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Should I upgrade my CPU or GPU?

MulleyUK
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I'm looking to upgrade my rig after having the same setup for the past couple of years. One thing I am looking to improve is the ability to multi-task. I use my PC for Gaming/Live streaming/Graphics Design & I also like to watch a lot of videos and live streams whilst I game.

 

Playing CS:GO At Medium/Low settings I average around 120-140 FPS. Watching a live stream at Source quality & Playing CS:GO at Medium/High settings I average around 50-60 FPS. My current CPU is a Quad-Core AMD A8-5600k APU @ 3.6Ghz & my current GPU is a 2GB MSI Radeon 7850.

 

My question is should I upgrade my CPU or GPU?

 

Also with a budget of £150 ($230) what do you recommend?

 

Thanks in advance for the help. 

New CPU and mobo in my opinion. Get these and stay within your budget:

 

 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£49.36 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £136.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 22:50 GMT+0000
Posted

I'm looking to upgrade my rig after having the same setup for the past couple of years. One thing I am looking to improve is the ability to multi-task. I use my PC for Gaming/Live streaming/Graphics Design & I also like to watch a lot of videos and live streams whilst I game.

 

Playing CS:GO At Medium/Low settings I average around 120-140 FPS. Watching a live stream at Source quality & Playing CS:GO at Medium/High settings I average around 50-60 FPS. My current CPU is a Quad-Core AMD A8-5600k APU @ 3.6Ghz & my current GPU is a 2GB MSI Radeon 7850.

 

My question is should I upgrade my CPU or GPU?

 

Also with a budget of £150 ($230) what do you recommend?

 

Thanks in advance for the help. 

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i'd upgrade the cpu and get PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 
CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor  ($103.98 @ OutletPC) 
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 Extreme3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($104.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $208.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 17:49 EST-0500
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i'd upgrade the cpu and get PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 
CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor  ($103.98 @ OutletPC) 
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 Extreme3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($104.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $208.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 17:49 EST-0500

 

this

Want a good game to play?  Check out Shadowrun: http://store.steampowered.com/app/300550/ (runs on literally any hardware)

 

another 12 core / 24 thread senpai...     (/. _ .)/     \(. _ .\)

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I'm looking to upgrade my rig after having the same setup for the past couple of years. One thing I am looking to improve is the ability to multi-task. I use my PC for Gaming/Live streaming/Graphics Design & I also like to watch a lot of videos and live streams whilst I game.

 

Playing CS:GO At Medium/Low settings I average around 120-140 FPS. Watching a live stream at Source quality & Playing CS:GO at Medium/High settings I average around 50-60 FPS. My current CPU is a Quad-Core AMD A8-5600k APU @ 3.6Ghz & my current GPU is a 2GB MSI Radeon 7850.

 

My question is should I upgrade my CPU or GPU?

 

Also with a budget of £150 ($230) what do you recommend?

 

Thanks in advance for the help. 

New CPU and mobo in my opinion. Get these and stay within your budget:

 

 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£49.36 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £136.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 22:50 GMT+0000

My arsenal: i7-9700k Gaming Rig, an iPhone, and Stupidity.

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Pretty much.


 

New CPU and mobo in my opinion. Get these and stay within your budget:

 

 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£49.36 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £136.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 22:50 GMT+0000

 

Maximums - Asus Z97-K /w i5 4690 Bclk @106.9Mhz * x39 = 4.17Ghz, 8GB of 2600Mhz DDR3,.. Gigabyte GTX970 G1-Gaming @ 1550Mhz

 

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i'd upgrade the cpu and get PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 
CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor  ($103.98 @ OutletPC) 
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 Extreme3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($104.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $208.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 17:49 EST-0500

 

Thanks for the help I will be sure to check it out.

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New CPU and mobo in my opinion. Get these and stay within your budget:

 

 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£49.36 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £136.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 22:50 GMT+0000

 

Thanks for the help. 

 

I was just wondering would I be downgrading rather than upgrading if I switched from a quad-core to a Duel-core at the same clock speed?

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Thanks for the help. 

 

I was just wondering would I be downgrading rather than upgrading if I switched from a quad-core to a Duel-core at the same clock speed?

For the most part, in your eyes...it'll be faster, due to the single threaded nature of software, all lightweight programs (huge percentage of the software available) are going to be faster in a CPU with faster single threaded performance, even with less cores to use, the cores in use are nearly twice as fast as your old ones.

 

Games will still hit peak framerates, they may dip a little in certain heavy scenes, but quickly recover to full performance.

Encoding and such, is still super fast, and if your using GPU assisted encoding programs, if not you can grab one to benefit, less of an issue anyway.

