Upgrade or build a brand new gaming pc?

[wazmoot]

I am trying to figure out if my current PC is worth upgrading, or is it so out-of-date that it's better to build from scratch? I would like to be able to use a GTX 760 level video card....or something to hold me off for a couple of years.

Here are my specs:

1) Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case with Upgraded USB 3.0
2) Intel® Core™2 Quad Processor Q9550 (12M Cache, 2.83 GHz, 1333 MHz FSB)
3) EVGA 122-CK-NF68-A1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
4) Western Digital WD Blue WD1600AAJS 160GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive
5) CORSAIR XMS2 6GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
6) XFX PRO750W XXX Edition Semi-Modular 80Plus Silver 750 Watt Power Supply
7) 2 x GeForce GTX 260 896MB 448-Bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI
8) LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with 12X DVD-RAM write and LightScribe Technology Black E-IDE/ATAPI Model LH-20A1H-185
9) Windows 7 Professional 64

Thanks!

 

[BustaRhymes]

It depends on your budget. Your core 2 quad still prob got a little life left in it. But building new might not be horrible if you got the money. It's really up to you.

 

[wazmoot]

What about keeping the 1) case, 4) hard drive, 6) power supply, 8) DVD/CD, and 9) Windows 7? My upgrades could be a 128 GB SSD, Intel Core i5 4590 CPU, 8 GB 1600MHz memory, NVIDIA GTX 770 2GB, and an ASUS H81 Chipset Motherboard. Is this doable?

My thought is that I can keep the hard drive but also buy an SSD. Is Windows 7 transferable from my current hard drive to SSD? I really don't want to purchase Windows 8.1.

 

[BustaRhymes]

Well yea you could gut your computer but there isn't much that is salvagable. I would rather have 2 computers than save $100 bux on a case and power supply.

I would try to get a graphics card that is at least 3 GB of VRAM

You could maybe buy a cheapo case for your old computer and build new in your antec one.

If you have a non OEM version (retail version) of Windows you can transfer that over. Or you could just buy a "System Builder" verion of windows 7 for about 80-90bux.

Theres a lot of options depending on how much cash you got.

 

[wazmoot]

Thanks for the advice. I will start researching 3+ GB graphics cards.

So if you had, say, a roughly $500 budget, how would you spend that money if you were in my situation? By the way, my version of Windows 7 is retail, not OEM.

 

[BustaRhymes]

I would prob do something like this.

http://pcpartpicker.com/parts/partlist/

You could swap the 750ti for an AMD r7 265 if you like. the r7 265 is a tiny bit faster for the same price, but it's not Nvidia.

 

[wazmoot]

BustaRhymes, is there something that I'm missing? They hyperlink provided above doesn't show a 750ti, or anything else for that matter. Maybe this is by design? There's probably something obvious that I'm not doing....so apologies in advance.

 

[BustaRhymes]

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/vqQyHx

OOPS