PSU + Graphics Card Upgrade question

[tehpwner]

Right now I am running with the following:

ATi 7870HD
i5-3570
16GB Memory
2 SATA HDDs and 1 SSD (primary HD)
1 DVD drive

I am looking to upgrade my graphics card (as it seems to be the weakest link) and was hoping to get something in the mid-high range tier. Additionally, I've never been good with PSUs so I am wondering what PSU I should get (Wattage etc) as my PSU is about 6-8 years old now and is showing signs of it. I live in Canada so keep that in mind if you want to directly suggest me certain parts, as not everything is available here.

If I missed anything important tell me and I'll add it to this post.

EDIT: Budget, ideally about $300-400 but no more than around $500 (USD for easier comparison)

[Arbiter]

Budget would be nice.

[tehpwner]

no more than around $500, pref. $300-400 total (USD for easier searching)

[Deleted]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 970 4GB STRIX Video Card ($349.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: Antec HCG M 750W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($79.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $429.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-02 12:37 EDT-0400

[Arbiter]

You don't need a 750W Power supply for a GTX 970 unless you have any intentions on SLIing another in the future. 550W Would be more than enough. Also throwing in the prices for canada.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 970 4GB STRIX Video Card ($396.95 @ shopRBC)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($54.99 @ NCIX)
Total: $451.94
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-02 12:47 EDT-0400

You can always drop down to a 760 or 770, but honestly the 970 is currently the best bang for your buck GPU out right now and if you can afford it, I don't recommend passing on it. May take a short little time finding one in stock though. Recommend just going through the sites listed on Pcpartpicker. Set it up to notify you.

[tehpwner]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 970 4GB STRIX Video Card ($349.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: Antec HCG M 750W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($79.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $429.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-02 12:37 EDT-0400

Comes out to ~450 USD when swapping to the Canadian version, so that's not too bad.

Any thoughts on the parts themselves?

EDIT:

You don't need a 750W Power supply for a GTX 970 unless you have any intentions on SLIing another in the future. 550W Would be more than enough. Also throwing in the prices for canada.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 970 4GB STRIX Video Card ($396.95 @ shopRBC)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($54.99 @ NCIX)
Total: $451.94
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-02 12:47 EDT-0400

No intention of ever SLI-ing, so that looks pretty good to me. I'll have to pickup the gfx card next month. Any concerns about something potentially phasing it out in the meanwhile?

[Arbiter]

What do you mean phasing out?

[tehpwner]

As in is there a prospective gfx card coming that might look like it's the next best candidate for the position.

[Arbiter]

Well the GTX 970 just came out like 2 weeks ago, which is why it's constantly sold out. It's possible they may release more affordable cards like a 960 or something, but even if they did there is no telling what the price per performance would be. What games do you play?



1080p benchmarks for BF4. That's an insane amount of performance for the price. Feel free to price check the rest of the cards on that list.

[tehpwner]

2 Weeks seems like a safe bet then for future safety on it.

The FPS genre semi-commonly, but I do play Paradox Grand Strategy games. The paradox games have the quirk of offloading as much of the calculations that it can onto the GPU after exhausting the CPU for not just graphical aspects, so it gains quite a bit from a better card.

[Arbiter]

2 Weeks seems like a safe bet then for future safety on it.

The FPS genre semi-commonly, but I do play Paradox Grand Strategy games. The paradox games have the quirk of offloading as much of the calculations that it can onto the GPU after exhausting the CPU for not just graphical aspects, so it gains quite a bit from a better card.

Well for someone that plays FPS games (not sure which ones you play though), frames per second is everything and if you want the best quality you can afford, 970 is the way to go. Anything lower would just to save you money. Nothing is slated to released that will be comparable.

[Deleted]

Your processor is fine, and should be fine for a good year or two yet. I'm still running an i7 2600k and for the time being, there's still no cost-effective upgrade for it.

Really, all you'd need to do is upgrade your graphics card. Everything else, if it's built around your current processor should be fine until at least next-gen.

[tehpwner]

Your processor is fine, and should be fine for a good year or two yet. I'm still running an i7 2600k and for the time being, there's still no cost-effective upgrade for it.

Really, all you'd need to do is upgrade your graphics card. Everything else, if it's built around your current processor should be fine until at least next-gen.

Yup, that was the idea. I just didn't have the cash for a card at when I ordered the rest, and didn't feel the need for a new one really until recently.

Thanks guys, I got the parts ordered this month after all so this thread's purpose has been solved.