Question Is my PC to old to be upgraded?

[Noted0]

My current pc is 3 years old and im looking to upgrade it and add a RTX 4070 and a Ryzen 7 5700x. But im not sure if it is safe to add these new components to such a cheap and old Motherboard and power supply. So if i replace them , all that is left is the DDr4 ram which is going out of date now anyway:

• Ryzen 5 2600x
• Rx 580
• Corsair CX650 PSU
• Corsair vengeance DDR4 ram (2x8GB)
• MSI A320M-A PRO motherboard

So should i upgrade or can i sell my pc and buy a brand new one for the same price range??

Willing to spend around £1000 - £1300

 

[Darkbreeze]

The 2600x can use up to 192w under full all core stress tests while the 5700x uses only up to about 126w under full stress, so if the 2600x ran without issues on that board then the 5700x should as well so long as you have a BIOS version installed that supports it. That however is a different question than whether you should upgrade or start new, but it is relevant. Personally, I wouldn't recommend running a 5700x, or any Ryzen 7 or 9 processor for that matter, on a board that lacks heatsinks on the VRMs especially if you plan to leave PBO enabled. But, you have an option here because you certainly CAN do just that, and THEN if you encounter any issues you can THEN simply swap out that board for a better one. Something from the B550 family would work nicely.

But something like this would certainly seem to be the better option IF you can realistically afford to do so. Since I don't know what case you have I'll assume you are able to use a standard size ATX board and do not REQUIRE a micro ATX board, but if you do, you can always change the selection.

If your existing DDR4 is fast enough and you have enough OF it that you believe it to be suitable to reuse, then you could eliminate the cost of that from this recommendation, but if you have a slower kit OR you want a higher capacity then I'd recommend doing it this way. Obviously build recommendations are highly fluid so there is much about this including different board and graphics card models that could be changed but this would be a very solid configuration.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (£156.99 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK ATX AM4 Motherboard (£139.98 @ Box Limited)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£89.68 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Total: £946.63
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-16 17:23 GMT+0000

 

[ohio_buckeye]

Though to be honest if you are going to a b550 board I’d say pick up a b660 or b760 board and maybe look at an i5 13400 etc. just a consideration.

A ryzen 5600/5600x may not be a bad idea in the current board either.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Well, that's true, those could be options as well, but the 13400F has nearly identical performance for multithreaded loads and only slightly better single core performance than the 5700x, but is about 50 bucks more expensive (So the 13400 non-F model is going to be even more) so it doesn't seem like a great option if you are trying to do this sort of on the cheap, but it is certainly AN option.

And since there's only an £13.00 difference in price between the 5600x and 5700x, that too seems like an option that might not make a lot of sense UNLESS that 13 pounds becomes an important factor due to other choices.

 

[Noted0]

So are you saying upgrading to a 4070 and R7 4700x would be ok as long as i also upgrade the mother board. Also are you sure the CX650 will be fine and wont damage my GPU if anything goes wrong because it is 3 years old.

Also the CX650 has only one 6+2 pin connecter and if i get a 3 fan rtx 4070 will it work on most of them

 

[InSovietRussiaComputerBuildsYOU]

Most power supplies can easily last 10+ years, unless you buy off-brands and stress them to 100% load like all the time. If you're a gamer and use your PC heavily 2-3 hours a day, a 3 year old PSU is fine. In fact some people just buy a 800-1000W PSU and then just forget about buying PSUs for a decade as that's enough for most things. Even if you go over wattage that your PSU can support, it won't damage any of your components. All PSUs nowadays have a plethora of defenses for overcurrent protection, overheating protections, etc. I've done gone over the limit of my old (2010s) PSU a few times when I got a more powerfull GPU - the system just shuts down immediately it can't provide enough power to the PC and worst case the PC might not switch on for a few seconds (I assume the PSU is cooling down in that time). Then after that you just switch it back on.

Don't jump to waste £150 on a motherboard - look up on the internet what others have done with your motherboard - see if they managed to use the 5700X on it and if it needed a BIOS upgrade or not. PC components sometimes ship with different BIOS versions depending on when they're made so your safest bet is to go into the BIOS and check what's the BIOS cersion there and then Google what BIOS version you need to run your new CPU if you haven't already.

P.S. Looks like people have Ryzen 5000 running on it with a BIOS update:

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

 

[Darkbreeze]

So are you saying upgrading to a 4070 and R7 4700x would be ok as long as i also upgrade the mother board. Also are you sure the CX650 will be fine and wont damage my GPU if anything goes wrong because it is 3 years old.

