Upgrade CPU or get GPU?

[Pokealong1227]

I have an old system with old hardware. I am going to start building a gaming rig(I sold my old one for bills and am now financially more stable, but still on a budget). I plan to just upgrade about half of the components once in this system, and then in about 2-4 weeks I would upgrade the rest most likely in a new smaller more vented case. I definitely need a new mouse and keyboard and think I found one. I currently have a 250W PSU with a Dual Core 3.5GHz processor(Phenom x2) which is very old and slow. It can run some games on minimum settings but not many. And they still only get 40-60 fps on minimum settings 720p. I am trying to decide if I should go ahead and get the R9 270 and a 500W PSU(bronze certified) with the mouse and keyboard(my mouse is HORRIBLE and makes my hand cramp), or start with a new mini-ATX motherboard and an FX-8350 cpu. I have 4GB of ram so I think I'm leaving that for last and of course the case will be last because the one I have is fairly decent. I also have a 7200rpm 1TB HDD so I think I'll keep that too. Monitor and speakers are also covered. I just really can't decide between PSU and GPU or CPU and MOBO. Would I need a PSU stronger than 250W if I got the FX-8350 or would the 250W work fine? Thanks for your help guys. If you have any other suggestions or just want to flat out tell me I'm wrong feel free to haha still learning. This is only my third PC and the other ones I had the money to put decent parts in all at once.

 

[Calnin]

I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a 250w... I suggest getting the GPU and PSU first between those two choices.

The other thing is that I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a mATX board. I suggest getting an i5 4460 + H97 motherboard or something if you want to do a CPU + motherboard upgrade if you want to upgrade the motherboard + CPU first. Even though the fx 8350 is rated at 125w, I feel like with all the other things in your system, it'd be cutting a bit too close for that power supply...

 

[sid_90]

I have an old system with old hardware. I am going to start building a gaming rig(I sold my old one for bills and am now financially more stable, but still on a budget). I plan to just upgrade about half of the components once in this system, and then in about 2-4 weeks I would upgrade the rest most likely in a new smaller more vented case. I definitely need a new mouse and keyboard and think I found one. I currently have a 250W PSU with a Dual Core 3.5GHz processor(Phenom x2) which is very old and slow. It can run some games on minimum settings but not many. And they still only get 40-60 fps on minimum settings 720p. I am trying to decide if I should go ahead and get the R9 270 and a 500W PSU(bronze certified) with the mouse and keyboard(my mouse is HORRIBLE and makes my hand cramp), or start with a new mini-ATX motherboard and an FX-8350 cpu. I have 4GB of ram so I think I'm leaving that for last and of course the case will be last because the one I have is fairly decent. I also have a 7200rpm 1TB HDD so I think I'll keep that too. Monitor and speakers are also covered. I just really can't decide between PSU and GPU or CPU and MOBO. Would I need a PSU stronger than 250W if I got the FX-8350 or would the 250W work fine? Thanks for your help guys. If you have any other suggestions or just want to flat out tell me I'm wrong feel free to haha still learning. This is only my third PC and the other ones I had the money to put decent parts in all at once.

Lets solve ur issues step by step... Whats ur over all budget for upgrading? What GPU u have right now? If ur budget is too tight, u can switch over to an AMD APU as well. Better PSU is required... at least 550Watts for the CPU and GPU u mentioned.
My opinion, since u have 4GB RAM and 1TB HDD, just upgrade ur CPU to FX8350+ ATX MoBo(Mini-ATX not good with that CPU and GPU u mentioned)+GPU+4GB RAM(more)+550Watt PSU.

 

[Pokealong1227]

I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a 250w... I suggest getting the GPU and PSU first between those two choices.

The other thing is that I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a mATX board. I suggest getting an i5 4460 + H97 motherboard or something if you want to do a CPU + motherboard upgrade if you want to upgrade the motherboard + CPU first. Even though the fx 8350 is rated at 125w, I feel like with all the other things in your system, it'd be cutting a bit too close for that power supply...

Thanks for the advice. I didn't realize intel could be so cheap. But may I ask why you'd suggest that over a fx 8350 with an mATX board? From what I've researched the fx8350 seems like a really good gaming CPU for the price. Thanks in advance and thanks for your advice so far. It's really helped.

