Balancing out/"fixing" current system

[Sneeex]

Last build, made mid 2014 has been giving me problems lately. I play games like Rocket League with well around 50+FPS but I'm unsure if the build (as it is) is balanced. Older games like Crossfire give me frame drops from 200 to 50 and back to 200 every few minutes and it's disrupting the gameplay. Some friends tell me it's the CPU, some say it's the GPU but the main problem might actually be the HDD. I've had it since the start of my previous system. (Celeron 2.8ghz, ATI Radeon 3600HD). Crystal disk says its health status is "Good" and temperature is around 35C as I'm writing this, but it is quite old and I'm unsure if a new HDD (or even an SSD) would solve the stutters

Also taking notes on possible small, budget upgrades to make games run on medium/high rather than almost low (ETS2 at the moment)

 

Specs:
CPU: Intel Core i3-4330 - 3.5GHZ, 4MB Cache, LGA1150
GPU: ASUS GeForce GT640 - 2GB DDR3
RAM: Kingston HyperX Blu - 1x 8GB DDR3, 1600MHZ

Motherboard: Asrock B85 Pro4 1150

HDD: Western Digital Blue 640GB - WD6400AAKS-22A7B2

[Sahil10416]

upgrading the gpu is the best option.

[downshiftxlr8]

What SATA Gen is that HDD ? Drive can be good but if it's older then...... I mean SSD's are getting cheaper.

[Sneeex]

12 minutes ago, Sahil10416 said:

upgrading the gpu is the best option.

Probably, also person who helped me build it said I should get a beefier cooler - So that should be on my to do list as well...

12 minutes ago, downshiftxlr8 said:

What SATA Gen is that HDD ? Drive can be good but if it's older then...... I mean SSD's are getting cheaper.

Chrystal disk says "Transfer mode: SATA/300"

The same models on newegg are listed as 3.0Gb/s but I doubt mine is even close to that 

[downshiftxlr8]

1 minute ago, Sneeex said:

Probably, also person who helped me build it said I should get a beefier cooler - So that should be on my to do list as well...

Chrystal disk says "Transfer mode: SATA/300"

The same models on newegg are listed as 3.0Gb/s but I doubt mine is even close to that 

Ouch SATA II..... I would at least get a SATA III drive or save just a smidge more for an SSD. GPU upgrade would be nice, but I feel you would see the most performance gains from a SSD upgrade.

[JefferyD90]

38 minutes ago, Sneeex said:

Last build, made mid 2014 has been giving me problems lately. I play games like Rocket League with well around 50+FPS but I'm unsure if the build (as it is) is balanced. Older games like Crossfire give me frame drops from 200 to 50 and back to 200 every few minutes and it's disrupting the gameplay. Some friends tell me it's the CPU, some say it's the GPU but the main problem might actually be the HDD. I've had it since the start of my previous system. (Celeron 2.8ghz, ATI Radeon 3600HD). Crystal disk says its health status is "Good" and temperature is around 35C as I'm writing this, but it is quite old and I'm unsure if a new HDD (or even an SSD) would solve the stutters

Also taking notes on possible small, budget upgrades to make games run on medium/high rather than almost low (ETS2 at the moment)

 

Specs:
CPU: Intel Core i3-4330 - 3.5GHZ, 4MB Cache, LGA1150
GPU: ASUS GeForce GT640 - 2GB DDR3
RAM: Kingston HyperX Blu - 1x 8GB DDR3, 1600MHZ

Motherboard: Asrock B85 Pro4 1150

HDD: Western Digital Blue 640GB - WD6400AAKS-22A7B2

That GPU is rough...  I'd recommend 3 things here... New storage, new video card, and a clean install of Windows.  I think that will go a long way in solving your problems.

[Sneeex]

17 minutes ago, JefferyD90 said:

New storage, new video card, and a clean install of Windows.  I think that will go a long way in solving your problems.

Storage is obtainable, never really reached half of those 640GB so a 480GB SSD should be fine for now and I'll just use the HDD as an offload for multimedia files, school projects and such. Xmas discounts are currently taking place anyways

As for video card, I'll either get something from Pascal/Polaris to future proof at least for some time or a used 750Ti. They're cheap and I heard many good things about them.

 

Clean windows... *shivers* had to reinstall it a month ago or so, brother downloaded some old game on my PC and it came with loads of chinese bloat. Nightmares. Lost all the 3d models and game mods I had along with programs and settings like Blender, Forza Studio

[JefferyD90]

9 minutes ago, Sneeex said:

Storage is obtainable, never really reached half of those 640GB so a 480GB SSD should be fine for now and I'll just use the HDD as an offload for multimedia files, school projects and such. Xmas discounts are currently taking place anyways

As for video card, I'll either get something from Pascal/Polaris to future proof at least for some time or a used 750Ti. They're cheap and I heard many good things about them.

 

Clean windows... *shivers* had to reinstall it a month ago or so, brother downloaded some old game on my PC and it came with loads of chinese bloat. Nightmares. Lost all the 3d models and game mods I had along with programs and settings like Blender, Forza Studio

That's why you should be doing regular backups of your data.  Additionally, get a better video card... you can do better than a 750Ti... that is a 4 gen older card.