[SOLVED] Upgrade advice appreciated - Upgrade this 10 year old rig or buy new one?

[kingsam04]

Hello,

Thanks for taking the time to read this, I am hoping someone with greater knowledge than me can point me in the right direction…

My 10 year old Zoostorm rig bought from Argos (I know - who shops at Argos for a gaming rig?!) nearly a decade or so ago is still alive, only upgrade ever made was late 2018 when I upgraded from a GTX760 to GTX1060 GPU. I am worried some components on this PC might breakdown in the near future as I have used it almost every day for the last 10 years with only 1 upgrade.

Current specs:
Intel Core i7 quad core Intel Core i7-3770 (Processor speed 3.4GHz).
16GB RAM.
GTX 1060 6GB
1TB Hard Drive
2560 x 1080 60HZ Monitor (LG Widescreen)

The mother board model is 7010-0265A, thats all I know. I understand it is outdated and as such I cant put new DD4 ram in it, only DDr3, and this limits the CPU upgrade potential, so I would need to buy a new motherboard along with a new CPU.

I have £1000 to spend, is it worth trying to upgrade such an old machine or should I just bite the bullet and buy a new one?

I have seen this deal which looks insane for £1000:

https://store.hp.com/UKStore/Merch/Product.aspx?id=6RT09EA&opt=ABU&sel=DTP&lang=en-GB&gclid=Cj0KCQjws_r0BRCwARIsAMxfDRh0GXbtfC7cp0QcsmN7RX9FwYfEW5CtWmqvhmTc5qtc2qbeJxPm1AMaAtsvEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

(Also, someone told me its not worth buying a GPU now as new RTX cards are coming out this year - Traditionally, how much do new GPU’s releases affect prices of existing GPU’s? Do prices fall a lot? - Don’t want to get burned!)

I know next gen consoles are out later this year with 4k gaming but I prefer PC.

 

[tennis2]

You're looking for a pre-built machine only? (aka not putting the components together yourself?)

Here's the hardware cost of that HP system. Most of the parts below (GPU/mobo/SSD/RAM/PSU/Case) are better quality than you'd get in the Omen.
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-9400F 2.9 GHz 6-Core Processor (£139.98 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: MSI B365M PRO-VDH Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£62.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR4-3000 Memory (£43.98 @ Aria PC)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 250 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive (£49.82 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 2 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (£56.87 @ CCL Computers)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2060 6 GB WINDFORCE OC Video Card (£314.99 @ Box Limited)
Case: Cougar MG130-G MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£37.21 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: SeaSonic S12III 550 W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£55.47 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case Fan: Fractal Design SSR3-140-WT 56.1 CFM 140 mm Fan (£8.48 @ AWD-IT)
Total: £769.79
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-04-21 17:16 BST+0100

 

[punkncat]

I don't feel like the HP Omen is the worst thing you could do in the prebuilt market. The most stand out item that I would mention, assuming that you are otherwise comfortable purchasing this particular computer, is to do the add on fee to have them install an SSD as your OS drive.

I won't mention alternatives or the fact that you could build it for hundreds less yourself.....(oops)

 

[kingsam04]

@tennis2

Thank you for taking the time to put that together, much appriciated!

Building a brand new PC instead of upgrading aspects of mine, or buying a premade pc did not cross my mind to be fair - sure it cant be that hard if I watch some youtube videos.

Is it worth waiting until new RTX cards are released? Will that see massive drop in current gpu prices? If the price drop is nominal then there would be need to wait.

 

[tennis2]

New GPUs are slated for September. Even then, they'll release the higher tier models first. It may be....Jan/Feb 2021 before a RTX2060 equivalent becomes available. (just a guess). We're not close enough to launch to be "waiting"

If I got to choose the components (and not just match a pre-built), I'd go with:
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor (£163.98 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: MSI B450M MORTAR MAX Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard (£89.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 Memory (£74.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 512 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive (£74.99 @ Box Limited)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 2 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (£56.87 @ CCL Computers)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon RX 5600 XT 6 GB GAMING OC Video Card (£274.98 @ CCL Computers)
Case: Cougar MG130-G MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£37.21 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair TXM Gold 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply (£64.99 @ Box Limited)
Case Fan: Fractal Design SSR3-140-WT 56.1 CFM 140 mm Fan (£8.48 @ AWD-IT)
Case Fan: Fractal Design SSR3-140-WT 56.1 CFM 140 mm Fan (£8.48 @ AWD-IT)
Total: £854.95
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-04-21 18:25 BST+0100

 

[kingsam04]

That does look incredible for the price, how do I get windows on a new pc? Do I need to buy another licence? I don't have an activation code as I bought a pre made pc with Windows already installed

 

[punkncat]

That does look incredible for the price, how do I get windows on a new pc? Do I need to buy another licence? I don't have an activation code as I bought a pre made pc with Windows already installed

Utilize a known virus free and working computer to download the tool to make a Windows 10 USB. It's easy to install Windows and there are many walk through on that aspect.
Purchase the license from Microsoft direct, or a trusted marketplace (Newegg, for instance). There is a place during install that you can add the key, or you can select that you don't have a key and add it later from Windows.

 

[King_V]

I wonder, though, given that it's an i7 (albeit an old one) thus can utilize 8 threads, would it be worthwhile to maybe go the 1660 Super route on the existing system?

This, of course, comes with two caveats:

• Is the existing Power Supply good?
• Does the motherboard's BIOS play nicely with newer video cards?

