear it's due to drop again?.

"2500k, z68 motherboard, 8 more gb ram, and a gtx 570"

Yeah in an ideal world I would upgrade every part of it. But obviously I have a budget, hence I'm asking which part is my bottleneck. I really want to know which single upgrade (let's say below £250) will bring me the most improvement.

Thanks though

That's some information that probably would have been useful in the OP.

Ken is right on target though. Your parts are pretty well matched (shoulda gotten an i5 750 when you built), so upgrading one is going to make the other your bottleneck.

I say to upgrade your GPU because you can overclock your CPU some more and would need new RAM if you got an Intel CPU (your current RAM is 1.65V, Intel likes 1.5V). A 6950 2GB fits nicely into your budget and would serve you through the next CPU upgrade cycle.