Is it worth upgrading my PC?

M

Mattyp

Enthusiast
Hi all,

I got my PC from pcspecilalist back in 2011 with the following specs:
Processor (CPU) AMD PHENOM II X4 965 (3.40GHz/8MB CACHE/AM3) - BLACK EDITION
Motherboard ASUS® M5A78L-M/USB3: M-ATX, USB 3.0, SATA 3.0Gb/s
Memory (RAM) 8GB SAMSUNG DDR3 DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 4GB)
Graphics Card 1GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 560 - DVI,HDMI,VGA - 3D Vision Ready

How will this PC fare with newer games such as Fallout 4 and Dark Souls 3? What upgrades would be the most beneficial?

Thanks.
 
M

Mattyp

Enthusiast
Budget is £300 to £400. At the moment I have a 750GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD7502AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s installed.
 
Stephen M

Stephen M

Author Level
That is a good HDD, would concentrate on a CPU or GPU before an SSD, they are great but not essential.
 
M

Mattyp

Enthusiast
Sorry for the noob questions but I know very little but how hard is it to install a new CPU? I'm temped to use the upgrade option via pcspecialist. What pieces of gear would you recommend for my budget? Would something like the gtx 750ti be pretty good?
 
GeorgeHillier

GeorgeHillier

Prolific Poster
Mattyp said:
Sorry for the noob questions but I know very little but how hard is it to install a new CPU? I'm temped to use the upgrade option via pcspecialist. What pieces of gear would you recommend for my budget? Would something like the gtx 750ti be pretty good?
Click to expand...

No, the 750ti is an entry level GPU and won't be much better than your current 560.

For a better CPU you'd need a new motherboard. I'd advise an i5, cheapest motherboard and whatever GPU fits your budget, most likely a 960
 
M

Mattyp

Enthusiast
GeorgeHillier said:
No, the 750ti is an entry level GPU and won't be much better than your current 560.

For a better CPU you'd need a new motherboard. I'd advise an i5, cheapest motherboard and whatever GPU fits your budget, most likely a 960
Click to expand...

Pcspecialist doesn't seem to offer an upgrade for motherboards. How does one go about choosing a new one?
 
K

Karnor00

Bright Spark
Mattyp said:
Sorry for the noob questions but I know very little but how hard is it to install a new CPU? I'm temped to use the upgrade option via pcspecialist. What pieces of gear would you recommend for my budget? Would something like the gtx 750ti be pretty good?
Click to expand...

Without upgrading the motherboard the best CPU you could get would be an FX-8370E. Which for gaming would barely be an improvement over your current PC.

Which effectively means you'd need a new motherboard as GeorgeHillier mentioned. I'd agree with him that an i5 would be a good CPU upgrade.

As for difficulty, unfortunately replacing the motherboard is about as difficult as it gets. You'd pretty much be building a new PC. If you're comfortable changing things inside your PC then it's really not that hard once you get started. But if you aren't comfortable with that then it's probably not a good option.
 
L

LFFPicard

Godlike
Replacing the Motherboard also makes Windows want a new activation.
That and the GPU is needing an upgrade.

To be honest it will be just as expensive and less hassle to buy a new PC at this point, salvage the current hard drive as a second drive for the new machine and sell off the old machine as a whole or for parts.
But, your budget does not allow for this.
 
GeorgeHillier

GeorgeHillier

Prolific Poster
LFFPicard said:
Replacing the Motherboard also makes Windows want a new activation.
That and the GPU is needing an upgrade.

To be honest it will be just as expensive and less hassle to buy a new PC at this point, salvage the current hard drive as a second drive for the new machine and sell off the old machine as a whole or for parts.
But, your budget does not allow for this.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's what i was thinking :p
 
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