Help deciding what to upgrade!

[JackT22]

Budget (including currency): want to keep it relatively cheap, but not too cheap. (Willing to spend a bit to make it better)

Country: United States

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: FPS games, and league of legends, sometimes adventure games not often tho.

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): 

 

So I had my first pc built by a company that my dad knew, because I had no clue about anything with PC’s. Ever since I had that built, I have experienced many problems with my pc, crashing, giving file errors, and just not allowing me to run anything at decent frames. Later I found out they sold me an old graphics card used for bit coin and had to re-purchase one myself. 
I am currently using a GTX 1060 6gb card, and 16 gb of ram. This has allowed me to run my FPS games, and get okay results. Now I am looking to upgrade my pc a little more, if that’s the GPU, CPU, or even the monitor. I am using a BenQ monitor, GL2460-B. Capping me off at 60 frames. 
My plan of action was to purchase a predator monitor to get more frames out of my graphics card. Or find any other problems with my build, that would improve my games the most.

Please give me your opinions! Thank you! 
 

-attached parts list used in initial build-

[smokedporkroast]

The PSU, Motherboard, SSD and HDD all are fine, no need to upgrade there. But if you wait for the Ryzen 3 3100 or 3300x to come out, you will gain a bunch of performance there, just make sure that your motherboard bios is up to date.

 

Next is the graphics card, a gtx 1060 is great for 1080p games, not even sure that you are using it to its full potential yet, though if you wanted to you could upgrade to a gtx 1660 ti for somewhere around gtx 1070 performance.

 

All in all the only thing that would really bump you fps up in 1080p games is the cpu in this case. Just dont go above 1080p and your pc will handle most games very well.

 

All this being said, get the best cpu/gpu that you can afford and make sure that its actually a decent 15-20% upgrade before you buy it. 

 

 

 

[FriedEngineer]

17 minutes ago, JackT22 said:

Budget (including currency): want to keep it relatively cheap, but not too cheap. (Willing to spend a bit to make it better)

Can you give us an actual number? Do you have $500 to spend or closer to $50? Relatively cheap is very subjective to you and your situation so it's super tough to give you very specific recommendations

[JackT22]

13 minutes ago, smokedporkroast said:

The PSU, Motherboard, SSD and HDD all are fine, no need to upgrade there. But if you wait for the Ryzen 3 3100 or 3300x to come out, you will gain a bunch of performance there, just make sure that your motherboard bios is up to date.

 

Next is the graphics card, a gtx 1060 is great for 1080p games, not even sure that you are using it to its full potential yet, though if you wanted to you could upgrade to a gtx 1660 ti for somewhere around gtx 1070 performance.

 

All in all the only thing that would really bump you fps up in 1080p games is the cpu in this case. Just dont go above 1080p and your pc will handle most games very well.

 

All this being said, get the best cpu/gpu that you can afford and make sure that its actually a decent 15-20% upgrade before you buy it. 

 

 

 

 

8 minutes ago, FriedEngineer said:

Can you give us an actual number? Do you have $500 to spend or closer to $50? Relatively cheap is very subjective to you and your situation so it's super tough to give you very specific recommendations

Sorry, yeah I’m willing to pay up to $450-500 I’d say. But overall trying to find the cheapest options that would give me better performance than the things I already have. If it helps. I was thinking of getting a RTX 2070 in the future, and another thing was a predator XB271HU monitor.

[JackT22]

25 minutes ago, smokedporkroast said:

The PSU, Motherboard, SSD and HDD all are fine, no need to upgrade there. But if you wait for the Ryzen 3 3100 or 3300x to come out, you will gain a bunch of performance there, just make sure that your motherboard bios is up to date.

 

Next is the graphics card, a gtx 1060 is great for 1080p games, not even sure that you are using it to its full potential yet, though if you wanted to you could upgrade to a gtx 1660 ti for somewhere around gtx 1070 performance.

 

All in all the only thing that would really bump you fps up in 1080p games is the cpu in this case. Just dont go above 1080p and your pc will handle most games very well.

 

All this being said, get the best cpu/gpu that you can afford and make sure that its actually a decent 15-20% upgrade before you buy it. 

 

 

 

Appreciate the response, do you think changing the monitor would be a good idea? 

[FriedEngineer]

4 minutes ago, JackT22 said:

Appreciate the response, do you think changing the monitor would be a good idea? 

Not until you change your GPU

 

7 minutes ago, JackT22 said:

a predator XB271HU monitor

That's a pretty hefty upgrade from where you are right now: 1080p 60 Hz to 1440p 144 Hz.

 

7 minutes ago, JackT22 said:

But overall trying to find the cheapest options that would give me better performance than the things I already have

I would stay with 1080p, maybe get a faster refresh rate one if you really want but focus on upgrading your GPU and CPU first, then make the jump to a 1440p monitor.

[JackT22]

6 minutes ago, FriedEngineer said:

Not until you change your GPU

 

That's a pretty hefty upgrade from where you are right now: 1080p 60 Hz to 1440p 144 Hz.