Also the CX650 has only one 6+2 pin connecter and if i get a 3 fan rtx 4070 will it work on most of them

I wouldn't bother looking for one of the "three fan" models, because they ARE going to require somewhat more power but are only going to offer minimal gains over any of the two fan OC models from most manufacturers. And assuming you do not try doing that, then your 3 year old CX650 SHOULD still be ok as they are MUCH better than the older CX units, however, it really WOULD be a good idea to invest the extra money in a better PSU if you are going to upgrade both the CPU and the graphics card to models that use significantly more power than your existing hardware. You could look at doing something like this. And again, if you are ok with reusing the memory you already have, then you could shave £90 or so off the cost. If what you have now is less than 2933mhz though, I'd probably recommend doing the memory too.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (£156.96 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK ATX AM4 Motherboard (£139.98 @ Box Limited)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£89.68 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£105.23 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1051.83
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-16 18:47 GMT+0000

 

[helper800]

IMO I would just keep the motherboard you have and do this:
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (£156.96 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£89.68 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Sapphire PULSE Radeon RX 7800 XT 16 GB Video Card (£482.99 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£105.23 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £834.86
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-16 18:57 GMT+0000

Or this:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (£156.96 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£89.68 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£105.23 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £911.85
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-16 18:57 GMT+0000

 

[ohio_buckeye]

I agree on keeping the board unless you just get a killer deal.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Any of these are certainly valid options. I just think that maybe, if you HAVE the money to afford a new board now, it kills two birds. Maybe three.

One, you get a new board, with a new warranty, rather than trying to use all new parts on a board that is really not the best choice for this hardware but more importantly is already likely five or six years old.

Two, you get a much better board, and regardless of what anybody says, the board you have CAN make a moderate difference in the performance of your CPU, memory and graphics card, not to mention it likely has other amenities such as more fan headers, usb headers, etc. than your current one has since it was a very budget model.

Three, if you DO replace the board as well you could probably sell the old motherboard, CPU and memory to somebody at a price that would be a bargain for them BUT would also return some of the money you spent on this hardware, to you, to reduce the investment.

But certainly if you can't afford it then like I said in the beginning and has been repeated, these are ALL acceptable options. It would be a shame though to get all this hardware, spend the extra money that you DID have which COULD have been used to buy a new motherboard on other things and then few weeks or even a year later when you don't happen to have the funds now to replace the board, your old one dies and you are without because now you don't have the funds that you had before. And believe me, we see it all the time. Hell, it's happened to me and to people I know more than once.

 

[thestryker]

If you're going to spend £1000+ don't upgrade your existing system or buy new AM4 just move on to AM5 if you want a longer upgrade path (if upgrade path isn't important to you picking whichever is cheaper between Intel and AMD is the way to go). You should be able to get a full AM5 setup for 1100-1200 including power supply (assuming keeping storage/case).

 

[Darkbreeze]

AM5 is going to be SIGNIFICANTLY more expensive if you want decent hardware, because the CPUs are much more expensive, the motherboards are much more expensive AND you'll need DDR5, which is moderately more expensive than DDR4. But I wouldn't argue against going that way or going with 13th/14th gen Intel if you can afford to, and you might be very well able to if you are willing to push that £1300.00 budget. Especially if you need to also replace the PSU with something decent. Power supplies are the most expensive I've ever seen them for anything worth buying right now.

 

[thestryker]

AM5 is going to be SIGNIFICANTLY more expensive if you want decent hardware, because the CPUs are much more expensive, the motherboards are much more expensive AND you'll need DDR5, which is moderately more expensive than DDR4. But I wouldn't argue against going that way or going with 13th/14th gen Intel if you can afford to, and you might be very well able to if you are willing to push that £1300.00 budget. Especially if you need to also replace the PSU with something decent. Power supplies are the most expensive I've ever seen them for anything worth buying right now.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 7600 3.8 GHz 6-Core Processor (£213.99 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Asus ROG STRIX B650E-F GAMING WIFI ATX AM5 Motherboard (£229.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: ADATA XPG Lancer Blade 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory (£105.44 @ NeoComputers)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory (£110.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£79.98 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1189.38
Total: £1194.93
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-17 00:45 GMT+0000

That's with a PSU and a B650E board (£229.99) rather than B650 (£139.99) for the PCIe 5.0 slot even though I don't think that's particularly important. It comes in well within the OP's price range and is £242.75 £248.30 more than your Zen 3 suggestion which didn't include a PSU. I wouldn't consider that a significantly more expensive choice given that it's within the price range, is faster, has more features and should be upgradeable to a much faster CPU in the future.

edit: changed DRAM choice to one on motherboard QVL

 

[helper800]

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 7600 3.8 GHz 6-Core Processor (£213.99 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Asus ROG STRIX B650E-F GAMING WIFI ATX AM5 Motherboard (£229.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: ADATA XPG Lancer Blade 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory (£105.44 @ NeoComputers)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£79.98 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1189.38
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-17 00:45 GMT+0000

That's with a PSU and a B650E board (£229.99) rather than B650 (£139.99) for the PCIe 5.0 slot even though I don't think that's particularly important. It comes in well within the OP's price range and is £242.75 more than your Zen 3 suggestion which didn't include a PSU. I wouldn't consider that a significantly more expensive choice given that it's within the price range, is faster, has more features and should be upgradeable to a much faster CPU in the future.