 

[Pokealong1227]

I have an old system with old hardware. I am going to start building a gaming rig(I sold my old one for bills and am now financially more stable, but still on a budget). I plan to just upgrade about half of the components once in this system, and then in about 2-4 weeks I would upgrade the rest most likely in a new smaller more vented case. I definitely need a new mouse and keyboard and think I found one. I currently have a 250W PSU with a Dual Core 3.5GHz processor(Phenom x2) which is very old and slow. It can run some games on minimum settings but not many. And they still only get 40-60 fps on minimum settings 720p. I am trying to decide if I should go ahead and get the R9 270 and a 500W PSU(bronze certified) with the mouse and keyboard(my mouse is HORRIBLE and makes my hand cramp), or start with a new mini-ATX motherboard and an FX-8350 cpu. I have 4GB of ram so I think I'm leaving that for last and of course the case will be last because the one I have is fairly decent. I also have a 7200rpm 1TB HDD so I think I'll keep that too. Monitor and speakers are also covered. I just really can't decide between PSU and GPU or CPU and MOBO. Would I need a PSU stronger than 250W if I got the FX-8350 or would the 250W work fine? Thanks for your help guys. If you have any other suggestions or just want to flat out tell me I'm wrong feel free to haha still learning. This is only my third PC and the other ones I had the money to put decent parts in all at once.

Lets solve ur issues step by step... Whats ur over all budget for upgrading? What GPU u have right now? If ur budget is too tight, u can switch over to an AMD APU as well. Better PSU is required... at least 550Watts for the CPU and GPU u mentioned.
My opinion, since u have 4GB RAM and 1TB HDD, just upgrade ur CPU to FX8350+ ATX MoBo(Mini-ATX not good with that CPU and GPU u mentioned)+GPU+4GB RAM(more)+550Watt PSU.

Well like I said in my post I can NOT afford to upgrade everything at once, even with an APU which I will not do because that would ruin the point of getting a dedicated graphics card. I plan to spend around $500 which is what everything I mentioned costs. You really didn't answer my question at all. I hate to come across rude but I already said most of what you said. I was simply asking which two items to get first as I have around $300 set aside for it right now. I also thought it was clear from the post but I guess not so I will post this for everyone else too, I DO NOT have ANY dedicated graphics right now. Sorry for leaving that info out.

 

[geofelt]

First of all, buy yourself a good mouse.
You solve a current problem and can carry it forward to a new build.

A 250w psu will not run any discrete gaming graphics card.

I am not a fan of the FX cpu's for gaming. Few games can use more than 2-3 cores so the 6 and 8 core variants are not very useful.
games depend mostly on a few fast cores, and the amd cores are not fast.

If you buy a FX cpu, you will also have to buy a discrete graphics card at the same time.

Do you have any possibility of future upgrades? If so, 500w will not be good enough, and there are no good FX cpu upgrades.

Consider the option of going intel on the cheap with a G3258. Yes, it is only two cores but $75 buys you a chip which is about 2x the power of your x2 and even more if overclocked.
You could start with integrated graphics if you want. and even reuse your 250w psu.
That would cost you $75 for the cpu and $60 or so for a msi H81M-P33 motherboard.
Here is what it can do:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pentium-g3258-b81-cheap-overclocking,3888.html

Next budget for a discrete graphics card and psu. Regardless of the card you pick, I suggest you overprovision the psu with a 650w psu. That will allow you a future upgrade to even the strongest of single cards.

In time, you may want to upgrade to a intel quad. At that time, the G3258 is owned at such a low cost that selling it or abandoning it will be relatively painless.

 

[flamefire999]

I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a 250w... I suggest getting the GPU and PSU first between those two choices.

The other thing is that I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a mATX board. I suggest getting an i5 4460 + H97 motherboard or something if you want to do a CPU + motherboard upgrade if you want to upgrade the motherboard + CPU first. Even though the fx 8350 is rated at 125w, I feel like with all the other things in your system, it'd be cutting a bit too close for that power supply...

Thanks for the advice. I didn't realize intel could be so cheap. But may I ask why you'd suggest that over a fx 8350 with an mATX board? From what I've researched the fx8350 seems like a really good gaming CPU for the price. Thanks in advance and thanks for your advice so far. It's really helped.

Ok the reason he suggested Intel is because it has stronger cores. The 8350 has 8 cores but most games don't use all 8 so there are unused cores. The main reason you would use 8 cores is if you are going to be rendering things, not for gaming. The i5 is a better CPU than the 8350 anyway but it shines when it comes to gaming. Also the i5 has integrated graphics so if your graphics card breaks then you will still be able to use your computer (even though it probably won't happen)

 

[Pokealong1227]

First of all, buy yourself a good mouse.
You solve a current problem and can carry it forward to a new build.

A 250w psu will not run any discrete gaming graphics card.

