Upgrading older CPU

[Lost0nPurpose]

So, I have had a PC sitting around for a while that i used to play a LOT of games on. Its been some time since it's last upgrade to say the least. What i'm looking for is a little advice in which direction might be best for me to take to give the PC a little more power, and run games a little smoother.

 

Specs...

 

Motherboard: ASRock H61MV-ITX (LGA 1155)

Link to official site for my motherboard: https://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/H61MV-ITX/

 

CPU: Sandy Bridge i5-2400 - 3.1 GHz

 

RAM: 2x Ballistix 8gb DDR3 1600MHz (totalling 16gb)

 

GPU: Asus NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 2gb VRAM

 

PS: Thermaltake Smart Series 500W

 

I would really like to upgrade the CPU and the GPU without having to upgrade the Motherboard. I was thinking maybe an i7-3770K and maybe a GTX 1050 (i'm only considering those 2 specific ones because i have a friend with both that will sell me both at the same time) but i would love to hear if anyone has any decent suggestions. 

[Daniel Z.]

1050 isn’t an upgrade from the 960, it’s slightly worse. Get a 570/580/1660 and 1080p will run fine. A bit down the road you should switch to newer CPU/RAM/Board.

[Fasauceome]

Your PSU could use an upgrade at some point too, not because of wattage but because Thermaltake's smart lineup is almost as cheap as it gets, and a cheapo PSU is never good to have in a system you care about.

[Lost0nPurpose]

Definitely good advice from both of you, thank you. Obviously ill keep checking this thread to see what anyone else has to say.

Quote

 

 

[Wh0_Am_1]

At the moment I just recommend upgrading the GPU to a RX580, GTX 1060, 1660, 1660 ti, or a 2060 (or if you are willing to go used not that your current system could fully utilize them at the moment, but I imagine a future upgrade will be able to) GTX 1070, 1070 ti, 1080, Vega 56, or a 64. And then save your money until you can afford to upgrade the CPU, MOBO, and RAM.

[aisle9]

1 hour ago, Lost0nPurpose said:

So, I have had a PC sitting around for a while that i used to play a LOT of games on. Its been some time since it's last upgrade to say the least. What i'm looking for is a little advice in which direction might be best for me to take to give the PC a little more power, and run games a little smoother.

 

Specs...

 

Motherboard: ASRock H61MV-ITX (LGA 1155)

Link to official site for my motherboard: https://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/H61MV-ITX/

 

CPU: Sandy Bridge i5-2400 - 3.1 GHz

 

RAM: 2x Ballistix 8gb DDR3 1600MHz (totalling 16gb)

 

GPU: Asus NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 2gb VRAM

 

PS: Thermaltake Smart Series 500W

 

I would really like to upgrade the CPU and the GPU without having to upgrade the Motherboard. I was thinking maybe an i7-3770K and maybe a GTX 1050 (i'm only considering those 2 specific ones because i have a friend with both that will sell me both at the same time) but i would love to hear if anyone has any decent suggestions. 

Xeon E3-1240V2. i7-3770 for sub-$60. Update your BIOS first to make sure it's compatible.

Logical GPU upgrade would be an RX 570. You can get one shipped for about $75 on eBay if you pick your listings carefully. I just grabbed one because its previous owner thought it was ruined. One VBIOS flash later and I have a free RX 570.

[Oalei]

22 minutes ago, aisle9 said:

Xeon E3-1240V2. i7-3770 for sub-$60. Update your BIOS first to make sure it's compatible.

Logical GPU upgrade would be an RX 570. You can get one shipped for about $75 on eBay if you pick your listings carefully. I just grabbed one because its previous owner thought it was ruined. One VBIOS flash later and I have a free RX 570.

so there is some that support it out of the box? i mean xeon compatibility is announce later on right?

[aisle9]

2 hours ago, Oalei said:

so there is some that support it out of the box? i mean xeon compatibility is announce later on right?

Most aftermarket boards at the time shipped with Xeon support. It was usually only OEM boards that had them locked out, and even then it was more commonly business-class systems that restricted Xeon support. Optiplex with a Xeon? Nope. No amount of BIOS flashing is going to make that happen. HP Pavilion with a Xeon? I've done that combination more times than I can count. Apparently someone somewhere noticed and got annoyed, because Intel suddenly stopped letting Xeons run on consumer chipsets when Skylake was released, putting LGA 1151 Xeons on the C232 chipset instead.

 

But, yeah, I have two systems sitting here right now with Xeons in them. An E3-1240V2 (i7-3770) system with an RX 580 and an X3470 (i7-870) system with a GTX 1050. They work perfectly, although the Ivy Bridge system has yet to sell and I'm hesitant to post the X3470 system until it does.