Do I need more than a quad-core for gaming?

[Mackelbot]

Just now, Krillingt75961 said:

You will need a new Mobo if you want to upgrade to pretty much anything.

Yep. When I first built the system (over a year ago now) I bought the cheapest possible compatible motherboard

[sgloux3470]

I would recommend the G4560 instead for a budget build.  Unless you just want to buy a CPU, then I'd say an 8350 is best.

[Mackelbot]

Just now, sgloux3470 said:

I would recommend the G4560 instead for a budget build.

Pentium?

[JoostinOnline]

2 hours ago, JDE said:

Then go with a i3 7350K or a G4560. The 7100 isn't really worth it.

The i3-7350K is a terrible value. 

[Phate.exe]

I mean your current motherboard will run pretty much any phenom II, which would be a big upgrade from what you currently have, ditto an FX cpu, although I wouldn't try overclocking either of them by much, unless you like the idea of your voltage regulators catching on fire.

 

It's too bad it doesn't have core unlocking in the bios, you could probably unlock your current CPU to a quad core.

 

You could try grabbing a used FX-8320e off ebay, should be only $70 or so.  That's probably your cheapest upgrade path without tearing apart the whole system.

[sgloux3470]

24 minutes ago, Mackelbot said:

Pentium?

Yeah.  With hyper threading.  It's as good as an i3 for like $60.

[Phate.exe]

3 minutes ago, sgloux3470 said:

Yeah.  With hyper threading.  It's as good as an i3 for like $60.

$60 plus a new motherboard (not that a new motherboard would be a bad idea).

 

An FX8320e would work on OP's current board (possibly requiring a driver update), and the performance difference is massive.  An x3 445 does 215cb in cinebench R15, and a 4GHz x3 445 only does 303cb.

 

A stock 8320e does 519cb.  If you can snag a used one for cheap on ebay, and maybe grab a cooler, you can have a solid upgrade for like $80 all-in.

 

But anything beyond that I'd just save my lunch money for a few more weeks to grab an R5 1400, a B350 mobo, and some DDR4.

[LienusLateTips]

2 minutes ago, Phate.exe said:

$60 plus a new motherboard (not that a new motherboard would be a bad idea).

 

An FX8320e would work on OP's current board (possibly requiring a driver update), and the performance difference is massive.  An x3 445 does 215cb in cinebench R15, and a 4GHz x3 445 only does 303cb.

 

A stock 8320e does 519cb.  If you can snag a used one for cheap on ebay, and maybe grab a cooler, you can have a solid upgrade for like $80 all-in.

 

But anything beyond that I'd just save my lunch money for a few more weeks to grab an R5 1400, a B350 mobo, and some DDR4.

It wouldn't be worth it; FX chips are horrible and with the saved motherboard cost you could get a Pentium and a B250.

[NumLock21]

Get a Peniium G4560 and a B250 board with 4 ram slots and a single 8GB of ram. Or wait until the entry level Ryzen comes out and then decided what you want to get. Do not get FX cpus, they're obsolete.

[sgloux3470]

1 hour ago, Phate.exe said:

$60 plus a new motherboard (not that a new motherboard would be a bad idea).

 

An FX8320e would work on OP's current board (possibly requiring a driver update), and the performance difference is massive.  An x3 445 does 215cb in cinebench R15, and a 4GHz x3 445 only does 303cb.

 

A stock 8320e does 519cb.  If you can snag a used one for cheap on ebay, and maybe grab a cooler, you can have a solid upgrade for like $80 all-in.

 

But anything beyond that I'd just save my lunch money for a few more weeks to grab an R5 1400, a B350 mobo, and some DDR4.

 

He could get a G4560 and a mobo for like $100-125.  Not that the 8320E would be bad though.

[Phate.exe]

2 hours ago, JDE said:

It wouldn't be worth it; FX chips are horrible and with the saved motherboard cost you could get a Pentium and a B250.

I'm aware FX chips aren't great, but OP mentioned light content production, and the extra threads might come in handy.  Plus it's not like an 8320e outright sucks for gaming.  Plenty of people are still using them.  OP has a 1050ti, so we're probably not gonna be bottlecking anywhere.

 

Plus all that's necessary for OP to upgrade to the 8320e is updating the bios, buying the chip and a hyper 212 evo, dropping the CPU into the mobo, reinstall cooler, and boot back into windows (Which probably won't freak out about license issues with a CPU swap).

 

Even the B250/pentium is still scraping the bottom of the barrel as far as modern hardware goes, so I don't really see the point of spending the money ($62 mobo, $65 G4560, $60-70 8GB DDR4 = $180-200 after shipping) to completely rebuild the system.

 

Personally, I'd just slap the FX into the existing system, maybe throw another stick of ram at it, rock it for another year or so, and then build something from the ground up.

[asand1]

FX is AM3+, you have AM3. If you were hoping to slap an FX in your motherboard it won't work.

[Conan1600]

lots of opinions here. truth be told you said you had 250.00 for a platform upgrade. you would be well served to add another 50 bucks to that and go with a new b350 and r5 1400 with 8 gigs of ram as suggested by another member for right at 300.00 or go used. when going used i typically find the best deals on ebay by simply looking for an entire desktop for sale with a standard atx or micro atx motherboard so that it can be transplanted to another case. typically i can find a intel 2500 and up i5 for under 200 bucks with ram HD and all. you would be served by almost any sandy bridge I5 or higher intel setup, or any new Ryzen much better than your current rig.

Do not waste money IMO on an i3 or older AMD CPU.

[Phate.exe]

2 hours ago, asand1 said:

FX is AM3+, you have AM3. If you were hoping to slap an FX in your motherboard it won't work.

According to OP, he has the motherboard linked below:

20 hours ago, Mackelbot said:

I do have an OEM motherboard (http://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-78LMT-USB3-rev-41#ov) but I have a 600W PSU

Which does support AM3+, and specifically lists the FX-83xx processors.

[asand1]

14 minutes ago, Phate.exe said:

According to OP, he has the motherboard linked below:

Which does support AM3+, and specifically lists the FX-83xx processors.

I didn't see that post, I just looked at the specs of his current CPU. I would look for a used 8320e dumped due to the Ryzen boon. Would be a cheap upgrade. Get an SSD with the saved money.

[Phate.exe]

1 minute ago, asand1 said:

I didn't see that post, I just looked at the specs of his current CPU. I would look for a used 8320e dumped due to the Ryzen boon. Would be a cheap upgrade. Get an SSD with the saved money.

Yeah, 8320e and a better cooler was my recommendation.  SSD isn't a bad plan either.