Upgrade Now or Upgrade Later

[PhyZyx24]

So, my motherboard is now broken and i don't know if its worth to buy same socket motherboard or should i just change it all. Should I buy a replacement motherboard and save for later upgrades or sell my cpu and ram and buy up to date parts?

My current specs:
Intel Core i3-4160

Gigabyte GA-H97M-D3H (broken)
2x4GB 1600Mhz

Corsair VS450
Toshiba 1TB
Palit GTX 750 Ti StormX Dual

My Upgrade Plans:
Ryzen 3/5 or Intel Kabylake/Cannonlake/Coffeelake

[Guest]

I would go and look for a used motherboard to fix your current pc.

 

Save up lots of money, to get at least an mid range (gaming) pc.

[genexis_x]

If you have enough budget, upgrade CPU, mobo, RAM, PSU and GPU

If not, get a used i7/Xeon, a used Haswell mobo and maybe a new GPU

 

I strongly suggest you to change the PSU since it's a bad PSU

[PhyZyx24]

3 minutes ago, ZM Fong said:

If you have enough budget, upgrade CPU, mobo, RAM, PSU and GPU

If not, get a used i7/Xeon, a used Has well mobo and a new GPU

 

I strongly suggest you to change the PSU since it's a bad PSU

I don't have enough budget so i'll be upgrading them one by one.

Yeah, i'll change my PSU to S12II 520w/620w after upgrading my CPU, Mobo, and Ram. I'll be keeping my GPU for a while since I only play CS:GO and some CPU intensive games.

[dlink377]

it still a decent computer, i personally would find cheap used motherboard.

 

if you are upgrading, buy at least ryzen 5 or i5.

[PhyZyx24]

7 minutes ago, Dutch-stoner said:

I would go and look for a used motherboard to fix your current pc.

 

Save up lots of money, to get at least an mid range (gaming) pc.

Fix it now and save more for a better pc? Sounds good to me.

[rn8686]

You could get a used motherboard and i7 4790/i5 4690, much cheaper. Otherwise Ryzen would also be good. 

[genexis_x]

1 minute ago, PhyZyx24 said:

I don't have enough budget so i'll be upgrading them one by one.

Yeah, i'll change my PSU to S12II 520w/620w after upgrading my CPU, Mobo, and Ram. I'll be keeping my GPU for a while since I only play CS:GO and some CPU intensive games.

Hmm okay. You're good.

[PhyZyx24]

4 minutes ago, dlink377 said:

it still a decent computer, i personally would find cheap used motherboard.

 

if you are upgrading, buy at least ryzen 5 or i5.

I might be recording some in game footage sometimes and might try streaming. Should I go for Intel or AMD? 

[dlink377]

Just now, PhyZyx24 said:

I might be recording some in game footage sometimes and might try streaming. Should I go for Intel or AMD? 

i am biased to intel, so I would pick an Intel as my first choice.

 

however, if you can get ryzen 5 (especially with 6 physical core), i think it is a much better choice than intel offering at same price point.

[PhyZyx24]

4 minutes ago, rn8686 said:

You could get a used motherboard and i7 4790/i5 4690, much cheaper. Otherwise Ryzen would also be good. 

Haswell processors are obsolete in the computer stores where I live and I don't trust 2nd hand computer parts too much. I just can't.

[PhyZyx24]

4 minutes ago, dlink377 said:

i am biased to intel, so I would pick an Intel as my first choice.

 

however, if you can get ryzen 5 (especially with 6 physical core), i think it is a much better choice than intel offering at same price point.

Would i5 kabylake series suffice for a bit streaming? I heard they're always 100% when in game.

[rn8686]

Just now, PhyZyx24 said:

Haswell processors are obsolete in the computer stores where I live and I don't trust 2nd hand computer parts too much. I just can't.

You could look at Refurbished section in stores, most used hardware is fine (Assuming you get it from a reasonably reputable seller). In that case than, Ryzen is a great option, especially if streaming (R5 is better than i5 in many scenarios, tighter frame times also). 