Personally I would either do your suggestion or keep the current motherboard and do my first build suggestion. My first build is significantly cheaper at about 350 less, but you stay on the AM4 platform. Personally I think, for 157, a 5700x is already a huge step up from what he has and it will perform very closely to AM5 even at 1080p. An extra 80 fps past 250 base with the 5700x seems a little extra, but on the other hand if it means the difference between 70 and 100 fps, then it could be worth it. Depends on what is being run.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I'd never, ever, purchase or recommend an Adata product. It's fine if that's your thing, but I've seen too many problems with their products AND there is basically zero way to verify compatibility with that Ryzen platform unless that specific kit happens to be on the QVL list because Adata does not maintain it's own compatibility list or utility. And they are absolute crap if you ever have to try and warranty something through them. Given the fact we know how much Ryzen platforms likes to not play nice with a lot of the memory out there, seems like a reach to me.

Not sure what you mean about my recommendation not having a PSU. It clearly does.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (£156.96 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK ATX AM4 Motherboard (£139.98 @ Box Limited)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£89.68 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Zotac Twin Edge OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£559.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£105.23 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1051.83
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-16 18:47 GMT+0000

Other than that, I see nothing wrong with your option either aside from being more expensive, which is something the OP has already hinted at might not be desirable. Doesn't seem all that fiscally beneficial though when you consider that between the 7600 and the 5700x there is like a 2% difference in CPU performance, for a 13% increase in overall price. But again, can't argue that it's viable. The REAL question here is, WHERE is the priority?

Are we just trying to gain some substantial improvements over the existing 2600x and RX580? Because if so, then just going with something like an £109.00 5600G will give you like a 25% gain in single core performance and a 30% gain in multithreaded performance, for literally half the price of any of the 7600 and significantly less than 5700X.

But if the only consideration is overall performance and longevity of the platform, then spending the full 1300 pounds to get the best hardware possible for the price is obviously the thing to do, but that's something we'd need to know from the OP as otherwise we are simply projecting our own preferences into the equation.

 

[thestryker]

Not sure what you mean about my recommendation not having a PSU. It clearly does.

I didn't notice you had a second list with one as your first list didn't which is what I was comparing to.

I'd never, ever, purchase or recommend an Adata product. It's fine if that's your thing, but I've seen too many problems with their products AND there is basically zero way to verify compatibility with that Ryzen platform unless that specific kit happens to be on the QVL list because Adata does not maintain it's own compatibility list or utility. And they are absolute crap if you ever have to try and warranty something through them. Given the fact we know how much Ryzen platforms likes to not play nice with a lot of the memory out there, seems like a reach to me.

I've never had a problem with Adata memory (wouldn't consider anything else they sell) but you bring up a very good point about the stupidity of AMD memory compatibility. It's an EXPO kit which is all I was looking for, but it's not on the QVL for that specific board so I updated with one that is.

 

[helper800]

I didn't notice you had a second list with one as your first list didn't which is what I was comparing to.

I've never had a problem with Adata memory (wouldn't consider anything else they sell) but you bring up a very good point about the stupidity of AMD memory compatibility. It's an EXPO kit which is all I was looking for, but it's not on the QVL for that specific board so I updated with one that is.

I think that lancer kit is listed as compatible on the ADATA website here.

 

[artk2219]

My current pc is 3 years old and im looking to upgrade it and add a RTX 4070 and a Ryzen 7 5700x. But im not sure if it is safe to add these new components to such a cheap and old Motherboard and power supply. So if i replace them , all that is left is the DDr4 ram which is going out of date now anyway:

• Ryzen 5 2600x
• Rx 580
• Corsair CX650 PSU
• Corsair vengeance DDR4 ram (2x8GB)
• MSI A320M-A PRO motherboard

So should i upgrade or can i sell my pc and buy a brand new one for the same price range??

Willing to spend around £1000 - £1300

Honestly, I would probably upgrade that build, less of a hassle and it kicks the can down the road a few years. Your motherboard will support a Ryzen 7 5800X3D, thats still one of the best gaming chips around, you could upgrade your BIOS to the latest version and pick up one of those. I don't know what cooler you have, so I threw one in the parts list that you could use with just about any processor you wanted to over the next few years. You could upgrade the RAM from 16GB to 32GB, and pick up an RX 7800 XT, more VRAM and a smidge faster than the RTX 4070 without raytracing, for less. All of those would get you a system with great gaming performance for the next few years, for under 900 pounds. Below is the parts list, as well as a review for the 7800 XT and I7 14700K, those reviews have all the other mentioned parts in them for comparison. I also threw in a review for the cooler, and a worst case power supply estimation, you should be good there.

