Upgrading from first build - What next?

[FruityLoop23]

Hey guys,

In February 2014, I built my first decent quality desktop, using advice I received mainly from here. It was a very budget conscious build and I really just needed to get up and running.

As the rig is approaching 2 years old, I'd like to start upgrading piece by piece. I've never done serious gaming, mainly just WoW, which I'm told is not very demanding. But in 2016, I'm planning to game a lot more and also some video editing.

At the mo, these are the components:

-Asus M5A97 LE R2.0 Motherboard (AMD 970/SB950, DDR3, 6 x S-ATA 600, ATX, PCI-Express 2.0, USB 3.0, Socket AM3+)
-AMD FX6300 Black Edition 6 Core (3.5/4.1GHz, 8MB Level 3 Cache, 6MB Level 2 Cache, Socket AM3+, 95W, Retail Boxed)
-VTX3D Radeon HD 7770 X-Edition
-Kingston Technology 120GB Solid State Drive 2.5-inch V300 SATA 3 with Adapter
-WD - 2TB Desktop SATA Hard Drive - OEM - Green
-Corsair Builder Series CX 430 Watt ATX/EPS 80 PLUS Bronze Power Supply Unit
-Corsair CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9 Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600 Mhz CL9 XMP Performance Desktop Memory Kit Black

I was wondering where people would advise starting the upgrade. I imagined the CPU and GPU?

If anyone would like to recommend examples of either that would be considerable upgrades to what I have, that would be great. I don't mind spending a decent bit of money but I don't need 100% top of the range components like a Titan or something.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Kind regards.

 

[Gingerbread]

Well you can't really upgrade efficiently to be honest. If you want to upgrade the CPU then it would be best if you went for intel which would require a different motherboard, not to mention ram as well if you go for skylake. If you go for GPU, then you need a new PSU since this is too weak to feed anything above the GTX 960 and I imagine you are looking for something beyond that.

 

[Vetsku]

You should upgrade your GPU first. Let me know your budget on the GPU. Also you should get a new PSU too.

 

[kyzarvs]

I push a GTX970 along just fine with a only-just-better-than-yours 6350 CPU. I'd look to PSU and GPU first myself...

 

[Karsten75]

In my opinion you're in the sweet spot for AMD processors. There's not much point in upgrading to the faster AMD processors. For that I'd rather recommend you consider a switch to Intel.

Your GPU can be upgraded and depending on games, may give you a bit of a boost.

The SSD is truly one of the few I do not recommend (see: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7763/an-update-to-kingston-ssdnow-v300-a-switch-to-slower-micron-nand) An upgrade to a better quality SSD might be something to consider.

Your PSU is also near the top of the "do not use" list, so an upgrade there might be indicative, especially if you get a more power-hungry GPU.

 

[FruityLoop23]

In my opinion you're in the sweet spot for AMD processors. There's not much point in upgrading to the faster AMD processors. For that I'd rather recommend you consider a switch to Intel.

Your GPU can be upgraded and depending on games, may give you a bit of a boost.

The SSD is truly one of the few I do not recommend (see: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7763/an-update-to-kingston-ssdnow-v300-a-switch-to-slower-micron-nand) An upgrade to a better quality SSD might be something to consider.

Your PSU is also near the top of the "do not use" list, so an upgrade there might be indicative, especially if you get a more power-hungry GPU.

How much of a job is it to switch to Intel? New motherboard and CPU? Will my other components seamlessly work with the new motherboard?

 

[kyzarvs]

In my opinion you're in the sweet spot for AMD processors. There's not much point in upgrading to the faster AMD processors. For that I'd rather recommend you consider a switch to Intel.

Your GPU can be upgraded and depending on games, may give you a bit of a boost.

The SSD is truly one of the few I do not recommend (see: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7763/an-update-to-kingston-ssdnow-v300-a-switch-to-slower-micron-nand) An upgrade to a better quality SSD might be something to consider.

Your PSU is also near the top of the "do not use" list, so an upgrade there might be indicative, especially if you get a more power-hungry GPU.

How much of a job is it to switch to Intel? New motherboard and CPU? Will my other components seamlessly work with the new motherboard?

I've never had much luck changing mobo chipsets and had to re-install windows when moving from Intel to AMD or vice-versa, don't know how W10 would handle it though.

Your 6300 isn't weak per se - it's fine for 1080p gaming, but I'd look to change to another socket as the next upgrade after this one.

 

[Karsten75]

Yes, the motherboard and processor should be a unit. If you stay on DDR3 boards (up to Haswell processors), you can re-use your RAM and GPU. As was noted, you may need a re-install (or at the very least, a repair install) to resolve issues at the Hardware abstraction layer. I'd recommend a re-install.


You will find a larger range in function and prices on Intel motherboards, so it mitigates a little against the perceived cost increase of the processor.

In all honesty, I'd probably not recommend it on a 2-year old build. I'd say go for a new PSU in the 600-700W range, of high quality and modular and get a new graphics card. Then wait until the end-of-year sales for this year (or late fall) and upgrade the motherboard and processor.

 

[FruityLoop23]

Thanks very much for all the info guys. Genuinely appreciate it as I would be completely lost without it.