[dlink377]

4 minutes ago, PhyZyx24 said:

Would i5 kabylake series suffice for a bit streaming? I heard they're always 100% when in game.

i personally use i5-7500, doesn't really have much problem when playing games.

 

I believe i5 would be a great choice, however if you need more cores or logical cores ryzen is a good choice. I don't buy ryzen now since I want a processor with some graphics card inside, and waiting for them to iron out all the issues.

 

[PhyZyx24]

8 minutes ago, rn8686 said:

You could look at Refurbished section in stores, most used hardware is fine (Assuming you get it from a reasonably reputable seller). In that case than, Ryzen is a great option, especially if streaming (R5 is better than i5 in many scenarios, tighter frame times also). 

I don't think there's a shop here where I can buy refurbished computer parts. 

In Ryzen 5 series, I am eye-ing for 1500x and 1600. 

[rn8686]

Just now, PhyZyx24 said:

I don't think there's a shop here where I can buy refurbished computer parts. 

In Ryzen 5 series, I am eye-ing for 1500x and 1600. 

The extra 2 cores will help with streaming, I recommend you get that (Either will be better than i5 for that though). 

[PhyZyx24]

Guess I would buy a replacement motherboard for now so I can use it while saving money and sell cpu,mobo and ram when I'm buying new parts. Thanks for helping

[aithos]

3 hours ago, dlink377 said:

it still a decent computer, i personally would find cheap used motherboard.

 

if you are upgrading, buy at least ryzen 5 or i5.

How do you figure that a 4~ year old i3 with a dated graphics card and DDR3 1600 RAM is a "decent" computer?

 

OP: I wouldn't recommend putting even a single penny into repairing/replacing your current motherboard.  You're wasting money by "saving" for a better upgrade unless you are less than 6 months away from being able to afford an entirely new build.  I also don't recommend upgrading "over time" because you end up paying significantly more by having parts become outdated sooner and needing more frequent updates.

 

My advice is to get a motherboard, CPU and PSU now at the very least.  If the MB is backwards compatible with the RAM you could delay that slightly if you can't afford to do it right away, but ideally you'd upgrade that now as well.  The GPU is dated but you can get away with waiting 3-6 months to save up and then if the 1100 series GPUs are releasing you might be able to score a good deal on a 1000 series due to price drops.

[elis]

Things depend on your budget. Without searching much around I found this. Doesn't seem too expensive, but well, in the end you are the one to decide.

[dlink377]

3 minutes ago, aithos said:

How do you figure that a 4~ year old i3 with a dated graphics card and DDR3 1600 RAM is a "decent" computer?

 

OP: I wouldn't recommend putting even a single penny into repairing/replacing your current motherboard.  You're wasting money by "saving" for a better upgrade unless you are less than 6 months away from being able to afford an entirely new build.  I also don't recommend upgrading "over time" because you end up paying significantly more by having parts become outdated sooner and needing more frequent updates.

 

My advice is to get a motherboard, CPU and PSU now at the very least.  If the MB is backwards compatible with the RAM you could delay that slightly if you can't afford to do it right away, but ideally you'd upgrade that now as well.  The GPU is dated but you can get away with waiting 3-6 months to save up and then if the 1100 series GPUs are releasing you might be able to score a good deal on a 1000 series due to price drops.

I said decent computer because:

• 750 GTi is still an okay graphics card for playing esports game, we don't know what game does he play. It is still better than newest gen iGPU.
• Haswell architecture is still fast enough for today use. It is only 18% increase in performance overall, even it is 4 years difference.
• DDR3 RAM is still fast, in fact I don't notice any big improvement jumping from DDR3 to DDR4.

Well, "decent" is very subjective. For someone like me that uses i3 and i5 mainly as work computer with no graphics card at all having haswell computer is good enough for my work as long it comes with SSD.

 

For OP:

If you have the budget to build entirely new system (CPU+Mobo+RAM+GPU+PSU), I suggest you to do so, especially when you want to stream the game simultaneously. However, If you don't have enough budget for all of that, I suggest buying cheapest (better if used) motherboard for your current CPU and buy it when you had enough money to upgrade all of that (just like your last post).

