Upgrading my comp. (HB)

[Shadow_Riv]

I would like to upgrade the computer I built last year around Nov. Current System Specs:

HIS Radeon 4890 | http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814161276

Intel i5 750

Gigabyte P55M-UD2 1156 Socket

Antec 300 case

Antec 500W PSU | http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817371004

DDR3 4GB | http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231277

Samsung Spinpoint 500GB (currently @ 85GB free) |http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822152181

What I've bought so far: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB

Games I play and want to play better: Sims 2 & 3 w/ all EPs and SPs, Sniper Elite, Halo, Crysis (runs okay but not on full specs.), Age of Empires 2 &3, etc...

Sites: Anything US based is fine. I prefer newegg but if another site has it for less then it's okay. Budget: $500 (I may go higher depending on what I need)

I don't want to upgrade my monitor or case because I feel they're fine. The monitor's native resolution is 1920 x 1080 btw.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

None of those games besides Crysis require upgrading. Do you just want to upgrade to max out Crysis?

 

[mfenn]

I sincerely hope that you're not looking for better performance in Age2. I played that on a PIII 500.

Your current system is quite fast and the only thing that would really benefit from an upgrade is the GPU. You're gonna be looking at the GTX 470 and up for a decent bump in graphics performance.

Something list this will be good:
Corsair 650TX $61 AR Apromo
GTX 470 $270 AR

EDIT: You could also get a heatsink like the Venomous X and overclock your i5 a bit.

 

[Davidh373]

The only thing I can see for you to upgrade is the graphics. What is your budget? A GTX 460 would be a significant upgrade. If you want something beefier like a 470 that would work too.

As for why I say that is because the rest of the computer is like new.

 

[Shadow_Riv]

My budget is $500. I could go higher. I mean none of those games, aside from Crysis, lag or become bumpy but I was told when I built it that building for the future (1-2 years) is stupid and that I should upgrade once a year. The HD is getting too low for my taste and I figured if I was going to buy an additional HD I might as well get some other upgrades in there as well.

 

[Shadow_Riv]

None of those games besides Crysis require upgrading. Do you just want to upgrade to max out Crysis?

Yep. Crysis 2 is on pre-order, so I'm not even sure what I'm going to be up against.

 

[Davidh373]

My budget is $500. I could go higher. I mean none of those games, aside from Crysis, lag or become bumpy but I was told when I built it that building for the future (1-2 years) is stupid and that I should upgrade once a year. The HD is getting too low for my taste and I figured if I was going to buy an additional HD I might as well get some other upgrades in there as well.

Get the 460 1GB. It is a good balance with the i5. I suppose your build wouldn't balance badly with a 470 either. Your choice, both are under budget .

EDIT: Crysis 2 seems like it will be better optimized since it is also set for console release. We are all hoping...

 

[Shadow_Riv]

I've never had a Nvidia card. Do you recommend a specific board manufacture?

 

[Davidh373]

I've never had a Nvidia card. Do you recommend a specific board manufacture?

Gigabyte, EVGA, ASUS. Really the actual card comes from NVidia or ATI and then stamped with a different sticker (rarely a different casing) so all that really differs is warranty.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

A GTX 460 wouldn't be much faster than a 4890. Due to your motherboard, CrossfireX and SLI aren't an option. The only two cards that are significantly faster than your 4890 are the GTX 480 and the 5970. You really should just wait for higher performing cards to come out.

 

[Shadow_Riv]

You're right. I checked the benchmarks and even came across this and the consensus is the same.

BTW, CrossfireX is an option for my mobo.

 

[Davidh373]

A GTX 460 wouldn't be much faster than a 4890. Due to your motherboard, CrossfireX and SLI aren't an option. The only two cards that are significantly faster than your 4890 are the GTX 480 and the 5970. You really should just wait for higher performing cards to come out.

Oh DAMN. I thought that was a 4850 for some reason. I have one of those and it still runs everything fine. If that is the case I would get a dedicated OS/App SSD @ around 65GB. I hear it's a pretty great upgrade. I'm thinking about that, or a 460 to get me some CUDA support for Adobe products.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

You're right. I checked the benchmarks and even came across this and the consensus is the same.

BTW, CrossfireX is an option for my mobo.

While your motherboard will allow you, your second slot is wired to 4 lanes and that will be a large bottleneck for the second card.

The board does support CrossFireX operation although we highly recommend against this setup as the second PCIe x16 slot is actually an x4 electrical slot running off the P55 chipset.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3572