- Jan 24, 2010
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- 18,530
bearing in mind i have no real funds for a new build i need a suggestion or two...... or three.
my current rig is quite old. i have upgraded and maxed out all i possibly can as im limited by my motherboard.....and finances!
my rig is as follows:
asus p53vm-hdmi motherboard
8 gigs ddr2 400 [4 sticks of 2 gigs]
q9650 at stock speed 3.0 ghz
1 tb 7200 rpm sata seagate performer [windows 10 64 bit build 14393.51 and all programs]
3 tb 7200 rpm sata seagate performer
2 tb western digital external drive [exact copy of the 3 tb seagate]
gigabyte r9 270 [2 gig]
tp-link gigabit ethernet card in pcie x1 slot [for some reason the onboard atheros gigabit lan port stopped working and doesnt exist in windows
550 watt quality psu
120mm rear fan, 90mm side window fan
NO optical drive
i use my computer mostly for FPS games, flight sims and others, and the basics [web browsing, watching videos(the optimum ultra 101 allows me to youtube and netflix at 1080p with zero latency and buffering)]. occasionally ill edit videos taken with my galaxy cell phone.
with almost all of the newest AAA titles with settings maxed out and AA/AF and vsync off, i get decent frame rates. if i get 30fps or greater im content but normally i get much better than that. older games run at 200 fps+!!!
i want to overclock the q9650 to 4 ghz, a 25% overclock which is easily attainable. i tried overclocking to 3.6 simply by putting the fsb to the memory's stock speed of 400. the q9650 runs at 333. with this one setting and locking the pcie bus to 100 i get a 800mhz overclock. unfortunately i let the bios automatically handle the voltages and it went up to 1.34 volts which was unnecessary. it could do 3.6 at stock voltage if i dial in all my settings manually. with the stock hsf temps ran up to 80°C in 30 seconds. at idle it runs at 50°C! smh.
im also going to buy a ssd to replace my main 1 tb drive. i know a single ssd is the last and only upgrade left to do with this rig and will, from what i hear, dramatically improve my access times and boot up speeds and programs loading faster. last year i replaced the E8400 3.0 ghz with the q9650 3.0 ghz and thats the fastest cpu this mobo can take. the memory is also the fastest possible and is maxed out at 8 gigs.
so there it is. my only upgrade path IS an ssd. with what i have explained above, my questions are:
1. would it be worth it to get 2 ssd's and put them in raid0? or is it overkill and ill just reach a point of diminishing returns?
2. what HSF do you reccommend in the 30-50 dollar range? i know ill have to measure and make sure about clearances and also i know i could spend a 100 dollars for a watercooled closed loop system or the top of the line noctua but all that extra cash for just a few degrees cooler aint worth it.
3. after these last upgrades what videocard do you reccommend for the future? the only upgrades WOULD be the videocard anyway. Fof me its not worth it spending 600+ on a videocard for an outdated beast. im hearing great things about the R9 390 and the RX 480 [8 gig model].
like i said, as is my pc serves me well but i know with a good hsf i can easily get 4.0 ghz+. it would be like i upgraded my cpu again.
i would like to thank you all in advance for your advice and participation.
my current rig is quite old. i have upgraded and maxed out all i possibly can as im limited by my motherboard.....and finances!
my rig is as follows:
asus p53vm-hdmi motherboard
8 gigs ddr2 400 [4 sticks of 2 gigs]
q9650 at stock speed 3.0 ghz
1 tb 7200 rpm sata seagate performer [windows 10 64 bit build 14393.51 and all programs]
3 tb 7200 rpm sata seagate performer
2 tb western digital external drive [exact copy of the 3 tb seagate]
gigabyte r9 270 [2 gig]
tp-link gigabit ethernet card in pcie x1 slot [for some reason the onboard atheros gigabit lan port stopped working and doesnt exist in windows
550 watt quality psu
120mm rear fan, 90mm side window fan
NO optical drive
i use my computer mostly for FPS games, flight sims and others, and the basics [web browsing, watching videos(the optimum ultra 101 allows me to youtube and netflix at 1080p with zero latency and buffering)]. occasionally ill edit videos taken with my galaxy cell phone.
with almost all of the newest AAA titles with settings maxed out and AA/AF and vsync off, i get decent frame rates. if i get 30fps or greater im content but normally i get much better than that. older games run at 200 fps+!!!
i want to overclock the q9650 to 4 ghz, a 25% overclock which is easily attainable. i tried overclocking to 3.6 simply by putting the fsb to the memory's stock speed of 400. the q9650 runs at 333. with this one setting and locking the pcie bus to 100 i get a 800mhz overclock. unfortunately i let the bios automatically handle the voltages and it went up to 1.34 volts which was unnecessary. it could do 3.6 at stock voltage if i dial in all my settings manually. with the stock hsf temps ran up to 80°C in 30 seconds. at idle it runs at 50°C! smh.
im also going to buy a ssd to replace my main 1 tb drive. i know a single ssd is the last and only upgrade left to do with this rig and will, from what i hear, dramatically improve my access times and boot up speeds and programs loading faster. last year i replaced the E8400 3.0 ghz with the q9650 3.0 ghz and thats the fastest cpu this mobo can take. the memory is also the fastest possible and is maxed out at 8 gigs.
so there it is. my only upgrade path IS an ssd. with what i have explained above, my questions are:
1. would it be worth it to get 2 ssd's and put them in raid0? or is it overkill and ill just reach a point of diminishing returns?
2. what HSF do you reccommend in the 30-50 dollar range? i know ill have to measure and make sure about clearances and also i know i could spend a 100 dollars for a watercooled closed loop system or the top of the line noctua but all that extra cash for just a few degrees cooler aint worth it.
3. after these last upgrades what videocard do you reccommend for the future? the only upgrades WOULD be the videocard anyway. Fof me its not worth it spending 600+ on a videocard for an outdated beast. im hearing great things about the R9 390 and the RX 480 [8 gig model].
like i said, as is my pc serves me well but i know with a good hsf i can easily get 4.0 ghz+. it would be like i upgraded my cpu again.
i would like to thank you all in advance for your advice and participation.
.
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