I'm a Noob at PC Upgrading. Help?

[Snuky]

Okay, So Basically I Want To Upgrade My PC But I'm a Noob When It Comes To It. Pretty Much My PC Specs Are:

AM720FX
AMD -4300
8GB Ram DDR3
4GB GTX 960
500V Power
1 TB Hard drive

And I'm Not really Sure What Else I'm Suppose To Add. I Plan To Upgrade To 16GB Of Ram But What I'm Not 100% About Is What Can I Upgrade My AMD 4300 To And If I Upgrade It, Do I Need To Upgrade The AM720 As Well.?

Help....

 

[CountMike]

AM720FX is designation for whole computer. Find out exact MB and than maybe you could upgrade processor.

 

[belo]

typically when you're "upgrading" you're only looking at things like memory, storage and maybe a gpu. If you want to really upgrade you need to buy a new mobo which in turn can handle newer/better - memory, processors and pcie ssd's etc.

Usually, not always the case, but usually when you buy an all in one solution it has generally the best spec'd components with it. For example, you might be able to handle ddr3 now, but a new mobo could handle ddr4. You usually can add more memory, more storage and better gpu's. But you might not be able to get the next generation stuff without essentially starting from scratch.

hope that helps.

 

[Obakasama]

Boring question: why are you upgrading?
Alternatively: what problem with your PC have you encountered making you want to upgrade?

For motherboard information I would suggest something like Speccy to find out what it is, so others can determine which CPUs are compatible with it.

 

[Snuky]

AM720FX is designation for whole computer. Find out exact MB and than maybe you could upgrade processor.

I Built Mine Exactly Like This For Starters.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00SV7ITKM/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It's a AM720FX 2GB.

 

[Snuky]

Boring question: why are you upgrading?
Alternatively: what problem with your PC have you encountered making you want to upgrade?

For motherboard information I would suggest something like Speccy to find out what it is, so others can determine which CPUs are compatible with it.

The Reason I'm Upgrading Is Because When i Play Certain Games On My PC, It Lags Out Any Other Tab I Have Open. Usually I Play Rocket League Or Watch Dogs 2 On My PC And Watch Youtube On My Second Monitor But It Basically Stops My Second Monitor From Responding And I Don't Know Why. I Play In 1280x720 And My Monitor Is 1920x1080. I Am Upgrading To 16GBs Of Ram So Hopefully It Helps Tomorrow, Since Task Manager Says My Memory is 100% Full And On CPU Usage As Well.

 

[Snuky]

typically when you're "upgrading" you're only looking at things like memory, storage and maybe a gpu. If you want to really upgrade you need to buy a new mobo which in turn can handle newer/better - memory, processors and pcie ssd's etc.

Usually, not always the case, but usually when you buy an all in one solution it has generally the best spec'd components with it. For example, you might be able to handle ddr3 now, but a new mobo could handle ddr4. You usually can add more memory, more storage and better gpu's. But you might not be able to get the next generation stuff without essentially starting from scratch.

hope that helps.

I Can Run DDR3, This Is The Computer I Had My Friend Build Me And It's Exactly The Same Except I Have a GTX 960 And Tomorrow I Will Have 16GB of Ram.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00SV7ITKM/ref=asc_df_B00SV7ITKM4726760?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&tag=shopzilla0d-20&ascsubtag=shopzilla_rev_365-20;14846258234014939242010090302008005&linkCode=df0&creative=395093&creativeASIN=B00SV7ITKM

Basically I Want To Upgrade So task Manager Doesn't Lag out And Say It's 100% On All The Tabs. It Only Does That With Games I Play With Steam.

 

[Obakasama]

Sounds like you've already bought the RAM so I'll skip that.

Personally it sounds like there's something wrong if some tabs in Task Manager are on 100%. It may be worthwhile trying to see if there are underlying issues before any major upgrades. Have you ran any anti-virus and malware scanners? This would be the first thing I would do to check if the system is actually okay. The other thing would be actually tracking which processes are utilising so much of the PC's resources.

From your experience it sounds like the CPU is the main factor in reduced performance. I would still suggest you find out what motherboard you have as CountMike suggested. A more powerful CPU is probably more noticeable than other upgrades given the problems you're experiencing.

 

[belo]

^ I'm with that guy. you want to rule out software before tackling expensive hardware. if you do a lot of torrenting and *cough* nighttime webbrowsing *cough* you could have some issues. There comes a point too where a fresh install of windows after years of use is a good fix.

But yes upgrading amount of memory will not hurt anything (make sure you have similar timing and that your bios is setup for the correct timing and voltage), iirc your comp will buffer to the lowest grade memory, so just buying 2 new sticks of extra memory might help but not as much as having 4 sticks of the best spec'd memory your mobo can handle. I might have lost you but I know because I learned that one the hardway.

also not every mobo takes every speed of memory. I'm concerned you bough memory without knowing what your mobo is capable of. Just look at all the different speeds ddr3 comes in. without overclocking you want the fastest speed your mobo can handle http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&IsNodeId=1&N=100007611 601190327 8000 601275373 600052012

after memory, yes you can upgrade your cpu after you figure out socket

 

[Snuky]

^ I'm with that guy. you want to rule out software before tackling expensive hardware. if you do a lot of torrenting and *cough* nighttime webbrowsing *cough* you could have some issues. There comes a point too where a fresh install of windows after years of use is a good fix.

But yes upgrading amount of memory will not hurt anything (make sure you have similar timing and that your bios is setup for the correct timing and voltage), iirc your comp will buffer to the lowest grade memory, so just buying 2 new sticks of extra memory might help but not as much as having 4 sticks of the best spec'd memory your mobo can handle. I might have lost you but I know because I learned that one the hardway.

also not every mobo takes every speed of memory. I'm concerned you bough memory without knowing what your mobo is capable of. Just look at all the different speeds ddr3 comes in. without overclocking you want the fastest speed your mobo can handle http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&IsNodeId=1&N=100007611 601190327 8000 601275373 600052012

after memory, yes you can upgrade your cpu after you figure out socket

I Did Look Into What Kind Of RAM My Mobo Can Handle, And I Did Get The Corsair Vengeance, The RAM I'm Good At Finding Since It's Pretty Much Easy To Find. I Just Feel Like I Think I Should Get A MotherBoard More Then 2GB, I'm Not Sure Though That's Why I'm Confused.

 

[Snuky]

I Game A Lot And I Have Over 75K Subs, So I Want To Get My PC Better Then It Is Now, What If I Upgrade My Processor To The Intel Core i5-4440 3.1GHz Quad-Core And I get A ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard? Would That Help My Gaming In Any Way? I'm Just Looking At PCPartPicker: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/rZsFCJ

 

[Obakasama]

As it currently stands (generally speaking) Intel's CPUs offer better performance than AMD's. (Still waiting to see if Ryzen lives up to the hype.)

As for what you're proposing it would depend on the prices where you are. Where I live some older components cost about the same as the newest if not more; I would get the latest generation of hardware due to the prices. But with that generation of i5 you can use your RAM.

 

[belo]

well you already bought ram, so while not a total waste of money if you're going to do a mobo I'd suggest the latest greatest and that'd be a 270 and one that will allow you to utilize ddr4 2400 and the new kabylake intel cpus. The new boards are being released daily so I might suggest you wait. you can reuse your gpu and also your case a probably your power supply.

also consider the new ssd's, you might be bottle necking there. the Samsung 960 will be substantially faster than a sata3 ssd if that's what you have and of course remarkably faster than a traditional harddrive. you can still use your 1tb drive, but run your os and games off your ssd.