I have £500 to upgrade my build

[mrstinky127]

Hello, last christmas i built my first computer, here are my specs

Motherboard - MSI - Z775
CPU - i5 3570 (Non K)
Video Card - EVGA GeForce GTX 660 SC 2GB GDDR5
RAM - 12GB corsair 1600mhz DDR3
Hard drive - 500GB standard hard drive and a 120gb i salvaged from my old pc
Power supply - 550w
Monitor - 1920x1080

I mainly play league of legends and i will be doing for the foreseeable future, i also want to be able to play battlefield 4 on some really nice settings. However the main reason i am wanting to upgrade is so that i will be able to stream at high quality. Fiber optic is being installed in my are very soon so i will be able to get around 70mb download and 10 upload where as at the moment i have 10down and 0.5 up.

I have £500 to spend

[Ghâzh]

What I'd do is add an SSD, aftermarket cooler and upgrade to 3570k for some overclocking. I'd also look in to those RAM modules you have atm, how did you manage 12GB? Do you have 2x4gb and 2x2gb sticks or how are you running dual channel?

If for whatever reason you aren't comfortable of overclocking, keep that non K model and buy a better graphics card instead. You might be able to fit in GPU upgrade anyway if you go with smaller SSD.

Intel i5 3570k - $219
COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 EVO - $34.99
250gb SAMSUNG 840 EVO - $179.99
total - $433.98

Alternatively you could get a bit smaller SSD like the 120gb one which is only $99.99 and fit in MSI GTX 770 TF for $399.99 totaling at $753.97. This should be close to £500 by my calculations.

[Deleted]

This is the suggestion I have:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£167.99 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£23.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£134.66 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: MSI Radeon HD 7950 3GB Video Card (£173.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Total: £500.61
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-10-06 17:22 BST+0100)

Gone for the 7950 as that's a ridiculous price for that performance.

[mrstinky127]

I have 12gb of ram because my ram was faulty so i got another 4gb of same ram whilst mine was being rma'd will it not be dual chanelling ?

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So you think it would be best to get an i5 3570k + a cooler and a new graphics card and i can then get an ssd for christmas

[Deleted]

Add an SSD, best performance boost u can get (and silent cause of no rotating shit and stuff) . U wont regret it. Imho u should aim for atleast 128GB

Rest is up to you.

[mrstinky127]

I think what tenagrychickens said is what i will do thanks for that, anything else ? Also should i get windows 8 ?

- - - Updated - - -

Also how do i find out if my ram is dual channel or not because i have 12gb

[durrtygoodz]

I got a 70 quid SSD on Friday and holy shit was it worth the money, my PC boots in about 15 seconds and loading screens may as well be non existant. You should definitely get one.

[mrstinky127]

Ok thats amazing i will deffo be picking one up

[Ghâzh]

I have 12gb of ram because my ram was faulty so i got another 4gb of same ram whilst mine was being rma'd will it not be dual chanelling ?

- - - Updated - - -

So you think it would be best to get an i5 3570k + a cooler and a new graphics card and i can then get an ssd for christmas

Yeah, that isn't running in dual channel mode in that case. You need an even number of sticks 2x2, 2x4, 4x4 etc. for dual channel. You'd be better off removing one stick so you'd have 4gb less RAM but it'd be running way faster. Also now that you are upgrading anyway just grab one 4gb stick more and you'll be fine.

Also yes on the i5 3570k + cooler and overclock it.

[Caelia]

Yeah, that isn't running in dual channel mode in that case. You need an even number of sticks 2x2, 2x4, 4x4 etc. for dual channel. You'd be better off removing one stick so you'd have 4gb less RAM but it'd be running way faster. Also now that you are upgrading anyway just grab one 4gb stick more and you'll be fine.

Also yes on the i5 3570k + cooler and overclock it.

Depends imo, if using RAM heavy applications that require much RAM I'd rather stick with 12GB in single channel rather than removing a stick.
Dual channel is around 5% faster than Single channel which won't really make a big difference in most cases except for synthetic tests.

[mrstinky127]

Im using it now for league and battlefield 4 what is best for that

[Ghâzh]

Yeah for gaming you only really need 4-6GB so having "only" 8GB total is totally fine. I'd remove one stick and have the faster RAM instead of more slower RAM. Also make sure those 2 sticks are in same colour slots. Usually slots 1 and 3 or 2 and 4.

[Scummer]

I'm not 100% sure on the rest but definitely go for an SSD. I don't know how many games you have installed at one time, that will make the difference between a 120 and 250 gb SSD. A 120gb SSD will still get you around 4-6 odd games and your OS.

It's worth bearing in mind though that if you upgrade to an SSD that it's preferable for it to have your OS on it and if so for it to be a fresh installation which can quickly increase the price by buying Win7 or another OS.

A Samsung 840 Series 120GB Solid State Drive would do nicely.

[mrstinky127]

i have been looking at some stuff on the web, would two 660's be better than getting a 7950 ?

[Deleted]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i7-3770K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor (£227.99 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£23.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£73.08 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: MSI Radeon HD 7950 3GB Video Card (£173.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Total: £499.03
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-10-07 02:19 BST+0100)

changed the ssd to a 120gb one and could add an i7 as u want to stream playing bf4 on nice settings.

[DeltrusDisc]

If you want to stream BF4 at high settings, I'd honestly suggest an i7-3770K PLUS a new GPU.

I'd wait a week or so, as new AMD GPUs are set to drop this week.

Also, BF4 is looking to be very AMD GPU-friendly.

[mrstinky127]

i will get the i7 that size ssd is a better size as i dont play lots of different games, i will wait to purchase the card too if what you said is true, thanks for all your help guys, really appreciated