Looking to upgrade my i5-4460..

[aaronw928]

As the title says.. I currently have:

i5-4460 on a Gigabyte z97-HD3 board
PowerCooler R9 380 4GB GPU
16GB Ballistix DDR3 RAM

I am looking to upgrade for some much more serious games. I would eventually like to upgrade to 4K, but for now I'm at 1080P on a 144hz monitor. I'm trying to find the most impactful upgrade for the least amount of money. I've been looking at used 4690K CPUs for around the $150-$200 range to extend my life a little, but I'm wondering if an extra $100 gets me a newer architecture with DDR4 and satisfies me for a few more years. Can anyone suggest an upgrade path based on these requirements? Can I get a decent CPU/Mobo/RAM combo for $300 to $350 that's a legitimate upgrade?

I've been looking at the Ryzen 1500X, 1600, and 1600X but I find the opinions and benchmarks so conflicting. It sounds to me like they aren't so great right now, but have a great future with optimization potential. Please help!

 

[GskillerX99]

i suggest you keep the motherboard and RAM and buy the i5 4690K(oc it) along with a GTX 1070 or Vega alternative(they are gonna get released soon). yes there is a future for optimizing the performance of Ryzen CPUs so that is another option but you will be stuck with an old R9 380.

for a 300-350 dollar price range this is the best you'll get:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 5 1600 3.2GHz 6-Core Processor ($217.88 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B350-PLUS ATX AM4 Motherboard ($98.29 @ OutletPC)
Memory: Crucial - Ballistix Sport LT 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $376.16
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-05-09 17:50 EDT-0400

if you extend your budget to $400 then you can get 16GB of RAM which is the recommended amount if you intend to play games.

 

[fry178]

ryzen kicks intel in everything except gaming at 1080p (and lower).

i would prefer to upgrade the gpu first, as it will have most impact on fps etc..