[SOLVED] MOBO & CPU upgrade

[Rorschach_]

Hello all. Long time listener, first time caller and all that.

I recently picked up a cheap second-hand pair of 8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 sticks, however my motherboard only supports up to 4GB a slot so I'm using this as an excuse for a system overhaul. This is primarily for gaming and my CPU is beginning to chug. I'm looking to order in the next day or two and I'm UK based.


My current spec is:

OS: Windows 7 Pro 64bit
CPU: Intel Core i3-530
RAM: 4x2GB (with the 2x8GB waiting)
HD: Crucial mx500 1TB & Kingston HyperX 240GB with an old Samsung 1TB HDD for archive
MOBO: GIGABYTE GA-H55M-UD2H
GFX: NVIDIA Geforce GTX 960
Case: Antec 300 (maybe 302? can't tell the difference visually)
PSU: PCZ 600W Mod X Stream-Pro
Fan: Freezer Pro Rev.2


I bought the rig second hand about 5 years ago, and haven't built a PC from scratch in about 10 years so my hardware knowledge is very spotty at best. So please excuse any stupid questions.
I upgraded the gfx card a couple of years ago and it's still coping okay so I'm hoping to make it last for another year or two before upgrading. I may get dual cards then, so if SLI/crossfire support isn't standard by now I'd be looking for that.
As such I'm currently just looking to upgrade the CPU and motherboard, unless people think there's a performance bottleneck elsewhere.

Motherboard
My motherboard's mini-ATX but it's an ATX case so there's space. I've noticed some of the new motherboards I looked at only seem to have two SATA ports. Is that common? My current board has 5 and I'm looking to replace the old HDD with another SSD at some point so I'd need more than two. Unless there's a way to daisy chain them to one port?
I see that DDR3 and DDR4s have different pins so I'm guessing there are no motherboards that are compatible with both? Kinda regretting getting the DDR3s now, but at least I'll be able to fit a lot more. Quantity over quality right?

CPU
To be honest, I have no idea. I've always been an intel guy, but I know AMD have been reasonable for a while now. Bonus points if I can reuse my current fan.

I'm not on a tight budget, but I don't need a water-cooled overclocked bleeding edge set-up. Just something reliable and will last me a while. I'm mainly paranoid about not doing my research and buying parts that are incompatible.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[CountMike]

Practically any new system (particularly CPU) will beat that one hands down. Nobody makes MBs with DDR3 any more so you'd at minimum have to get CPU + MB + RAM.
It's all up to money you wish to invest balanced by needs.
Most modern ATX motherboards have at least 4 SATA ports and one or two M.2 ports.

 

[Rorschach_]

Thanks for the advice.

I've been having a look at DDR3 vs DDR4 comparisons and while DDR4 is obviously better, it only seems to be a few percent. Capacity doesn't seem to be an issue since I could boost it to 32 GB if I ever needed to, and this RAM's 1600 MHz speed is still faster than my current.

Anyone have any ideas on what sort of top-end CPU I'd be looking at with a DDR3 only motherboard? I'd rather not waste the £60 I spent on this RAM, but if I'm going to really be limiting my CPU options I'll reconsider.

 

[logainofhades]

You would have to look at the used market, and 4th gen Intel, to continue utilizing your ddr3. I would just hold off, for Ryzen 3000, in another month or 2, and then build new. Ram prices are going down, and you could probably easily sell your old ram, on Ebay, or repurpose the system, for something else.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

Hold off , I wouldn't invest any further in that outdated platform.

 

[Rorschach_]

Ok, you persuaded me.
(thanks for all three answers, i just picked one so the thread's finished)