What components are worth upgrading?

[iGPR3]

Budget (including currency): ~£500

Country: England

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Modded Assetto Corsa, BeamNG and FH5

 

 

At the moment I have an Aldi Medion prebuilt with a Zotac 2060 super mini and i5-10400. Ive since swapped the case into a Lian Li Mesh II Snow and its a great system. It has 16 GB of dual channel RAM and 3TB of total storage, I usually play at 1440p but my GPU is limited to 60fps at that high a resolution.

 

I was considering a GPU upgrade for christmas, maybe see what 3000 series prices are like or even get some money instead and buy the 4060 when it releases. This or I could maybe upgrade my motherboard for upgradability like quad channel RAM, more NVMe M.2 slots, etc, although I would also have to think about CPU sockets and maybe upgrade that aswell.

 

As far as upgrades go for now, I was considering buying a better CPU air cooler like the Vetroo V5 or maybe 16GB of faster RAM and get another 2 sticks later on when I get a better mobo.

 

What do you think would be a cheap ish upgrade that would make a big difference for the system I have? Thanks in advance!

[191x7]

6 minutes ago, iGPR3 said:

Budget (including currency): ~£500

Country: England

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Modded Assetto Corsa, BeamNG and FH5

 

At the moment I have an Aldi Medion prebuilt with a Zotac 2060 super mini and i5-10400. Ive since swapped the case into a Lian Li Mesh II Snow and its a great system. It has 16 GB of dual channel RAM and 3TB of total storage, I usually play at 1440p but my GPU is limited to 60fps at that high a resolution.

Do you know the specs of the power supply (PSU)? At least the manufacturer and wattage if you don't know the model?

Also, which motherboard is it using (yo ucan find out using CPU-Z)?

 

A better GPU would be nice, but for a much stronger GPU you'd need a better CPU too, and most likely a new PSU, depending on the PSU you have you might need a better one anyway.

 

Replacing the motherboard while keeping the CPU isn't something I'd recommend in your case. 

 

Do you run a stock (box) cooler? If so, using a better cooler might decrease your PC noise and maybe help with the temperatures and aesthetics.

 

[iGPR3]

12 minutes ago, 191x7 said:

Do you know the specs of the power supply (PSU)? At least the manufacturer and wattage if you don't know the model?

Also, which motherboard is it using (yo ucan find out using CPU-Z)?

 

A better GPU would be nice, but for a much stronger GPU you'd need a better CPU too, and most likely a new PSU, depending on the PSU you have you might need a better one anyway.

 

Replacing the motherboard while keeping the CPU isn't something I'd recommend in your case. 

 

Do you run a stock (box) cooler? If so, using a better cooler might decrease your PC noise and maybe help with the temperatures and aesthetics.

 

Im not entirely sure on names of things as it is a prebuilt.. the PSU is a 550W and is labelled ‘power block 550’, I havent been able to find much at all about the PSU. The motherboard isn’t an official branded one, as its Aldi. From what I have found on the Medion website, I believe its a B460H6-EM board from what I can find but most of the website is in German.. I’m not sure about the cooler, its not a stock i5 cooler but its certainly a beefier one than what Intel provides. Its probably a case of upgrade every major thing or dont upgrade at all, as upgrading one component on its own is useless without other better components.

[Tegneren]

29 minutes ago, iGPR3 said:

I could maybe upgrade my motherboard for upgradability like quad channel RAM

Your system dont support quad channel ram, for that you need something like a intel xenon or AMD Threadripper system.

Depending on your motherboard you can however have 4 sticks of RAM, but its still running in Dual channel just with increased capacity. For a gaming system its not really much to gain by going above 16GB in most cases.

 

At that budget yo can get a decent GPU, like a "low end" 3070 or a good 3060TI, or a 6700XT if you should choose to go the AMD route.

My nephew runs a 3070 with a 10400f CPU and that works just fine, and will be good at 1440p as its easier on the CPU at that higher resolutions.

