CPU upgrade or no?

SodaYoda · July 1, 2020

Hey everyone,

So for context, I built my first PC in 2014 and I haven't engaged in any computer stuff since then so my knowledge of pc components that have come out since 2015 is very limited.

Up until recently I've had no issues in terms of speed but I'm studying industrial design and I've started using programs like premiere pro, solidworks, keyshot and adobe CC very regularly and noticed that my computer is struggling to run them comfortably without lagging. (When I'm rendering 1080P clips on premiere pro, youtube on chrome will lag pretty bad)

So i did some research everything is suggesting that 8gb of ram isnt enough, so I want to upgrade to 32gb of ram but was wondering if its worth upgrading my cpu to like a ryzen 5 3600 and as a result upgrade to ddr4 ram? This would be in the interest of "future proofing" it for a while.

I've read recent threads that suggest my current cpu (core i7-4790K) is still good but buying 32 gbs of ddr3 ram costs like $300 (in australia) and upgrading motherboard, cpu and getting 32gbs of ddr4 ram will cost me around $650. Do you think thats a smart investment? or do you think I should just buy ddr3 ram and save $300?

My build consists of:

CPU: i7-4790K at stock 4.0ghz

Memory: 8gb corsair vengeance ddr3

GPU: GTX970 Windforce 4GB

Motherboard: msi h97m-g43

Storage:

samsung 256gb SSD

Kingston: 480gb SSd

WD blue: 1TB HDD

(OG win7, recently upgraded to win10)

Haro · July 1, 2020

If you need the 32 gigs go for it.

Ddr3 prices have come down and it will totally not cost 300 bucks ( even au dollars )

If your satisfied with the current performance wait for zen 3

Mopy · July 1, 2020

I do belive ram is the issue since that GPU should hold its own. Thce CPU may also be an issue becuase of cores a bit and L3 cashe

Windows7ge · July 1, 2020

IMO that depends on how critical this is for your education and how you expect for the investment to pay for itself.

If you know that it will I'd get onboard with the latest platform.

If you feel there's a 50/50 chance this career path is going to go up in smoke then I'd probably check if RAM and/or your CPU are the bottleneck and look from there to find inexpensive second hand parts. Old server platforms can sometimes be goldmines for cheap high performance workstations.