To replace the CPU or GPU

[Triggered Fridgekin]

I've been thinking about it lately and have decided to throw some cash at my older system and spruce it up a little. While it can do what I ask of it fairly well such as playing GW2 at a decent frame rate with some eyecandy, I think there is a little room for improvement in spite of being on a tight budget. I should also mention that I plan to pick up another 4GB kit of RAM since that's dirt cheap.

My budget is about $150 tops and I hate, hate, hate mail-in-rebates.

CPU: AMD Phenom XII 550 BE unlocked to a B50 Quad ~ 3.2ghz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-790XT-UD4
RAM: 4GB G.Skill F3-12800CL9-2GBNQ
Graphics Card: XFX Radeon 5770 1GB
Power Supply: 650w Zilverstone Zeus
Operating System: Win7 Ultimate
Resolution: 1680 x 1050

My impression is that the video card is what should get the boot since it was a mid-range card a few years ago and has likely slipped in to oblivion at this point to for future titles. Since I am only playing at 1680 x 1050, I wouldn't need a high-end card to provide me with optimal results and some eye candy so I've been eyeing some 6850s on ncix for about $130.

On the other hand, my processor was never cutting-edge either and I bought it because it was a solid solution to get a Quad core processor at the time but, sadly, those times have passed and I can pick up a Phenom II X4 965 BE for $100. The problem is that this processor isn't *that* much better in spite of still being an upgrade which makes me weary. However, I'm not sure how well my B50 will play with the 6850 and whether or not I will get a bottleneck one way or the other.

If these were current pieces of hardware, it would be easy to dig up info as to whether or not other have looked in to it, but with the CPU and GPU being, at least, one generation apart and the B50 not being an 'official' part, it's a lot of guessing and indirect research to hope I can get an accurate ballpark figure.

I know the ideal solution would be to just toss the two or even dump my AMD setup and work on a Intel machine but this is more like a band aide fix until the winter when I can put together something better.

---------- Post added 2012-08-21 at 10:48 PM ----------

Well, for the hell of it, I ran my system through 3DMark 11 and compared it to a similar setup with a B50 and a 6850 and I got measly 2753 points under the default 720p settings whereas the person with the 6850 got 4545.

I also checked in on the 965 and it's roughly the same as the B50 paired with the 6850 which kind of backs up my thoughts that going from the B50 to the 965 is the wrong direction to take for this quick fix.

I'm not really fond of using synthetic benchmarks to determine which is the best choice but I think that, in this case, I'm left with little doubt as to what I should do.

[Deleted]

Why would you hate MIR?

Going from a 5770 to a 6850 isn't worth it on such a slim budget. They are far apart, sure, but would you upgrade from a 6770 to a 6850? I wouldn't.

My recommendation would be to save $100-150 more, and get a 2500k with a nice Z68 board (or even a Z77 if it's within reach). That will cost you around $280 minimum (or thereabouts). I suggest this purely because you mention GW2, a game that will more than likely depend on CPU performance more than GPU.

Later on you can try to pick up a 7850 for around $200 or so. I reckon they will drop in price come Christmas/early next year when the 8000-series are nearing release.

[Tanthalus]

AMD have just dropped the 7850/7870 pricing - to the point where you ca get a 7850 for the same price as a 6850 was at launch...a much bigger upgrade for you right now , and in most `new` games your cpu will be fine as the games are gpu limited

edit:

case point

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102998

under $190 shipped allready

[daniel4masters]

Do not even bother with newegg.com
they have the worst customer service ever.
Go to tigerdirect.com

[Blackmist]

IMO, get a graphics card. You can then take it with you when you upgrade to a decent Intel system later on.