[walkawalka]

3 hours ago, PhyZyx24 said:

I don't think there's a shop here where I can buy refurbished computer parts. 

In Ryzen 5 series, I am eye-ing for 1500x and 1600. 

ryzen 1600 has best value and the stock cooler actually performs quite well. I just did a new build with the 1600 and I am overclocked to 3.95 at 1.356v idle temps 31-35c and after 1 hour of p95 barely hit 70c all on the stock cooler. and here are some benchmarks as you will see the multi core performance is excellent for the dollar value

[Guest]

3 hours ago, PhyZyx24 said:

I don't trust 2nd hand computer parts too much.

I'm using used memory, CPU and mobo. All works very well, and it's also very stable. (AMD ftw) You should give it a try.

 

Oh, I also use a used keyboard, but that needs to be replaced anyways when there is some keyboard/desk interaction.

[aithos]

1 hour ago, dlink377 said:

I said decent computer because:

• 750 GTi is still an okay graphics card for playing esports game, we don't know what game does he play. It is still better than newest gen iGPU.

The 750ti is what I put in my GFs computer two years ago, that doesn't play games.  As a measuring stick, being better than an internal graphics processor... is not at all impressive.  While they have gotten substantially better over the years they have always been pretty much garbage, being better than garbage isn't "decent".

 

Quote

• Haswell architecture is still fast enough for today use. It is only 18% increase in performance overall, even it is 4 years difference.

Haswell architecture isn't the problem, I have a 4770k that is more than sufficient for modern games... I'm only upgrading for the platform updates.  However, the OP doesn't have a 4770k... he has an I3.  An i3 is sub-par the day you buy it, and 4 years later is woefully out of date, even the i5 CPUs from Haswell are getting dated unless you have one of the better ones AND you're overclocking.

 

Quote

• DDR3 RAM is still fast, in fact I don't notice any big improvement jumping from DDR3 to DDR4.

The RAM was just a throw-in comment, whether you notice a big difference or not there is a difference.  Also, 8GB is a pretty small amount and the OP should really be getting 16GB.

 

Quote

Well, "decent" is very subjective. For someone like me that uses i3 and i5 mainly as work computer with no graphics card at all having haswell computer is good enough for my work as long it comes with SSD.

I don't mean to be rude, but what you use at work has literally no relevance here... we aren't talking about "generic" task decent, we are talking about decent for gaming.  Even though the OP mostly plays CSGO and probably other eSports games, he still plays games and throwing more money into a sub-par 4 year old build is a fools errand.  It's a complete waste of money.

 

ESPECIALLY if the OP is already considering upgrading.  If you are thinking about upgrading then every dollar you spend on your current system is a dollar you aren't spending on your upgrade, it's a waste of money.  What will end up happening is the OP will buy the MB and then something else will come up and need replacing, or he will buy a new CPU + MB but not be able to afford a nice one and in two years will end up outdated again.  Upgrading over time is always a bad idea.

 

[elis]

1 hour ago, aithos said:

What will end up happening is the OP will buy the MB

Not a good idea to buy an old motherboard+CPU. Even if one is very low on budget, the lowest should be something not more than 1 generation old (ie, mobo supporting 6th gen intel + 6th gen CPU). At least that way some futureproof is guaranteed.

[aithos]

2 hours ago, elis said:

Not a good idea to buy an old motherboard+CPU. Even if one is very low on budget, the lowest should be something not more than 1 generation old (ie, mobo supporting 6th gen intel + 6th gen CPU). At least that way some futureproof is guaranteed.

Umm... I think you should read my post again because what you said doesn't make sense.  I was telling the OP not to buy a replacement motherboard for his current computer, and I was saying that if he does it will mean less money for his future upgrade and would probably end up buying just the CPU + MB and have to compromise on the quality again.  It's a nasty cycle where you invest money in old technology and end up spending more for lackluster performance because you didn't plan intelligently.