TR Forums

Currently -
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 - Kentsfield
ASUS Commando
And NVIDIA GTX 285

I have a good case and PSU -

I am considering topping this system out - since it should last me at least another year if not more that way. Or... better suggestions.

Looking for input on upgrades to those three items listed.

Thanks!

What do you use your PC for? What is your budget for upgrading?

If you game, I'd recommend a faster GPU. (You will need at least Vista or W7 to get DX11).

If you do a lot of computational tasks (encoding, CFD, FEA), a faster CPU (will necessitate a mobo swap as well).

If you want to add more snappy to your computing, then get a good SSD.

I game (deadspace 2 - dragon age 2... witcher 2) and I do a lot of graphic manipulation in photoshop cs - and I word process.

My budget is not to much of a consideration - but I don't want to move to a new mobo - just wanting to top this one out.. or if that money would be better spent going to a new mobo and gpu...

Bottom line - been gone to Afghanistan a year.. back now - want to know what I should upgrade to.

I run win 7 already.

If you're going to upgrade your CPU, you'll want a new motherboard and new memory, too.
$220 Intel Core i5-2500K quad-core 3.3 GHz LGA1155 CPU w/ HSF
or $125 Intel Core i3-2100 hyper-threading dual-core 3.1 GHz LGA1155
$100 Gigabyte GA-Z68MA-D2H-B3 micro-ATX Z68 LGA1155 motherboard
$55 -10 code "EMCKCHB22" 2x4 GiB PC3-10600 G.Skill F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL (DDR3-1333, CAS 9, 1.5 V) memory

A GPU upgrade would have the biggest impact on your in-game experience.
$240 -30MIR XFX Radeon HD6950 1 GB graphics card
or $227½ Zotac GeForce GTX560Ti 1 GB
or $242½ Zotac GeForce GTX560Ti 1 GB AMP! (950 MHz)
or $270 -30MIR HIS Radeon HD6950 2 GB (840 MHz)

An SSD would make your desktop and web browsing much faster, but wouldn't do much for your gaming.
$200 0.12 TB Corsair Force 3 (SandForce SF-2281) SSD
or $145 -10MIR 0.10 TB Kingston SSDNow V+100 (Toshiba T6UG1XBG)
or $215 0.13 TB Crucial M4 (Marvell 9174)
or $260 0.12 TB Corsair Force GT (SandForce SF-2281)
or $275 0.12 TB OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS (SandForce SF-2281)

your mobo offers up to the q95xx/q96xx processors as far as asus website shows for support, but you need to upgrade bios, and that might fail, and kill the board :/ while the q9xxx are still relatively good performers, you could buy a new core i3/5/7 processor and a new mobo for the same price as the q9550 goes for on average... that or just overclock your q6600, it should hit around 3.4ghz no sweat and save you having to buy a newer cpu.
biggest upgrades would be one of the gpu's JAE posted or an ssd if you dont have one.

Yay! Options!

Thank you!

OK, you have almost same system config like me and games that you play are also currently what i am playing, so here is what i have to say.

You need a faster CPU - Q6600 is brought to the knees as soon as you enable ubersampling in Witcher 2.
Monitoring software shows my HD5850 at around 50- 60% usage while i play other games (Excluding witcher 2 - 80 - 85 %) So CPU is where you should see a lot of improvement.

As far as GTX 285 goes, that is not a slow card in any sense, so any upgrade with the current available cards is not going to show you a day and night difference.

EDIT: Stick to Nvidia if you use Photoshop extensively (even if you upgrade, i would suggest you to go for GTX 570)

OP is running a similar rig as mine, a [email protected] and a GTX280, and I have the same upgrade itch to scratch. I am looking at an i5 2500k with a Gigabyte Z68 GA-Z68XP-UD3-iSSD (onboard 20gb SSD) and a Corsair H80 WC setup which should speed things up noticeably over my current setup. Re-using most of the parts save for the board and chip, so my upgrade should only run me $600.

