Upgrading CPU soon - Need advice!

[Doujaxx4150]

I recently built my first budget computer and I really, really don't like it. I'm glad I was able to get it to turn on the first try but I failed to do enough research on the mobo/cpu.

Here is my current setup:

Processor: AMD A10-6800K APU : Quad Core ~4.1GHz
Memory: 16GB RAM
GPU: AMD Radeon HD7870

The GPU I'm fine with keeping for now as I believe it's the least of my problems.

I accidentally ordered an FX 8350 when I was buying all the parts and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I really want to upgrade to something worthwhile and have a few questions below


My budget over the coming weeks for this would be ~$500. I'm willing to invest more if it's justified.

Should I purchase a new mobo that is compatible with the FX 8350 I have sitting around?

Or should I purchase a mobo for an Intel chip - if so any recommendations on a mobo/cpu combo?

If I need to post anything else, just ask! I greatly appreciate any feedback on this

 

[connydaa]

I recently built my first budget computer and I really, really don't like it. I'm glad I was able to get it to turn on the first try but I failed to do enough research on the mobo/cpu.

Here is my current setup:

Processor: AMD A10-6800K APU : Quad Core ~4.1GHz
Memory: 16GB RAM
GPU: AMD Radeon HD7870

The GPU I'm fine with keeping for now as I believe it's the least of my problems.

I accidentally ordered an FX 8350 when I was buying all the parts and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I really want to upgrade to something worthwhile and have a few questions below


My budget over the coming weeks for this would be ~$500. I'm willing to invest more if it's justified.

Should I purchase a new mobo that is compatible with the FX 8350 I have sitting around?

Or should I purchase a mobo for an Intel chip - if so any recommendations on a mobo/cpu combo?

If I need to post anything else, just ask! I greatly appreciate any feedback on this

I would recommend i5-4690k and msi gaming 5. They are good to overclock if you buy a aftermarket cpu cooler .
I got msi gaming 5 and i5-4690k and as cpu cooler: coolermaster tx3 evo with those i can get it to 4.3ghz stable (3.5 ghz stock)

 

[bicycle_repair_man]

Going from an A10-6800K to an FX-8350 is certainly a worthwhile upgrade. The problem with the 6800K is that it's an APU, meaning that both the CPU and GPU are on the same piece of hardware. This is good for a small form factor PC, but not suitable for a gaming build, as the overall performance is a compromise between CPU processing and GPU processing.

Are you using this build for gaming? If so, you could buy an Athlon X4 860K, keep your existing motherboard and upgrade the GPU to a GTX 970. This would be a better choice and offer much better performance over your HD 7870.

 

[Doujaxx4150]

Thank you both for the responses!!!

Yes this is to be used for gaming - however I'm really just looking to improve frame rate even if I play at low-medium settings. It would be awesome to play on med-high or even ultra but that can wait as long as I can play Rift/League without having FPS taking a dive. I'm sitting at less than 10fps in raids in Rift and it bounces from 30-60fps in League.

So I'm trying to weigh out a few things here and it's all assuming I keep the GPU HD7870:

1) Purchase the Athlon X4 860K for my current board

2) Upgrade to a new board that supports AM3+ and use my FX-8350

3) Upgrade to an intel board that both of you mentioned, either the MSI Gaming 5 or MSI Gaming 7 and purchase an i5 4690K CPU


So I'm thinking I put them in order from worst to best results - would I be correct? If I keep the GPU for now and upgrade later....to get the best results I should grab the intel board / i5 CPU?

 

[bicycle_repair_man]

An A10-6800k, even without the HD 7870, should be getting better frame rates than that. Have you disabled the integrated GPU within the BIOS, therefore forcing the HD 7870 is do all the graphical legwork? That may very well solve the problem.

 

[Doujaxx4150]

An A10-6800k, even without the HD 7870, should be getting better frame rates than that. Have you disabled the integrated GPU within the BIOS, therefore forcing the HD 7870 is do all the graphical legwork? That may very well solve the problem.

I'm not sure actually. It's been a while so I will check as soon as I get home and reply with the result! I guess we'll go from there. I won't be home for about 7 or 8 hours but will post as soon as I tinker.

 

[Doujaxx4150]

Going from an A10-6800K to an FX-8350 is certainly a worthwhile upgrade. The problem with the 6800K is that it's an APU, meaning that both the CPU and GPU are on the same piece of hardware. This is good for a small form factor PC, but not suitable for a gaming build, as the overall performance is a compromise between CPU processing and GPU processing.

Are you using this build for gaming? If so, you could buy an Athlon X4 860K, keep your existing motherboard and upgrade the GPU to a GTX 970. This would be a better choice and offer much better performance over your HD 7870.

An A10-6800k, even without the HD 7870, should be getting better frame rates than that. Have you disabled the integrated GPU within the BIOS, therefore forcing the HD 7870 is do all the graphical legwork? That may very well solve the problem.

I checked and it's disabled already in BIOS. So with that - from my last post which option would be optimal? I checked out the MSI Gaming mobo and the CPU you guys recommended and it would fit in my budget - so if that's the best choice for performance I'm fine to go with it.

 

[connydaa]

Going from an A10-6800K to an FX-8350 is certainly a worthwhile upgrade. The problem with the 6800K is that it's an APU, meaning that both the CPU and GPU are on the same piece of hardware. This is good for a small form factor PC, but not suitable for a gaming build, as the overall performance is a compromise between CPU processing and GPU processing.

Are you using this build for gaming? If so, you could buy an Athlon X4 860K, keep your existing motherboard and upgrade the GPU to a GTX 970. This would be a better choice and offer much better performance over your HD 7870.

An A10-6800k, even without the HD 7870, should be getting better frame rates than that. Have you disabled the integrated GPU within the BIOS, therefore forcing the HD 7870 is do all the graphical legwork? That may very well solve the problem.

I checked and it's disabled already in BIOS. So with that - from my last post which option would be optimal? I checked out the MSI Gaming mobo and the CPU you guys recommended and it would fit in my budget - so if that's the best choice for performance I'm fine to go with it.

those are good choice i recommend you to buy a aftermarket cpu cooler so you can overclock too i dont know how much you can overclock with the stock cooler but i got that mobo and cpu and coolermaster tx3 evo and i can get 4.3ghz (stock 3.5)

 

[st3v30]

Sell your old parts if you can it will lower your cost of new ones XD.Oh yea and in LoL unlock fps(set to 144.) and no vsync sometimes it just act stupid.

 

[bicycle_repair_man]

An MSI Gaming 5 motherboard and an FX-8320 or FX-8350 processor would be a good combination. If your budget allows it, an i5 4690k and Z97 motherboard would be better.