I am not a fan of the FX cpu's for gaming. Few games can use more than 2-3 cores so the 6 and 8 core variants are not very useful.
games depend mostly on a few fast cores, and the amd cores are not fast.

If you buy a FX cpu, you will also have to buy a discrete graphics card at the same time.

Do you have any possibility of future upgrades? If so, 500w will not be good enough, and there are no good FX cpu upgrades.

Consider the option of going intel on the cheap with a G3258. Yes, it is only two cores but $75 buys you a chip which is about 2x the power of your x2 and even more if overclocked.
You could start with integrated graphics if you want. and even reuse your 250w psu.
That would cost you $75 for the cpu and $60 or so for a msi H81M-P33 motherboard.
Here is what it can do:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pentium-g3258-b81-cheap-overclocking,3888.html

Next budget for a discrete graphics card and psu. Regardless of the card you pick, I suggest you overprovision the psu with a 650w psu. That will allow you a future upgrade to even the strongest of single cards.

In time, you may want to upgrade to a intel quad. At that time, the G3258 is owned at such a low cost that selling it or abandoning it will be relatively painless.

Thanks for the advice, but I don't see a point in making such a minor upgrade when I have $300 to spend. I could afford to get the i5-4460 and H97 suggested before. Wouldn't that be better as a current upgrade? I might even be able to afford a PSU with that right now.

 

[geofelt]

I see nothing wrong with M-ATX. If the current case is small and supports only M-ATX, that is fine.
I might suggest the ASRock Z97M Anniversary motherboard for long term upgradeability to 14nm broadwell. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157529

 

[Pokealong1227]

I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a 250w... I suggest getting the GPU and PSU first between those two choices.

The other thing is that I wouldn't put a fx 8350 with a mATX board. I suggest getting an i5 4460 + H97 motherboard or something if you want to do a CPU + motherboard upgrade if you want to upgrade the motherboard + CPU first. Even though the fx 8350 is rated at 125w, I feel like with all the other things in your system, it'd be cutting a bit too close for that power supply...

Thanks for the advice. I didn't realize intel could be so cheap. But may I ask why you'd suggest that over a fx 8350 with an mATX board? From what I've researched the fx8350 seems like a really good gaming CPU for the price. Thanks in advance and thanks for your advice so far. It's really helped.

Ok the reason he suggested Intel is because it has stronger cores. The 8350 has 8 cores but most games don't use all 8 so there are unused cores. The main reason you would use 8 cores is if you are going to be rendering things, not for gaming. The i5 is a better CPU than the 8350 anyway but it shines when it comes to gaming. Also the i5 has integrated graphics so if your graphics card breaks then you will still be able to use your computer (even though it probably won't happen)

Thanks for clearing that up I will look at the i5-4460 then. Or something similar. Could a 250W temporarily support that or should I go ahead and upgrade the PSU with it?

 

[geofelt]

First of all, buy yourself a good mouse.
You solve a current problem and can carry it forward to a new build.

A 250w psu will not run any discrete gaming graphics card.

I am not a fan of the FX cpu's for gaming. Few games can use more than 2-3 cores so the 6 and 8 core variants are not very useful.
games depend mostly on a few fast cores, and the amd cores are not fast.

If you buy a FX cpu, you will also have to buy a discrete graphics card at the same time.

Do you have any possibility of future upgrades? If so, 500w will not be good enough, and there are no good FX cpu upgrades.

Consider the option of going intel on the cheap with a G3258. Yes, it is only two cores but $75 buys you a chip which is about 2x the power of your x2 and even more if overclocked.
You could start with integrated graphics if you want. and even reuse your 250w psu.
That would cost you $75 for the cpu and $60 or so for a msi H81M-P33 motherboard.
Here is what it can do:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pentium-g3258-b81-cheap-overclocking,3888.html

Next budget for a discrete graphics card and psu. Regardless of the card you pick, I suggest you overprovision the psu with a 650w psu. That will allow you a future upgrade to even the strongest of single cards.

In time, you may want to upgrade to a intel quad. At that time, the G3258 is owned at such a low cost that selling it or abandoning it will be relatively painless.

Thanks for the advice, but I don't see a point in making such a minor upgrade when I have $300 to spend. I could afford to get the i5-4460 and H97 suggested before. Wouldn't that be better as a current upgrade? I might even be able to afford a PSU with that right now.

With now knowing your budget I agree that a i5-4460 would be a fine first step and would give you more longevity.
As I posted later, the ASRock Z97M Anniversary would be my pick for motherboard.
And, yes, 250w psu would be fine until you need a discrete graphics card.