[SOLVED] Is my System worth upgrading?

[SamCho]

Hello,

I am considering getting a new graphics card but I am concerned that my system is too old. I am a casual gamer, therefore I don’t want to put too much money into my computer. I only want to play 1080p at medium settings. I cannot do that currently for modern games.

So I was considering getting a new graphics card but I am worried that the CPU is too old. I am trying to get the best upgrade to my system for less than $150. I know I need an SSD upgrade and CPU upgrade but that is not really possible now.

My PC: HP Envy 750-116 Desktop

CPU/APU: AMD A10-8750 Radeon R7, 12 Compute Cores 4C+8G , 3.6 GHz

GPU: Integrated Radeon R7 card

Ram: 12 GB DDR3

HD: WD Black 1 TB Hard Drive

If I get something like a Radeon RX 550, Will it make a difference for gaming graphics?

Thanks for the help

 

[King_V]

There are a few issues going on.

1. Are you in the US? If so, then I would not recommend the RX 550 or RX 560. The prices of the least expensive RX 550 and RX 560 cards are only a little below the least expensive RX 570 cards. The RX 570's performance is far greater than the RX 560 or RX 550.
2. While you will see a performance upgrade by getting a new video card, the CPU will, ultimately, hold it back. HOWEVER - the new video card can be carried over to a new system when you upgrade the rest of the components.
3. I couldn't tell from the photo of the machine on the page you listed. Can your system take full-size expansion cards, or is it a low profile system that can only take half-height cards.
4. The PSU is listed as 300 Watts. The CPU you have is 65W, the RX 570 would be 150W, and everything else would probably be another 45W. That's 260W total. I don't know how much your PSU can produce on the 12V rail, but the specs sticker on the PSU should list that. Is it possible to post that info here? Either which way, if the system were running flat out (CPU and new GPU maxed), it may not be quite up to the task.
   1. Does the PSU have 6-pin and/or 8-pin GPU connectors available? If not, then the RX 570 is out of the question.
5. Ultimately, though, the old pre-AM4 architectures are outdated, and not worth upgrading. Any minor upgrades that might be available would be of minimal gain, and a poor performance-per-dollar value.
   1. Another thing is that not only do you have DDR3 RAM, but at 12GB, I'm guessing that it's one 8GB stick and one 4GB stick, so at best, it only runs with some of the memory in dual-channel mode, and otherwise in single-channel mode. That hurts performance.

The ideal scenario would be really to update everything at once, should your budget permit it.

 

[hftvhftv]

https://www.asus.com/Graphics-Cards/GTX1650-O4G-LP-BRK/ This would max your budget out, but it'd get the job done and be able to be used in another system once you have the cash to upgrade.

 

[SamCho]

There are a few issues going on.

1. Are you in the US? If so, then I would not recommend the RX 550 or RX 560. The prices of the least expensive RX 550 and RX 560 cards are only a little below the least expensive RX 570 cards. The RX 570's performance is far greater than the RX 560 or RX 550.
2. While you will see a performance upgrade by getting a new video card, the CPU will, ultimately, hold it back. HOWEVER - the new video card can be carried over to a new system when you upgrade the rest of the components.
3. I couldn't tell from the photo of the machine on the page you listed. Can your system take full-size expansion cards, or is it a low profile system that can only take half-height cards.
4. The PSU is listed as 300 Watts. The CPU you have is 65W, the RX 570 would be 150W, and everything else would probably be another 45W. That's 260W total. I don't know how much your PSU can produce on the 12V rail, but the specs sticker on the PSU should list that. Is it possible to post that info here? Either which way, if the system were running flat out (CPU and new GPU maxed), it may not be quite up to the task.
   1. Does the PSU have 6-pin and/or 8-pin GPU connectors available? If not, then the RX 570 is out of the question.
5. Ultimately, though, the old pre-AM4 architectures are outdated, and not worth upgrading. Any minor upgrades that might be available would be of minimal gain, and a poor performance-per-dollar value.
   1. Another thing is that not only do you have DDR3 RAM, but at 12GB, I'm guessing that it's one 8GB stick and one 4GB stick, so at best, it only runs with some of the memory in dual-channel mode, and otherwise in single-channel mode. That hurts performance.

The ideal scenario would be really to update everything at once, should your budget permit it.

Thanks for the reply,

1. I am in the US. I saw the sale at best buy and wanted to try it bc I can return it easily if the RX550 didn't work. Some sellers don't take returns for graphics cards ( Ex. Damn Fry's Electronics).

3. I am pretty sure that I have the space for a full-size graphics card. Because I have in the past fit a Radeon HD 6950 in there. Unfortunately like most used cards on Craiglist, that card was a bust and I learned my lesson. It was a full-size card though.

4. I did have to upgrade my power supply to a Corsair 650M bc of what I said earlier so the power supply does come with the 6 and 8 pins and can power a graphics card.

So I know that the entire system needs to be upgraded. I really don't see myself gaming in the long term (max for another 2 yrs). Right now I am getting less than 20 fps on the games I want to play at 1080p on Lowest settings. These are games like GTA5 which is already 4 yrs old. So I just want to spend enough to run older MMOs at decent quality and get decent FPS. Do you think an RX 570 will achieve that goal? I can also replace that 4 Gb ram with another 8GB to make it two 8GBs.

Thanks for all the help

 

[King_V]

It might be worthwhile to run some kind of monitoring software (HWInfo, MSI Afterburner, etc) that will graph CPU and GPU utilization over time while gaming.

The results may be different for different games, but see what those graphs show you. I would suspect, though, that the integrated graphics of the A10 are pegged at max usage before the CPU itself is. Also, given that the integrated GPU needs to rely on system RAM (DDR3, way slower than a GPU's DDR5 or DDR6), the integrated GPU is more likely to be holding you back.

BUT - I'd like you to check it out with the graphing just to be sure.

Here's a link to the current prices, lowest-to-highest, of the RX550, RX560, and RX570 cards. I stuck only with the 550-640, and 560-1024, since the 550-512 and 560-896 are basically crippled versions of those cards.

Worst case, if the RX570 does improve performance, but less than you expect, then you can carry it over to whatever new system you build in the future.