PC upgrade

Avant of Eredon · August 8, 2018

Hi,

my friend's motherboard has died and he asked me for help with putting together an upgrade( board was with 1150 socket and its probably better to upgrade now, then to waste money on an 1150 motherboard). Yes, I see the irony.

Thing is, I have never 100% made a build by myself and since it would be my friend who pays the price if I screw up...I thought it better to hopefully get advice from someone who actually knows what he/she is doing. Anyway, on to the build:

1.

- Budget is not entirely fixed, but 900$ is probably the top.

- We are in the Czech Republic, so Newegg is sadly not an option and even Amazon often just refuses to ship to us - which makes this even more complicated.

2.

Its a gaming setup. He mostly plays MMOs (PoE, Destiny, Warthunder) and open-world RPGs.

3.

He runs on 2 monitors, probably won't be adding more any time soon. I am not sure about resolution (can ask if needed), but its probably 1920*1080.

4.

No peripherals needed.

5.

Since intro covers the why I'll use this point to what exactly needs an upgrade. Since the motherboard that died had an 1150 socket, the main two components would be CPU and MB. The RAM is DDR3 and still usable (I might be able to convince him to get DDR4, but I am not sure if its worth it myself), same for graphics card and power supply (EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 SC GAMING ACX 3.0, 8GB GDDR5, Chieftec iARENA GPA-500B8 500W). He also wants a new case to go with the system.

Thats about all info I can think of. Thank you in advance if you do decide to help out.

Spotty · August 8, 2018

Keep the graphics card, the GTX 1070 your friend has is more than capable for 1080p gaming, replace everything else. All modern platforms use DDR4 not DDR3, so if you wanted to continue using DDR3 memory you would be looking at buying a used 1150 socket board, but as you mentioned it's probably not worth the cost to be buying in to the older platform. Unfortunately this means that you will be needing to buy new DDR4 memory, but the upgrade should last your friend a while whereas sticking to 1150 socket/DDR3 memory is already towards the end of its usefulness.

I'm not familiar with it, but at first glance that power supply looks like garbage. Your friend should be looking at replacing the PSU as well.

8 minutes ago, Avant of Eredon said:

- Budget is not entirely fixed, but 900$ is probably the top.

Just to clarify, is that $900 USD?
I've put some part lists together to give you a general idea of what parts you could be looking for. This will give a general idea of price as well, however if parts cost a premium where you are then things may be a bit more expensive for you than they are in this list which uses USA stores, so keep that in mind. You will probably have to find some reputable part stores/online retailers in your local country or elsewhere within Europe. I've left plenty of room in the builds to hopefully keep them well within the $900 budget even if there is some inflation on prices where you live.

AMD Build. (Feel free to swap out the 2600 for a 2700 if you want more power and budget isn't an issue, though a 2600 should be plenty for their needs)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 5 2600 3.4GHz 6-Core Processor ($165.99 @ Walmart)
Motherboard: ASRock - AB350M Pro4 Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($74.49 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Corsair - Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($159.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - FOCUS Plus Gold 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($73.38 @ Amazon)
Total: $473.85
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-08-08 13:45 EDT-0400

Intel (Feel free to swap the i5 8400 out for up to an 8600 if you want a more powerful CPU and if budget isn't an issue, though an 8400 should be a good match with a GTX 1070)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel - Core i5-8400 2.8GHz 6-Core Processor ($178.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B360M-A Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($76.17 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair - Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($159.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - FOCUS Plus Gold 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($73.38 @ Amazon)
Total: $488.53
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-08-08 13:49 EDT-0400

If your friend doesn't already have an SSD for his boot drive, I'd look at adding in one of those as well. It will help a lot with boot times and overall response of the system. Plenty of room in the budget for one.

I didn't include a case in the build lists since I'm not sure what your friend finds aesthetically pleasing. But expect an additional $50-$100 for a decent case.