[PCPartPicker Part List](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/zxXL9c)

Type|Item|Price
:----|:----|:----
**CPU** | [AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/CZ3gXL/amd-ryzen-7-5800x3d-34-ghz-8-core-processor-100-100000651wof) | £284.89 @ Clove Technology
**CPU Cooler** | [Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/hYxRsY/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-pa120-se-d3) | £39.00 @ Computer Orbit
**Memory** | [Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/W6ndnQ/corsair-vengeance-lpx-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr4-3200-memory-cmk32gx4m2e3200c16) | £55.99 @ Amazon UK
**Video Card** | [ASRock Challenger OC Radeon RX 7800 XT 16 GB Video Card](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/rfV2FT/asrock-challenger-oc-radeon-rx-7800-xt-16-gb-video-card-rx7800xt-cl-16go) | £499.00 @ Computer Orbit
| *Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts* |
| **Total** | **£878.88**
| Generated by [PCPartPicker](https://pcpartpicker.com) 2023-11-17 21:48 GMT+0000 |

Radeon RX 7800 XT reference review (Page 29)

AMD has elegantly unveiled the Radeon RX 7800 XT, marking a refined expansion of their product range that spans from mainstream to the high-end graphics niche. This addition epitomizes a significant s...

www.guru3d.com

Intel Core i7-14700K Review - Catching the 13900K

Intel Core i7-14700K is the only processor released today with an upgraded core configuration. Thanks to an additional four E-Cores, more cache and a 200 MHz frequency bump, the 14700K reaches performance quite close to the 13900K, at much better pricing.

www.techpowerup.com

Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE Review: Incredible, Affordable Air Cooling Performance

Shockingly cool and quiet, less than $40!

www.tomshardware.com

Power usage estimation:

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT - PSU Calculator - Build HGswzi

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT - Power Supply Calculator Build HGswzi

outervision.com

 

[Darkbreeze]

I think that lancer kit is listed as compatible on the ADATA website here.

That must be somewhat new, or new-ish at least. In the past, and admittedly it's been a good while since I even bothered to look at the Adata website or products, they did not have a compatibility list like G.Skill memory configurator, Corsair memory finder or Crucial memory advisor. Good to know, because that is one of the primary reasons I tend to avoid OTHER manufacturers besides those three if the company doesn't have specific kits listed on the QVL for that board. Knowing they do, I MIGHT be a LITTLE more inclined to look at their memory products BUT there is another issue at play which actually, Corsair is somewhat guilty of too although in a different way.

Adata, and I know this for a fact, has a tendency purchase high quality ICs on early runs of a given memory model/product so that it reviews well (And I would assume, since they have a compatibilty list, shows compatibility there too) but then does the old bait and switch (Much like Corsair does although they do it for different reasons and mostly only on the Vengeance LPX kits) and starts selling the same kit using much less desirable and compatible chips. So I'd still be pretty leery of that.

 

[--SID--]

Also the CX650 has only one 6+2 pin connecter

CX650 has one cable with two 6+2 pin connectors.

 

[Noted0]

After looking up what my pc is worth to sell it as it is ,I think I'm going to sell the GPU,CPU and motherboard but keep the ram,240gb ssd,1tb HDD, power supply and case. I will then buy a R7 5800x , CPU cooler, Motherboard, NVME and a RTX 4070 because i hate AMD software and also want to do 3d modeling and animation.

And will end up with this PC:
PCPartPicker Part List: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/MzyjWt

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£184.97 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 Spectrum V3 71.93 CFM CPU Cooler (£57.78 @ Newegg UK)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING PLUS ATX AM4 Motherboard (£119.00 @ Computer Orbit)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital Green 240 GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Crucial P3 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (£47.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate BarraCuda 1 TB 3.5" 7200 RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Video Card: MSI VENTUS 2X OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card (£562.79 @ Newegg UK)
Case: Cooler Master MasterBox MB520 ARGB ATX Mid Tower Case (Purchased For £0.00)
Power Supply: Corsair CX650 (2017) 650 W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (Purchased For £0.00)
Total: £972.53
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-11-18 00:24 GMT+0000

If ive done anything wrong please help

 

[thestryker]

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 Spectrum V3 71.93 CFM CPU Cooler (£57.78 @ Newegg UK)

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/hYxRsY/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-pa120-se-d3

Much better cooler for less money. Everything else looks decent enough.

While I personally wouldn't buy new AM4 just to keep existing memory that is certainly the cheapest option.

 

[ohio_buckeye]

You could also look at Intel for ddr4 compatibility. I’m in the USA but just bought an i5 12600kf from Amazon for $140 today. Should be here tomorrow.