 

I would stay with 1080p, maybe get a faster refresh rate one if you really want but focus on upgrading your GPU and CPU first, then make the jump to a 1440p monitor.

Oh okay, so what steps and how should I take them? 

[JackT22]

15 minutes ago, FriedEngineer said:

Not until you change your GPU

 

That's a pretty hefty upgrade from where you are right now: 1080p 60 Hz to 1440p 144 Hz.

 

I would stay with 1080p, maybe get a faster refresh rate one if you really want but focus on upgrading your GPU and CPU first, then make the jump to a 1440p monitor.

Okay, that makes allot of sense. Thanks for clearing that up. I was struggling on what to focus on. Glad to hear the monitor can wait.

[FriedEngineer]

29 minutes ago, JackT22 said:

Oh okay, so what steps and how should I take them? 

• CPU Options:
  • Budget: Ryzen 3100 - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $100
  • Mid Range: Ryzen 3300X - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $120
  • More $: Ryzen 3600 - 6 Cores/12 Threads currently $172.39+tax on amazon
• GPU Options
  • Budget: Nvidia GTX 1660 Super or Ti or AMD Radeon 5500 XT
  • Mid Range: Nvidia RTX 2060 or AMD Radeon 5600 XT
  • Better: Nvidia RTX 2060 Super or AMD Radeon 5700 XT

If you stick with the budget options you'll be around $400 and already have the beginnings of a higher refresh rate 1080p monitor. If you want to go for the higher end options you'd just have to wait a bit longer for a better monitor. Also, if you get a used GPU you can probably get a tier better for the same price.

[JackT22]

7 minutes ago, FriedEngineer said:

• CPU Options:
  • Budget: Ryzen 3100 - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $100
  • Mid Range: Ryzen 3300X - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $120
  • More $: Ryzen 3600 - 6 Cores/12 Threads currently $172.39+tax on amazon
• GPU Options
  • Budget: Nvidia GTX 1660 Super or Ti or AMD Radeon 5500 XT
  • Mid Range: Nvidia RTX 2060 or AMD Radeon 5600 XT
  • Better: Nvidia RTX 2060 Super or AMD Radeon 5700 XT

If you stick with the budget options you'll be around $400 and already have the beginnings of a higher refresh rate 1080p monitor. If you want to go for the higher end options you'd just have to wait a bit longer for a better monitor. Also, if you get a used GPU you can probably get a tier better for the same price.

Okay, thanks man, I appreciate all the advice. Think I’ll find a RTX 2070 for used like you suggested. And maybe look further into the right CPU for that card. Not too worried about the waiting on the monitor, as long as it gets me closer to my dream build. 
 

[FriedEngineer]

Just now, JackT22 said:

Okay, thanks man, I appreciate all the advice. Think I’ll find a RTX 2070 for used like you suggested. And maybe look further into the right CPU for that card. Not too worried about the waiting on the monitor, as long as it gets me closer to my dream build. 
 

Sure thing! If you can swing it, a used RTX 2070 or 2070 Super and a Ryzen 3600 would be golden. That all should work with your MB and RAM as well.

[smokedporkroast]

If the monitor looks good to you then stick with it. Its good to set a limit on your fps so the game runs smoother and 60 hz/fps looks good in almost every situation. That being said, the upgrade to 75hz or even 100+ hz is mind boggling. Though, it requires a better system to run at those frame rates. In general, for your system I recommend sticking with 60 or 75 hz monitors and maxing out the graphics detail on basically every game. If you do get an rtx 2070 or better along with a better cpu (r5 3600) then you could easily play any game at 144hz with variable refresh rate on (gsync, freesync) at 1080p or even 1440p.

[smokedporkroast]

In my case, I use a ryzen 7 2700 with a gtx 1070 that I got refurbished from ebay for $200 about a year ago. My monitor is a 32" LG 1440p at 144hz (VA) with a 4s response time and it runs great. I mostly play CSGO, shadow of war, and fallout 4. 

[smokedporkroast]

4 hours ago, FriedEngineer said:

• CPU Options:
  • Budget: Ryzen 3100 - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $100
  • Mid Range: Ryzen 3300X - 4 Cores/8 Threads. not quite for sale yet but will be soon for around $120
  • More $: Ryzen 3600 - 6 Cores/12 Threads currently $172.39+tax on amazon
• GPU Options
  • Budget: Nvidia GTX 1660 Super or Ti or AMD Radeon 5500 XT
  • Mid Range: Nvidia RTX 2060 or AMD Radeon 5600 XT
  • Better: Nvidia RTX 2060 Super or AMD Radeon 5700 XT

If you stick with the budget options you'll be around $400 and already have the beginnings of a higher refresh rate 1080p monitor. If you want to go for the higher end options you'd just have to wait a bit longer for a better monitor. Also, if you get a used GPU you can probably get a tier better for the same price.

Great approach.