Optional update - looking for thoughts

burh4n · May 10, 2020

Budget (including currency): $150 USD

Country: US

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Primary game at the moment is Borderlands 3, otherwise filthy casual playing AAA titles a few years late; Heavy browser based work, occasional CAD, spreadsheets, document writing, coding/scripting, often needing to switch between multiple types of work.

Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc):

Current build working fine, but definitely dated, running a i7-3770 (non-k) with a slight boost to 4.3 GHz all core using an ASRock mobo. A friend recently upgraded his rig, and has a Ryzen 1600 (original SKU), MOBO, and RAM (not sure of speed but should meet minimal spec) he's willing to sell to me for $150. Based on my research, I don't expect much of a boost for gaming, but hopeful that I may see some increase in my day-to-day work. I've noticed some stuttering with my system lately, and I've done my best to keep things well enough maintained. My existing power supply should be fine and I expect the same with the CPU cooler, I have a Zotac RTX-2060 AMP which has been sufficient for my gaming so far; pushing to a 1080p ultra-wide at 75 Hz.

Curious if anyone else here has made a similar upgrade? I'm asking my friend if he'd be willing to let me trial the gear before I commit, but wondering if it's worth the hassle of even demoing the system. I'll post the full specs of the gear when he lets me know (or if he lends it to me). My goal here is to spend the minimal amount of money to get a boost in performance (I'm currently out of work) and this seemed like it could be a good path, but interested in what the forum has to say.