A good $660 Upgrade

[arickgabriel]

Hello everyone. Again I need a very fair advice from those people who aren't Intel/AMD fanboys. I have decided to jump ship to Intel, as I am currently on an AMD based build. List of components below:

Asus M5A99FX Pro R.2
Phenom II X4 955BE OC'd to 3.8GHZ
Hyper 212 Evo
Inno3D GTX 980 Herculez (I know, this is heavily bottlenecked, but I got it for only $467, or PhP21,000 here in the Philippines.)
G Skill Ripjaws X 1333 2GBx4
FSP Aurum Gold 700W (planning to replace with Seasonic G-750)
Samsung 840 EVO 250GB SSD
WD Black 1TB
Seagate 7200rpm 500GB

The first component I am planning to upgrade besides the CPU and mobo is the PSU, since I want a more fresh supply of power for my parts, especially my GPU. My question is this - upon checking the current prices of Intel components here in the Philippines, is it better to go Skylake, or will a Haswell build be enough? I'm only gaming on 1080p. I don't need an i7 build too, just an overclockable i5 will do. I am not satisfied anymore with my current build since the 955BE cannot give me a constant 60fps especially when viewing A LOT of buildings and landscapes. Remember, my budget's only around $660, as I'm only planning to upgrade CPU, mobo, RAM, and PSU.

 

[bliq]

I'd keep the PSU you have unless theres something wrong with it. FSP Aurum Gold PSU's are very solid PSU's.

Use the savings to possibly bump you up to skylake i5-6600k and a good motherboard and maybe more RAM.

 

[arickgabriel]

I'd keep the PSU you have unless theres something wrong with it. FSP Aurum Gold PSU's are very solid PSU's.

Use the savings to possibly bump you up to skylake i5-6600k and a good motherboard and maybe more RAM.

Thanks for the reply. I'm already eyeing the 6600k if ever I'll choose Skylake. What motherboard can you suggest? I prefer Asus mobos BTW.

 

[oczdude8]

Definitely don't waste money "upgrading" your PSU. You will not get any performance benefit from it (obviously), and it will probably last another few years (Especially since its under pretty light loads in your system).

If possible go for a skylake i5 with a higher end Z chipset motherboard

 

[hennybeartech]

You can get an i5 4460 cheap in gilmore. like 7k php or cheaper. and partner that with a good h97 chipset board. if you want over clocking, get the 4690k anbd get a good z97 mobo with good power phases and a cooler like at least a hyper 212x available in all leading pc hardware stores. if you want aesthetics go with an AIO like corsair h65, check dynaquest for prices.

You really need a good quality psu no matter what. see this list for more information: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-2547993/psu-tier-list.html

here in the philippines for builds that are using a single gpu and that are on a budget, i reccomend the s12 series from seasonic as its the cheapest tier 2 PSU that you can buy. i personally use the s12 520w on my 4460 and gtx 970.

your cpu definitely bottle necks the gpu. that can only go as far as maybe 270x's or gtx 760's without compromises.

 

[Outlander_04]

You can pretty much double your cpu horsepower by swapping in an FX 8320 and overclocking.
Then you would be running demanding games on. Par with any Intel build

 

[arickgabriel]

You can pretty much double your cpu horsepower by swapping in an FX 8320 and overclocking.
Then you would be running demanding games on. Par with any Intel build

Actually I've already thought of that. I even posted a question regarding that months ago, that's why if you'll take a look at my component list, I have a M5A99FX Pro R.2 because initially I decided to go with an FX8320 build.

But upon seeing benchmarks and reading on threads, I've read that most games prefer Intel builds optimization wise. I actually hate that fact, seeing AMD CPUs are really good in the price to performance department.

Lastly, when I posted here a few months ago they all told me that it would be a waste of money to go with the 8320 telling me that it's hardly an upgrade to a 955 BE because of having weaker cores. I'm also looking at the heat and power generated by it when heavily overclocked, and it gets VEEEERY hot in my room.

 

[arickgabriel]

You can get an i5 4460 cheap in gilmore. like 7k php or cheaper. and partner that with a good h97 chipset board. if you want over clocking, get the 4690k anbd get a good z97 mobo with good power phases and a cooler like at least a hyper 212x available in all leading pc hardware stores. if you want aesthetics go with an AIO like corsair h65, check dynaquest for prices.

You really need a good quality psu no matter what. see this list for more information: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-2547993/psu-tier-list.html

here in the philippines for builds that are using a single gpu and that are on a budget, i reccomend the s12 series from seasonic as its the cheapest tier 2 PSU that you can buy. i personally use the s12 520w on my 4460 and gtx 970.

your cpu definitely bottle necks the gpu. that can only go as far as maybe 270x's or gtx 760's without compromises.

Hey fellow Pinoy! Well I check their prices everyday in TPC and Dynaquest and I'm not convinced with the price difference of Haswell and Skylake CPUs. They're almost the same, which frustrates me the most. For the motherboards, good z97s and z170s are also almost similar in prices, and I find them rather expensive considering my use and my eye for aesthetics.

IF I go Haswell, what Asus z97 board would you recommend?

 

[Outlander_04]

Older games that don't use all cores favor Intel

But new games and DX12 favor more cores.

And usually even when the AMD is "slower" its making more than 60 fps anyway. Since most monitors are 60 Hz they can never disply more than 60 fps . Ever. The extra frames are dropped and never displayed

 

[hennybeartech]

if you go for z97-a or the plus, it'll be a good choice. or the asrock pro 3 or 4. if you want a flashy red dragon on your mobo go on the msi gaming, its good too but of course, go for asus if you can.