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Cpu or Gpu upgrading.

OBielegend
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Hi guy I'm new to this forum and I'm looking for some advise.

 

I have got a bit of extra cash and am looking for the best possible upgrade for my money

 

I am running

Asus M5a97 le2.0 

8Gb of Ram at 1600mhz

Amd fx 4170(I have liquid cooling) 

and a Radeon hd 7870 

 

I have about £200 and I'm a student so I cant really change my budget.

 

I would like to know which would make the most difference an Amd fx 8350 or another Hd 7870? 

 

My concerns are that the cpu upgrade would not make much of a difference and running

two Radeon card in crossfire have many problems ie. optimization and driver problem's. 

(I heard they are working on better driver's, but who knows when they will come out)

 

Also my MotherBoard has two PCIe slots one is PCIe 2.0 x16

                                                        the other is PCIe 2.0 x16 (x4 mode)  

 Would this make a difference?

And my PC runs almost everything at full settings at playable frame's is it worth upgrading now or waiting until I start working and build a high end system without a budget?

 

Thank you for reading. 

Regards. 

OBieLegend 

 

 

  

 

 

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Hmm...this is tuff. 

 

You see, if you get another 7870 then your cpu will surely bottleneck you, but it won't bottleneck a single 7870. And upgrading to a 8350 would't give you a performance boost with only a single 7870.

 

Also your motherboard will definitely slow down the second 7870 with only 4 lines going to it.

 

It's a hard call, the only thing I could suggest is upgrading both...Maybe a 6350 and sell the 7870, then put the money towards a 7970? Not to mention the problems of having two cards vs. having a single card...

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From my point of view, an 8320 will make all the difference for you, you will see performance differences even in general use scenarios, so it's definitely worth upgrading to. Also, running that card in a 4X slot will kill the bandwith, making it yeld half of it's normal performance, and maybe dragging the other one down too.

Codename: HighFlyer, specs:  CPU: i5 2500k cooled by a H70ish(2 rad)   Mobo: MSI MPower Z77   GPUs: Gigabyte GTX 660 OC 1150 MHZ core, 3150 memory both   RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16G @1600mhz   SSD: ADATA Premier Pro sx900 / HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB/Samsung 1TB   Power supply: Corsair RM650 80+ Gold   Case Corsair Carbide 500R   5.4 ghz achieved on the good old 2500k, may it rest in peace. Current daily OC is 4.8 @1.41 v

 

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From my point of view, an 8320 will make all the difference for you, you will see performance differences even in general use scenarios, so it's definitely worth upgrading to. Also, running that card in a 4X slot will kill the bandwith, making it yeld half of it's normal performance, and maybe dragging the other one down too.

Yes. Something like this and perhaps commit to getting an ssd if you haven't already.

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Hmm...this is tuff. 

 

You see, if you get another 7870 then your cpu will surely bottleneck you, but it won't bottleneck a single 7870. And upgrading to a 8350 would't give you a performance boost with only a single 7870.

 

Also your motherboard will definitely slow down the second 7870 with only 4 lines going to it.

 

It's a hard call, the only thing I could suggest is upgrading both...Maybe a 6350 and sell the 7870, then put the money towards a 7970? Not to mention the problems of having two cards vs. having a single card...

 

 

From my point of view, an 8320 will make all the difference for you, you will see performance differences even in general use scenarios, so it's definitely worth upgrading to. Also, running that card in a 4X slot will kill the bandwith, making it yeld half of it's normal performance, and maybe dragging the other one down too.

 

 

Yes. Something like this and perhaps commit to getting an ssd if you haven't already.

 

 

I would definitely go for a 8350

 

 

I think you should get a new cpu and get another gpu later because the 7870 is still a very good card (over 60fps in bf3)

 

 

Go for a 6350 sell your 7870 if you can and but a 7950 or 7970

Thank you for such fast reply's

 

I think that I will buy A Fx 8350 and then try to sell my Fx 4170 and Hd 7870 and get a Hd 7970

 

Thank you so much for your advise.  

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Thank you for such fast reply's

 

I think that I will buy A Fx 8350 and then try to sell my Fx 4170 and Hd 7870 and get a Hd 7970

 

Thank you so much for your advise.  

Go 8320, and save some cash, i guess you'll be overcloking the thing anyways.

Codename: HighFlyer, specs:  CPU: i5 2500k cooled by a H70ish(2 rad)   Mobo: MSI MPower Z77   GPUs: Gigabyte GTX 660 OC 1150 MHZ core, 3150 memory both   RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16G @1600mhz   SSD: ADATA Premier Pro sx900 / HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB/Samsung 1TB   Power supply: Corsair RM650 80+ Gold   Case Corsair Carbide 500R   5.4 ghz achieved on the good old 2500k, may it rest in peace. Current daily OC is 4.8 @1.41 v

 

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Get another 7870 and Crossfire

I still don't recommend doing that until AMD's driver fix is released.

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"I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you" - Edward I. Koch

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8350 all the way. Crossfire is broken and needs to be fixed (and properly I may add) before you should even consider it.

Area 51 2014. Intel 5820k@ 4.4ghz. MSI X99.16gb Quad channel ram. AMD Fury X.Asus RAIDR.OCZ ARC 480gb SSD. Velociraptor 600gb. 2tb WD.

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Just be careful over clocking something like a 8 core on your motherboard. it really isn;t designed to handle that much power draw, hence why it only uses a 4 pin CPU plug. You're going to want to swap it out or at least put some heatsinks on the mofsets or you're going to find you're getting throttling.

 

 

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