Question Suggestions for a GTX 1070 upgrade on MSI Z170A board, Intel® Z170 Express Chipset?

SaltyNuts

Platinum Member
May 1, 2001
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I bought a PowerSpec PC ages ago, like probably 3 or 4 years ago, from MicroCenter. It has a GTX 1070 card. Still seems ok, but slowing down in some games. I figured, what the heck, there must be an easy, cheap upgrade for this, I got it like 3 or 4 years ago so surely there is a ton newer stuff, and cheap. But I did some googling, and others replying to similar threads in a few places (not AT, other forums) were naming video cards, and when I looked them up on Amazon, they were like over $1,000?!??!? Is there not any reasonably priced graphics card as an upgrade for this computer? Its PowerSpec model G313 in case that matters.

Thanks!!!
 

lobz

Platinum Member
Feb 10, 2017
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Right now? Literally just do NOT upgrade and I'm not even kidding. NOTHING is cheap right now that'd mean an actually worthwhile upgrade to an 1070. Wait for the GPU crapstorm to be over, if you can.
 
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SaltyNuts

Platinum Member
May 1, 2001
2,399
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Oh wow, that is incredible. Throughout my life I remember graphics cards being like $100 to like $250, the latter being screamers. But now over $1,000 for an upgrade, like 3 or 4 years after I bought the system? AMAZING. What caused this? The coin mining crap? Any chance it will return to normal soon? Can't wait for that crap to collapse.
 

Fallen Kell

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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Oh wow, that is incredible. Throughout my life I remember graphics cards being like $100 to like $250, the latter being screamers. But now over $1,000 for an upgrade, like 3 or 4 years after I bought the system? AMAZING. What caused this? The coin mining crap? Any chance it will return to normal soon? Can't wait for that crap to collapse.
The coin mining "crap" as you put it along with a global shortage of chip manufacturing capability brought on by a combination of covid (both a supply loss and a massive 40-50% increase in demand for computers due to a lot of people working from home and having kids go to school from home requiring everyone to have their own separate computer and/or upgrading existing computers due to age and the sudden need for them to do more than check email/browse the net).
 

Tup3x

Senior member
Dec 31, 2016
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I upgraded to RTX 3060 Ti and with overclock it's about 2x faster in general (rasterisation performance). Still, I thought that the 559 € I paid was steep. It did give much needed speed boost for 1440p. Now the same MSI Gaming X Trio costs about double... and you still can't actually buy one. It's better to just wait at the moment.
 

SaltyNuts

Platinum Member
May 1, 2001
2,399
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Wow, thanks everyone. Sitting put on the graphics card for a LOOOOONG time it seems. What about CPUs - I know this is not the CPU forum but just generally, do they have shortages like the graphics cards? Right off hand their prices seem a little high but not insane lol.

Thanks!!!
 
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blckgrffn

Diamond Member
May 1, 2003
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www.teamjuchems.com
Wow, thanks everyone. Sitting put on the graphics card for a LOOOOONG time it seems. What about CPUs - I know this is not the CPU forum but just generally, do they have shortages like the graphics cards? Right off hand their prices seem a little high but not insane lol.

Thanks!!!

It’s mainly GPUs. Ram has been going back up a bit, but CPUs, mainboards and nvme storage solutions are reasonable. I’d say CPU prices are way better now than they were in say, November of 2020. It’s the end of the line for new stuff that uses DDR4 so if you can drop in a new CPU I’d say go for it.

If you are willing to work it, you can still get GPU upgrades. Luckily you have a 1070 so when all the prices inflated, so did the value of your card. You just have to find the right opportunity.

I’d say the the 3080/3090 power and heat dissipation requirements would make them a challenge for a prebuilt that had a 1070 to even handle, even if you could buy them.
 

GodisanAtheist

Diamond Member
Nov 16, 2006
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Wow, thanks everyone. Sitting put on the graphics card for a LOOOOONG time it seems. What about CPUs - I know this is not the CPU forum but just generally, do they have shortages like the graphics cards? Right off hand their prices seem a little high but not insane lol.

Thanks!!!

AMD CPUs did definitely experience a serious squeeze at launch, but the situation for DIY folks appears to be slowly resolving on the CPU front.

No absolutely killer deals, but there are a number of very reasonable options from both AMD or Intel across the board becoming more and more available.

Even used GPU prices are slowly coming down. They're certainly still hyper inflated, but not quite what they were 2-3 months ago.
 

lobz

Platinum Member
Feb 10, 2017
2,057
2,856
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Wow, thanks everyone. Sitting put on the graphics card for a LOOOOONG time it seems. What about CPUs - I know this is not the CPU forum but just generally, do they have shortages like the graphics cards? Right off hand their prices seem a little high but not insane lol.

Thanks!!!
CPUs were a little rough too a couple of months ago, though not even remotely close to the level of damnation GPUs have been seeing. The CPU market is somewhat healthy right now, so... shop away if you're in the mood :) :)
 

VirtualLarry

No Lifer
Aug 25, 2001
56,226
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Of course, the real question is: Why weren't you "mining" on the GTX 1070 for the last six months? You could have paid off part of a new GPU with that one.