Gamer friends have recommended I ditch the GTX280 in favor of a newer DX11 card that uses less juice, but for now I am going to run the 280 and see what happens. I play older games (CoH:OF, TF2) so any GPU upgrade is not really worth it unless I get into BF3 in a big way (doubtful). I'd even given thought to buying a GTX295 since they are so darn cheap these days ($150 !!) and moving the GTX280 to my workbench rig.

My own Q6600 upgrade was to a GTX460. I did a whole-system upgrade just a couple of weeks ago, though. Running a single screen at 1920x1200, the GTX460 is just fine, though leaving that system whole as a backup, I went with a GTX560Ti, i7-2600k, and SSD.

The SSD makes the most immediate difference in the desktop experience. The i7 makes the most difference when I do number crunching applications. I can push settings a little higher with the 560Ti...but I probably could have saved the upgrade if I did not want to preserve the old system.

A solid upgrade to your system if you want to save budget for a bigger rebuild would be the GTX460 1GB. You can get one for between $120 and $170 AR depending on overclock and cooler. The MSI (my 560) and Gigabyte (my 460) twin fan coolers are great at keeping noise and temperatures low. Unless you go with a new MB, you aren't doing anything really worthwhile with the processor. The more you push it with a graphics upgrade, the more of a bottleneck you will see from the older CPU. There was a day-and-night difference for my upgrade...but I came from an 8800GT which is quite a bit slower than the 280. Even though the GTX295 that Walkintarget suggests is more powerful than the 460, I think that I would still go with the less power hungry, cooler, DX11 460.

Hey all - I'm back.. was agonizing over spending the cash... but... my system is 3 years old. o.O I was shocked. I bought and assembled it in February 2008.

So ya.. I'm going to upgrade a lot more than just what was listed.

Question - what size PSU will I need? I have a 750 right now.... I am pretty sure that is MORE than enough to even run SLI if I desire.

Also - JAE - what was the impetus behind recommendation of the Gigabyte MB? Bang for buck?

I am considering - getting a new case -(currently running an ANTEC 900 and not sure if a new video card will fit... the GTX 285 is already flipping tight) and getting another EVGA GeForce GTX 285 1GB and running SLI (although - finding one of those cards is gonna be hard to do) on an ASUS board.

I will also need to change from IDE drives... to more SATA especially my CD drive...

dractul wrote:

Question - what size PSU will I need? I have a 750 right now.... I am pretty sure that is MORE than enough to even run SLI if I desire.

As long as you don't try to run a pair of GeForce GTX480s, 570s or 580s, that should be fine.

dractul wrote:

Also - JAE - what was the impetus behind recommendation of the Gigabyte MB? Bang for buck?

It's LGA1155 with the Z68 chipset, Crossfire/SLI, four DIMM slots and USB 3.0 included for less than half the cost of the P8Z68-V Pro that you linked. It also doesn't waste any resources with obsolete PCI slots or IDE controllers.

dractul wrote:

I am considering - getting a new case -(currently running an ANTEC 900 and not sure if a new video card will fit...

It should be fine, as long as you aren't getting a dual-GPU monster.

dractul wrote:

I will also need to change from IDE drives... to more SATA especially my CD drive...

I've had success with this SATA<->IDE bridge with a vintage IDE slot-load DVD drive. However, you definitely want to upgrade to Blu-ray BD-R or BD-ROM/DVD-RW at this time.

Some of the suggestions in this other thread may be useful to you.

Just so you know - I really appreciate your help. Thank you for taking the time to answer and reply to all of us mini-gerbils. (I appreciate everyone else who contributed as well - just not sure how often JAE hears "thanks")

Okay, last question - If I upgrade everything else (mobo, memory, processor ) Will my current video card bottleneck? or should I just stick with it?

I'm thinking any difference will be minimal in games if I go with the cpu, mobo, memory upgrade)

If you want to wait until Southern Islands (Radeon HD7xxx ?) GPUs appear, you could probably get by with your current graphics card for another three months. Southern Islands will be appealing as smaller, faster, cooler, cheaper versions of the well-liked Radeon HD6xxx GPUs.