 

So I would upgrade the GPU before the CPU, and not bother with upgrading RAM or storage now

[191x7]

9 minutes ago, iGPR3 said:

Im not entirely sure on names of things as it is a prebuilt.. the PSU is a 550W and is labelled ‘power block 550’, I havent been able to find much at all about the PSU. The motherboard isn’t an official branded one, as its Aldi. From what I have found on the Medion website, I believe its a  board from what I can find but most of the website is in German.. I’m not sure about the cooler, its not a stock i5 cooler but its certainly a beefier one than what Intel provides. Its probably a case of upgrade every major thing or dont upgrade at all, as upgrading one component on its own is useless without other better components.

Can you take a photo of the label on the PSU?

 

As for the motherboard, use CPU-Z to check it. It's probably not a proprietary board, probably a regular mATX or ATX board, likely AsRock, ECS, or something.

I find the info on an ECS B460H6-EM. 2 RAM slots (so for RAM upgrade you'd have to go 2x16GB to replace the 2x8GB).

 

[iGPR3]

10 minutes ago, Tegneren said:

Your system dont support quad channel ram, for that you need something like a intel xenon or AMD Threadripper system.

Depending on your motherboard you can however have 4 sticks of RAM, but its still running in Dual channel just with increased capacity. For a gaming system its not really much to gain by going above 16GB in most cases.

 

At that budget yo can get a decent GPU, like a "low end" 3070 or a good 3060TI, or a 6700XT if you should choose to go the AMD route.

My nephew runs a 3070 with a 10400f CPU and that works just fine, and will be good at 1440p as its easier on the CPU at that higher resolutions.

 

So I would upgrade the GPU before the CPU, and not bother with upgrading RAM or storage now

 

 

 

I know that 32GB might be a stretch but for games like BeamNG and Minecraft that eat up RAM then it might be worth the upgrade even if I wont use all of it.

 

Also, would it be worth saving for a new motherboard? My system was designed for one exhaust fan and the CPU fan so it only has 2 fan headers on the board, and it isnt as good as another board might be as its primarily designed to work with my components in mind.

[iGPR3]

10 minutes ago, 191x7 said:

Can you take a photo of the label on the PSU?

 

As for the motherboard, use CPU-Z to check it. It's probably not a proprietary board, probably a regular mATX or ATX board, likely AsRock, ECS, or something.

I find the info on an ECS B460H6-EM. 2 RAM slots (so for RAM upgrade you'd have to go 2x16GB to replace the 2x8GB).

 

Im at my grandmas playing dominos so I cant check the label or CPUZ. The board is an mATX and im not sure what CPUZ says off the top of my head, i’ll leave a reply when I get home with it.

[Tegneren]

3 minutes ago, iGPR3 said:

I know that 32GB might be a stretch but for games like BeamNG and Minecraft that eat up RAM then it might be worth the upgrade even if I wont use all of it.

 

Also, would it be worth saving for a new motherboard? My system was designed for one exhaust fan and the CPU fan so it only has 2 fan headers on the board, and it isnt as good as another board might be as its primarily designed to work with my components in mind.

It wouldn't hurt with more ram, just dont expect too much of a boost.

 

Lack of fan headers can easily be solved with splitters or fan controllers. If you feel hindered by lack of features on your current motherboard an upgrade might be needed, but at that point you can also consider a platform change, like intel 12th gen or AMD Ryzen.

Also depending on what motherboard you have it might not be suitable for a upgrade to something like a i7 either

[iGPR3]

2 hours ago, Tegneren said:

It wouldn't hurt with more ram, just dont expect too much of a boost.

 

Lack of fan headers can easily be solved with splitters or fan controllers. If you feel hindered by lack of features on your current motherboard an upgrade might be needed, but at that point you can also consider a platform change, like intel 12th gen or AMD Ryzen.

Also depending on what motherboard you have it might not be suitable for a upgrade to something like a i7 either

yeah, but at least with a new board I would have headroom for upgrades in the future, and a new CPU would be great as mine maxes out quite a bit. 

 

Maybe 12th gen would be a good option when 13th gen releases, or Ryzen would certainly be a good option for the price with the success of their 7000 CPUs.