Time for a new rig?

[BorealThundar]

Howdy folks. Many moons ago I was in need of a new computer mainly for WoW. It just so happened that Best Buy had on sale an Alienware Aurora rig with an i7 CPU (2.7 ghz), 6 gb of ram, and an Radeon HD 5870 GPU. It was marked down from $1799 to $1020 or so, so I jumped on it and bought it. This of course was 2 months before Cataclysm came out, and it could handle anything I threw at it. Now, 5 years later it has been having issues. I got bored with WoW, and quit for a while, but since I already paid for the special edition of WoD, I'd like to step back in and give it a try (since I am also getting bored with my PS4).

It runs fine other than the RAM has stopped working. It should have 6 gb, which it recognizes, but only 2.99 gb is available. Rather than just by a new PC, I'd like to replace the RAM and give it a try.

My question is though with my system specs so far would it even be worth trying out or is my PC just too old?

BTW, I have seen the system requirements which look like I am at the "recommended" but I really don't know if using a few add-ons is taken into account, raiding with a good FPS and not at the lowest settings, etc.

Any feedback would be most helpful. Thank you!

[Tehterokkar]

If you aren't short on money, replacing the PC would be a smart thing to do, at this point there's no telling when the CPU and/or GPU fail completely. You can get a pretty kick-ass WoW system for around $850-950 or even lower if you so desire.

If you don't have money to spend, new kit of ram(2x 4GB) is around $70, but if your entire system is 5 years old, other parts might fail(as mentioned before) and thus the RAM purchase can be partly wasted.

[BorealThundar]

I'm thinking i will just go with getting some more RAM for now. I really just want to play the new expac, try it out. If I enjoy as much as i think I will (judging by the new stuff) I may go with a new rig in a month or so.

Luckily I've set some money aside, and i've seen some pretty decent PCs for around $850.

I'd love to build my own, but I am not that well versed in that category.

[Vash The Stampede]

It'll play most games fine. Why it doesn't see the other memory stick is concerning. If you're certain it's just the ram then buy new ram. Otherwise it could be the motherboard or maybe the memory stick needs to be reseated. Also it's not running in dual channel mode which means the CPU is slower than it should be. Getting proper dual channel memory working again would give you back your speed.

[Vaelanor]

Hey Boreal, I know you think you may not be that well versed in building a pc but trust me, it's an extremely simple process with a large multitude of video, picture and written step by step sources to make it a breeze for you. With the money you have set aside, if you salvage your hard drive from the old pc, you'd be set for an extremely powerful rig. I'd say you should give the building a go, or at least watch a couple videos on it. At that price point, ~850 dollars, the contrast between a self built one and a pre built pc are huge, the pre builts don't stand a chance.

[apluscarp]

I actually walked my friend through building a PC on skype. If you have a online friend who is computer literate you could try that.