Computer Upgrade Recommendations

[NasalEye]

Hello this is my first topic so i'm sorry if i don't include something

i have an old computer that i have been trying to upgrade for awhile now because it can't play most games at low setting over 30 FPS but i don't know what direction to go in. ive concluded that it is the CPU is the bottleneck.

 

Current PC Specs

AMD A4-5300

MSI FM2-A55M-E33 Motherboard

8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz

Crucial MX500 500GB SSD

MSI Radeon HD 7700 

 

I play esport games and a few AAA games at 1920 x 1080 with a 60 Hz monitor

I was considering getting an old used hp desktop and reuse the ssd, and hd 7700 or upgrading my current computer with a better processor. i have a low budget of $250

Open to any suggestions.

[3 Lions]

You need to start from scratch and build a new PC I'm afraid. 

[SZ1357]

With your low budget it's pretty difficult to recommend anything really, you'd need to replace your GPU, RAM motherboard and CPU at the very least. I would suggest waiting a little longer to save up a bit more to get a more price-performance build:

 

Ryzen 3 2200G

ASROCK Z370 motherboard (because it's relatively cheap for an ATX motherboard that supports overclocking)

8GB DDR4 RAM (your preference)
Stick with the same storage

RX 570

 

 

[Kered124]

Buy something such as this: https://www.ebay.com/itm/DELL-Optiplex-3020-4th-GEN-CORE-i5-Desktop-Computer-TOWER-3-3GHZ-8GB-320GB-Win-7/233088956967?hash=item36452f3a27:g:YOMAAOSwYUZcLfDq:rk:7:pf:0

Throw in your GPU and possibly power supply. Game.

[Kered124]

Here is someone on Reddit who did the same thing: 

EDIT: 

 

You will also need this adapter to power that motherboard with a standard power supply: https://www.ebay.com/itm/New-ATX-Power-Supply-Cable-24pin-To-8pin-For-DELL-Optiplex-3020-7020-9020-T1700/132670521652?epid=22014540599&hash=item1ee3c78134:g:x4sAAOSwRyRbHQDI:sc:USPSFirstClass!53818!US!-1:rk:2:pf:1&frcectupt=true

[mariushm]

Don't follow SZ1357's advice as he's saying stupid things... for example a Ryzen 3 2200g won't work on a Z370 motherboard (it's Intel chipset, for Intel CPUs)

 

If you want as cheap as possible, upgrading to a RX 570 will give you a significant boost in fps and you'd be able to reuse it later with other hardware.

 

The RX 570 is kinda the sweetspot for performance for money for 1080p gaming. Another good option would be a GTX1060 but with 4 or more GB of memory, not the 3 GB versions.

 

The RX 570 would be kind of slowed down a bit by your processor, because it has only 2 cores. Modern games also start to use 4 or more cores all the time.

So if you don't want to upgrade everything, what you could do would be to upgrade just the processor to something faster.

However, on your FM2 platform (because the motherboard has socket FM2 for processors), even the highest end processor you could upgrade to would still be kind of slow and outdated, so it's debatable if it's worth spending the money.

Still, to give you an answer, you'd want to go for A8-6xxx processors, or A10-5xxx / A10-6xxx processors, those would be about twice as powerful as your current processor, but still around 60% of the performance of a socket AM4 Ryzen 2200g :

 

no integrated graphics 

Athlon X4 	Richland 	AD760KWOA44HL 	760K 	100 	3.8GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	N/A 	7721vB1.zip
Athlon X4 	Richland 	AD750XOKA44HL 	750 	100 	3.4GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	N/A 	7721vB1.zip
Athlon X4 	Trinity 	AD750KWOA44HJ 	750K 	100 	3.4GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	N/A 	7721vA0.zip
Athlon X4 	Trinity 	AD750KWOA44HJ 	750K 	100 	3.4GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	N/A 	7721vA3.zip
Athlon X4 	Trinity 	AD740XOKA44HJ 	740 	100 	3.2GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	N/A 	7721vA0.zip
Athlon X4 	Trinity 	AD740XOKA44HJ 	740 	100 	3.2GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	N/A 	7721vA3.zip

with graphics

A-Series 	Trinity 	AD580KWOA44HJ 	A10-5800K 	100 	3.8GHz 	1MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD7660D 800MHz 	7721vA0.zip
A-Series 	Trinity 	AD580KWOA44HJ 	A10-5800K 	100 	3.8GHz 	1MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD7660D 800MHz 	7721vA3.zip
A-Series 	Trinity 	AD5700OKA44HJ 	A10-5700 	100 	3.4GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	HD7660D 760MHz 	7721vA0.zip
A-Series 	Trinity 	AD5700OKA44HJ 	A10-5700 	100 	3.4GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	HD7660D 760MHz 	7721vA3.zip

A-Series 	Richland 	AD680KWOA44HL 	A10-6800K 	100 	4.1GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD8670D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip
A-Series 	Richland 	AD680BWOA44HL 	A10-6800B 	100 	4.1GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD8670D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip
A-Series 	Richland 	AD679KWOA44HL 	A10-6790K 	100 	4.0GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD8670D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip
A-Series 	Richland 	AD679BWOA44HL 	A10-6790B 	100 	4.0GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD8670D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip
A-Series 	Richland 	AD6700OKA44HL 	A10-6700 	100 	3.7GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	HD8670D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip

A-Series 	Richland 	AD660KWOA44HL 	A8-6600K 	100 	3.9GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	100 	HD8570D 844MHz 	7721vB1.zip
A-Series 	Richland 	AD650BOKA44HL 	A8-6500B 	100 	3.5GHz 	3.5MB 	N/A 	A1 	65 	HD8570D 800MHz 	7721vB1.zip

If you can find one of these for around 60-70$, it MAY be worth upgrading your CPU to one of these, you'll extend the life of your system for maybe 1-2 more years.

If it costs more than that amount, it's kinda not worth it.

 

An upgraded CPU + a video card like RX 570 would give you a decent performance in games.

The CPU would still be the weakest link.

 

To get something better, you will have to change the processor, the motherboard AND the memory, because the modern platforms all use DDR4.

Socket AM4 from AMD would be your best bet.

Athlon 200ge would be the cheapest processor you could buy for socket AM4 at around 55$ and that would give you performance just  a tiny bit above what the best FM2 processors could give you.

Ryzen 3 2200g is 99$ but it's much better, basically twice as powerful as the Athlon 200ge and around 4-5 times as powerful as your current processor. It has an integrated video card which is kind of almost as fast or a bit faster in some games than your current.

Then you would have to buy a motherboard which costs from around 60$ and up (ideally, go for a B350 or B450 chipset, A320 based motherboards would be a tiny bit cheaper but you lose some benefits like overclocking, fewer memory slots, fewer usb and sata ports so it's often not worth it)

And you'd also have to change the RAM, and with Ryzen, you'd want to go with high frequency memory as it does matter... so a 8 GB 3000 Mhz or 3200 Mhz would be another 50-60$ .... so overall it would cost you around 225-250$ just for motherboard+cpu+ram  and eventually you'd want to upgrade from the integrated graphics anyway.

 

So drawing the line, cheapest and most improvement : go for a RX 570 or RX 580 or GTX 1060 4+ GB ,

Then either upgrade cpu only or gather more money and get all three at same time (cpu+mb+ram)

 

[YourCrush1234]

For 530 dollars you can get a heck of a lot better system it has

r5 2200g

matx board whith hdmi

250gb nvme ssd (Sata)

1tb hdd

cheap rosewill case that already has fans

8gb ddr4 vengeance ram 2x 4gb

windows 10 

evga 450w psu