Advice on Upgrading Current PC Gaming System

[Raders09]

Hi

I currently have a 5 year old gaming PC, its not that bad when playing high end games but could do with some Upgrades.
I'm thinking about Replacing the current CPU for a Quad Core, that has Good performance for a reasonable price witch is Supported for a AM2 socket connector.

Current PC Specs:

[Motherboard]: M2N-E SLI
[CPU]: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4600+ 2.4Ghz
[RAM]: 2x1Gb Kingston DDR3, 1x MEADR522P4701- PQI 2GB DDR2-667U
[Videocard]: x2 Nvidia GeForce 7600 GT [Setup]: SLI
[BIOS]: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG [Version]: ACRSYS - 42302e31
[Operrating system]: Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64 bit

Any Ideas?

 

[Mango(MarkWright)]

Maybe get a Quad Core Processor?

 

[samwil]

Upgrade your graphics card, since your motherboard is capable of SLI, you might want to buy a GTX 670 now, and then SLI another one later if you feel the need to, or both at the same time it depends on your budget.
Also yes a Quad core would be a nice idea to slot in there, an i5 should be sufficient
And also obviously not needed, maybe switch out your RAM for a single 8GB 1600MHz? bit of future proofing if you need it, like I said not really needed for gaming yet however.
I noticed you put your operating system in the specification listed, don't worry about upgrading that, windows 8 doesn't offer any increase in speed and it's mainly aimed at tablets, so I wouldn't upgrade to Windows 8.
Also consider a SSD, or a Caviar Black, these speed up your loading times, and you can boot from cold to fully running in a fraction of the time with a SSD compared to your standard Hard drives.

Considerations for you then:
i5 3.4Ghz 3570
GTX 670 - SLI in future if you want to.
SSD - 120 GB should tidy you over as your first hard drive and then get a 1TB caviar black as your secondary.
Or if you don't want to invest in a SSD go just with the caviar black.

 

[Raders09]

Thank you for your detailed and very informed reply. Your right, my Graphics Card does need bringing up to date and I'm going to look in to the GTX 670. But in regards to the i5 3.4ghz 3570k I'm not sure Whether this would be compatible With my current M2N-E SLI mobo as it supports AM2 and AM2+ Only.

Do you know of any good AMD AM2 Quad core processors as AMD seem pretty good for performance for a good price.
I was looking at the AMD Black Edition Phenom II X4 965 Processor CPU 3.4GHz (AM3) Socket Quad Core
But i Cant support AM3

 

[vanthus]

Check the size of PSU you have as this could limit what you can upgrade,especially the graphics card.

 

[Raders09]

PSU Information:

18 A
AC Input: 230v.4A,47-63H7
DC Output: 3.3v 20.0A
Fuse Rating: 5A, 250v
Max Output Power: 350w

 

[vanthus]

PSU Information:

18 A
AC Input: 230v.4A,47-63H7
DC Output: 3.3v 20.0A
Fuse Rating: 5A, 250v
Max Output Power: 350w

A 350W PSU leaves very little scope for upgrades.To be honest I'm not sure it would be worth spending all that money on a 5 year old PC,I would consider putting it towards a new computer.

 

[NMEBowen]

Im with Vanthus on this one im afraid your far better off getting your old pc to a good home (gave mine to my dad) and saving a little more and getting something new and fresh with a few more upgrade options for later on.

 

[Raders09]

A 350W PSU leaves very little scope for upgrades.To be honest I'm not sure it would be worth spending all that money on a 5 year old PC,I would consider putting it towards a new computer.

Thanks for your Advice ill take that in to consideration.