Since the GTX 1060 works, a used GTX 1070 might also be worth considering, depending on the pricing of 1070 cards on the used market. The same caveat applies about the power supply, though, as we don't know the exact brand/model of the PSU you have, and the 1070 does require more power than the 1060.

 

[tennis2]

I left off the Windows license since that can range from $10 - $100 depending on where you buy from.

Certainly nothing wrong with upgrading only the GPU now (as long as the PSU is capable). That can be carried over to a new CPU+mobo+RAM when the time comes.

My i7-3770 (OC'd to 4.2GHz on my Z77 mobo) is going to carry me into 2021/DDR5.

 

[kingsam04]

Thanks again for sharing your wisdom guys!

If I spend money on a new psu (defo needs upgrading) and graphics card, how high a card can I get without bottlenecking this old cpu?

I mean, would I be able to stick in a RX 5700 XT or RTX 2070 super?

Don't want this old timer blowing up on Me!

 

[King_V]

Oh, you don't run any risk of blowing anything up. And, don't worry about bottlenecking. There are some games that are heavily GPU reliant, and some that are heavily CPU reliant.

On the same system, one game may be held back by the GPU, and another held back by the CPU.

You could put such video cards in, but at that point, the 60Hz limit of your monitor is what holds it back. The video card can display more frames than your monitor can show you. It would be throwing away money for higher-end cards whose capabilities you can't make use of.

Out of curiosity, what's the exact model number of your monitor?

 

[kingsam04]

Well, thanks for the advice guys!

I am now in a position to make a more educated decision moving forward!

King_V - My monitor is LG Ultrawide -25UM58

https://www.lg.com/uk/monitors/lg-25UM58

When I bought it I was told I could overclock it to 75hz, watched YouTube videos and tried to change to 75hz on nvidea control centre and hardware manager on windows and it just reverts back to 65hz...

 

[kingsam04]

My friend sent me a link to Aldi website - I thought he was joking at first....

They are selling this Medion PC for £950:

Intel® Core™ i5-9400 Processor
6G RTX 2060
1,024 GB PCIe SSD
Fast Wireless LAN IEEE 802.11 ac-Standard-Technology with up to 1,73 Gbps (2×2)
Bluetooth 5.0
Network Controller Gigabit LAN (10/100/1000 Mbit/s)
Windows 10

https://www.aldi.co.uk/medion-gaming-desktop-pc/p/700959312887900

Im ordering this today, Medion seem to be a decent company so this looks like a bargain.

CPU doesnt look amazing but should be ok for gaming with that GPU - 3 year warrenty if anything goes wrong

1st Gaming PC from Argos
2nd Gaming PC from Aldi



Thanks again everyone!

 

[King_V]

Hmm, weird, the info I've dug up says the monitor supports 75Hz outright. Not sure what to make of that. Any which way, it does not support FreeSync. You MIGHT have to download a monitor driver file for it, and in Display settings go to advanced, select monitor, and choose to install a driver for it (or select from a list, if that particular EXACT model is in the built in list),

(I'm trying to go from memory right now, not on a Windows machine at the moment. Also it seems like the 25UM58G and MAYBE the 25UM58-P variants have FreeSync, but the standard 25UM58 does not, unfortunately).

Either way, I think your current setup would work well with just a graphics card upgrade, and you'd be able to maintain a 60fps rate more easily. Then maybe save up to get a newer PC down the road (what with the 4000 series Ryzen chips coming out, etc).

But I'll admit that I will tend to be a cheap S.O.B. at times!

 

[tennis2]

https://www.aldi.co.uk/medion-gaming-desktop-pc/p/700959312887900
Im ordering this today, Medion seem to be a decent company so this looks like a bargain.

Quite strange!
Let us know what you think once you take delivery.

 

[kingsam04]

After calling the company helpline I have been told that pc is not currently available at its advertised specs...

After looking at 4k gpu prices I have made the decision to wait for next gen consoles to release. 4k gaming at 60 fps for around £500 is insane. Already have a 4k tv so I'm going to bite the bullet and buy a console. Thanks again everyone for the input, take care!

 

[King_V]

Erm, definitely wait and see what happens with the actual performance of the consoles. People have been claiming 4k60fps for consoles for quite some time now. Each time, I'm given to understand it's been disappointing.

Disclaimer: I haven't owned a console. Well, unless you count my brother's original Playstation back in the late 90s, his Sega Genesis, and my ancient Atari 2600 (which still works)

 

[kingsam04]

Erm, definitely wait and see what happens with the actual performance of the consoles. People have been claiming 4k60fps for consoles for quite some time now. Each time, I'm given to understand it's been disappointing.

Disclaimer: I haven't owned a console. Well, unless you count my brother's original Playstation back in the late 90s, his Sega Genesis, and my ancient Atari 2600 (which still works)

Fair point, gonna wait a few months anyway to see if any overheating issues surface given the power of the hardware the companies claim to incorporate into their systems. If im going to spend a lot of money upgrading/buying a new PC I want to be able to access 4k gaming and cant justify spending thousands of pounds on PC to get 4k gaming when console manufacturers are saying they can provide it at such a low price.

In the meantime, I am happy playing Warzone on my GTX 1060 at 2560 x 1080.

If the consoles aren't as powerful as stated and/or if my ancient pc does start to develop issues I now know I can build a PC myself to save some cash - which wouldn't have entered my mind were it not for this thread!