Multitasking is still good, just not as good as the i5/i7, but performance is still there to rip into.

 

Most of your daily duties will be faster, as will some games.

Maximums - Asus Z97-K /w i5 4690 Bclk @106.9Mhz * x39 = 4.17Ghz, 8GB of 2600Mhz DDR3,.. Gigabyte GTX970 G1-Gaming @ 1550Mhz

 

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For the most part, in your eyes...it'll be faster, due to the single threaded nature of software, all lightweight programs (huge percentage of the software available) are going to be faster in a CPU with faster single threaded performance, even with less cores to use, the cores in use are nearly twice as fast as your old ones.

 

Games will still hit peak framerates, they may dip a little in certain heavy scenes, but quickly recover to full performance.

Encoding and such, is still super fast, and if your using GPU assisted encoding programs, if not you can grab one to benefit, less of an issue anyway.

Multitasking is still good, just not as good as the i5/i7, but performance is still there to rip into.

 

Most of your daily duties will be faster, as will some games.

I was considering going with these two...

 
CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor  (£79.19 @ Aria PC) 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3 Micro ATX AM3+ Motherboard  (£39.59 @ Aria PC) 
Total: £118.78
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker
 
What do you think?
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I was considering going with these two...

 
CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor  (£79.19 @ Aria PC) 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3 Micro ATX AM3+ Motherboard  (£39.59 @ Aria PC) 
Total: £118.78
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker
 
What do you think?

 

If your focus is Gaming,.. I mean thats what your primary objective for this machine is.. then dont get any FX processor, well.. they will be okay, it's usually when using 2xHighPerformanceGPU's that it cripples. This link is a good read, across a few configs,..also there are real world users and experiences from people like you...

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/266481-an-issue-with-people-bashing-the-fx-cpus/page-5#entry3621417

^Wall of text, huge,.. but expand all of it, have a read... keep an eye on MinimumFPS (FPS drops) and Price,.. AMD's setup isn't cheaper anymore.

You need a decent chipset to manage the FX's CPU,.. and if not buying a decent one,.. can lead to throttling of the cores frequencies. (even at stock in some cases)

You need to spend more on the FX motherboard to do well, by that time you could have gone with the Intel route, spent less,.. and have more performance.

 

I know...

:(

 

For a huge range of tasks that isn't gaming any FX is comparable,.. but the Intel i3 or better yet an i5 will do WAY better in a huge range of games...\

 

I g2g for a few hours.. @Faceman can take over ;)

Maximums - Asus Z97-K /w i5 4690 Bclk @106.9Mhz * x39 = 4.17Ghz, 8GB of 2600Mhz DDR3,.. Gigabyte GTX970 G1-Gaming @ 1550Mhz

 

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If your focus is Gaming,.. I mean thats what your primary objective for this machine is.. then dont get any FX processor, well.. they will be okay, it's usually when using 2xHighPerformanceGPU's that it cripples. This link is a good read, across a few configs,..also there are real world users and experiences from people like you...

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/266481-an-issue-with-people-bashing-the-fx-cpus/page-5#entry3621417

^Wall of text, huge,.. but expand all of it, have a read... keep an eye on MinimumFPS (FPS drops) and Price,.. AMD's setup isn't cheaper anymore.

You need a decent chipset to manage the FX's CPU,.. and if not buying a decent one,.. can lead to throttling of the cores frequencies. (even at stock in some cases)

You need to spend more on the FX motherboard to do well, by that time you could have gone with the Intel route, spent less,.. and have more performance.

 

I know...

:(

 

For a huge range of tasks that isn't gaming any FX is comparable,.. but the Intel i3 or better yet an i5 will do WAY better in a huge range of games...

Ok thanks a lot for the help it is really appreciated! 

 

I think I am going to go with what Dadasmithywinkle posted...

 

 

New CPU and mobo in my opinion. Get these and stay within your budget:

 

 
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£49.36 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £136.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-05 22:50 GMT+0000

 

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If your purpose is gaming, an Intel is the processor you want.

 

Even an i3 outperforms an FX8 in the majority of games.

"I genuinely dislike the promulgation of false information, especially to people who are asking for help selecting new parts."

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Thanks for the help. 

 

I was just wondering would I be downgrading rather than upgrading if I switched from a quad-core to a Duel-core at the same clock speed?

its better to have a faster dual core

My Cheap But Good Rig: I7-3770s, Intel Motherboard (actually made by intel), 16gb DDR3, Nvidia Gtx 1070, 250gb Samsung 850 EVO SSD, 750gb HDD, Evga 500 BR power supply

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