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General discussion

Looking to upgrade - help needed!

May 17, 2015 12:16AM PDT

Hey everyone,

I am looking to upgrade a few aspects of my current gaming rig and need advice. This is my current setup:

GeForce GTX 970 (This I recently upgraded and I am very happy with)
i7-3820 CPU @ 3.60
Corsair Vegeance Blue 16GB DDR3
Gigabyte X79-UP4

I am looking to upgrade both my motherboard and processor. I honestly have no clue whatsoever about the motherboard and am looking for any and all advice on that. In regard to the processor, I am most interested in the Intel Core i-5 4690K, as it seems to routinely receive the best reviews. But, if you have other ideas, please let me know.

Other than what I have mentioned - is there anything else I should take into consideration? Even though I have had my PC for a few years, I still remain quite the neophyte when it comes to the best setup.

Thanks in advance,

- Tom

Discussion is locked

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Let's start with this passage.
May 17, 2015 1:39AM PDT

"Our tests demonstrate fairly little difference between a $225 LGA 1155 Core i5-2500K and a $1000 LGA 2011 Core i7-3960X, even when three-way graphics card configurations are involved. It turns out that memory bandwidth and PCIe throughput don't hold back the performance of existing Sandy Bridge-based machines. "
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-cpu-review-overclock,3106-4.html

So the CPU is up to the task, you have 16GB RAM and motherboards don't usually give you a performance boost.

I'd look at moving to a SSD.
Bob

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Upgrade to improve what ??? What is the primary use of
May 17, 2015 3:03AM PDT

the PC ?

How are you backing up you system ?

What PSU is in the syste ?

What drives (SSD or HDD) are you using ?

VAPCMD

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Thanks for the feedback!
May 17, 2015 3:42AM PDT

Bob - Thanks for the information, as always. I should have listened to you a little over a year ago about my monitor purchase...

I currently have a SSD, so I am good for that. Thanks!

VAPCMD - Thanks for the reply!

My primary use is for gaming. I am a teacher and use it for lesson planning, but definitely nothing work intensive. In regard to backing it up, I haven't given it any thought as of now.

For the PSU:
- 750 Watt - Corsair CX750 - 80 PLUS Bronze

For the drives:
- 60 GB Corsair Force Series GT SSD (everything is stored on here to run the computer - purchased with the initial build)
- 2 TB HARD DRIVE -- 64M Cache, 7200rpm, 6.0Gb/s - Single Drive (also purchased with the original build)
- Added a Kingston 120 GB SSD as well

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With that new GPU
May 17, 2015 3:54AM PDT

It looks very capable. I know it may be tough but it may be time to flip out those 2 SSDs for a 256 or 512GB SSD. And this time just let the games be on the C drive.

If there is some sluggishness, try this. Change your DNS to 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4.
If you doubt this, and even then, run NAMEBENCH ( https://code.google.com/p/namebench/ ) before and after.

Then when you have time, scan for ad/mal/spyware with Grif's help. It's at
http://forums.cnet.com/7726-6122_102-5509131.html?tag=posts;msg5509131

Finally or maybe first, read and take some hints from http://www.zdnet.com/article/windows-7-and-ssds-setup-secrets-and-tune-up-tweaks/ (Ed Bott!)
Bob

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Will be looking into all of that!
May 17, 2015 4:11AM PDT

Great stuff - I changed the DNS and will be reading through the links you provided to boost the system. I agree with the larger SSD - I think it is time for that. Thanks again for everything!