Official "Upgrade Help" Thread

[Chuluka]

My currents specs are:
Core2Duo e8500 @ 3.16GHz
4GB DDR2-800 RAM
550Watt Vantec Ion2+
GTX560Ti 1GB
1TB HDD
250GB HDD

Intel Core i7-3770k @ R3265
Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H @ R1756
Corsair Vengeance 4 x 4GB kit R1124
ARCTIC COOLING Freezer i30 R371
OCZ Agility 3 60GB R844

Total: R7360

I'm having some second thoughts about upgrading. My PC can run all games available today and in most cases maxed out at 1920x1080 at 20fps+. So my question is will I see a noticeable difference and is it actually worth it?

[Toxxyc]

So my question is will I see a noticeable difference and is it actually worth it?

Yes and yes. You'll see load times drop significantly, your PC will run cooler and thus quieter and everything will simply speed up and happen faster. Not good if games are too fast for you currently.

[McDangerous]

Yes, you will see a marked gain in performance Chuluka, depending on what games you play. If you're into RTS games or modern shooters like BF3 you'll see some decent performance gains from upgrading your CPU. I went from a dual core Athlon to a quad core Phenom II and I experienced a huge gain in performance with my 4870. Your graphics card is considerably quicker than mine was, and your new processor is a lot more powerful than the Phenom II I upgraded to.

With a GTX 560Ti you should be playing most games at 60fps+, not 20fps+. The only games that should be going below 60 are BF3 with Ultra settings, although turning off the AA modes will give you a boost close to 60, and Metro 2033, which rapes even the craziest system.

I can guarantee you'll see a massive improvement, and adding an SSD to your setup will make the upgrade even more pronounced.

And Toxxyc, you're wrong, games don't go faster with a powerful setup, they're still rendered at the same speed, they're just rendered smoother.

[Toxxyc]

And Toxxyc, you're wrong, games don't go faster with a powerful setup, they're still rendered at the same speed, they're just rendered smoother.

Oh, I understand. That was a joke, though a lame one... :P

[Acinixys]

Have this motherboard: http://www.zapsonline.com/intel-lga-1155/51945-gigabyte-h67ma-usb3-b3-lga-1155-socket-motherboard-rega-h67ma-usb3-b3.html


Need a board with a PCI slot that is the same or better for under R1800.

Or a PCI-E to PCI adaptor will also do.

I can do R2200 if I REALLY have to

I currently have an i5 and 4Gb of DDR3 transcend RAM if its important?

[Wesley]

GIGABYTE H77M-D3H @ R1077 or
ASRock Z77 PRO3 @ R1241 or
GIGABYTE Z68AP-D3 @ R1317 or
ASUS P8H77-V @ R1520

If you can find stock, go for the Asrock Pro.

[Lysis]

Yes, you will see a marked gain in performance Chuluka, depending on what games you play. If you're into RTS games or modern shooters like BF3 you'll see some decent performance gains from upgrading your CPU. I went from a dual core Athlon to a quad core Phenom II and I experienced a huge gain in performance with my 4870. Your graphics card is considerably quicker than mine was, and your new processor is a lot more powerful than the Phenom II I upgraded to.

With a GTX 560Ti you should be playing most games at 60fps+, not 20fps+. The only games that should be going below 60 are BF3 with Ultra settings, although turning off the AA modes will give you a boost close to 60, and Metro 2033, which rapes even the craziest system.

I can guarantee you'll see a massive improvement, and adding an SSD to your setup will make the upgrade even more pronounced.

And Toxxyc, you're wrong, games don't go faster with a powerful setup, they're still rendered at the same speed, they're just rendered smoother.

Interesting you brought this up. I have an i5 2500k with a GTX570 and 4GB DDR3 1600 and I get terrible stuttering occasionally in BF3 multiplayer and when I exit BF3 it takes ages to get back to my desktop; this doesn't happen with singleplayer. I know the computer troubles thread might be a more appropriate place for this, but I thought I would mention this since you say a less powerful card should cope with BF3. Has anybody ever encountered this problem before? I have all my drivers up to date and although I have the settings on Ultra I have, as you suggested, turned the AA off as well as the vsync (which seems to mitigate the occurence of stuttering).

[Acinixys]

GIGABYTE H77M-D3H @ R1077 or
ASRock Z77 PRO3 @ R1241 or
GIGABYTE Z68AP-D3 @ R1317 or
ASUS P8H77-V @ R1520

If you can find stock, go for the Asrock Pro.

Why? What makes it special? (Apart from the fact that it looks so sexy in black!)

Also... anything in the R2000 range?

And thanks for the help! :D

[Wesley]

Interesting you brought this up. I have an i5 2500k with a GTX570 and 4GB DDR3 1600 and I get terrible stuttering occasionally in BF3 multiplayer and when I exit BF3 it takes ages to get back to my desktop; this doesn't happen with singleplayer. I know the computer troubles thread might be a more appropriate place for this, but I thought I would mention this since you say a less powerful card should cope with BF3. Has anybody ever encountered this problem before? I have all my drivers up to date and although I have the settings on Ultra I have, as you suggested, turned the AA off as well as the vsync (which seems to mitigate the occurence of stuttering).

The stuttering issue for most people is more that in multiplayer your framerate drops below 60FPS especially in large maps and very busy firefights. In some games you can enable triple buffering and keep V-Sync on to mitigate those problems and in some cases eliminate the issue completely. If you have V-Sync on, you may have dropped frames because in the middle of rendering what you see on-screen maybe something changed with the players on the field or your internet connection has a hiccup. That produces a choppy framerate, which is very different from stuttering. To those who've never seen the difference between the two, the terms are used interchangeably.

You can try download Rivatuner and use the Direct3D Overrider option to try take away the lag/stutter in-game. Its old software, but works a treat even on my machine.

I'm not so sure about the time taken to return back to your desktop, though, that's a mystery.

Why? What makes it special? (Apart from the fact that it looks so sexy in black!)

Also... anything in the R2000 range?

And thanks for the help! :D

Better placement of the SATA headers to not cross with graphics cards, front USB 3.0 header, better sound card, still has VGA as a backup and Asrock boards are back to the standard they were in the early Core 2 Duo days. Great overclockers and very stable.

And its black. Duh!

[Lysis]

Thanks, just looked in the Nvidia control panel and I see it has a triple buffer option. Just in case that doesn't work let me elaborate as it may be that I phrased some of my earlier post poorly. I have v-sync off as I realise it can cause issues when frame rates drop below 60, and just for the record MSI afterburner reports that my BF3 multiplayer frame rates hover at about 50fps on the larger maps (this is with a core overclock to 810MHz and a memory clock of 4.2GHz). The choppy frame rate is certainly not caused by internet hiccups as I have this issue in every match I play and it gets progressively worse in a way similar to the supposed memory leak issue at launch.

Anyway, sorry for the thread hijack. I'm going to try triple buffering and then take this issue to the other thread if issues persist. Thanks for the help Wesley.

[Wesley]

Does this only happen with BF3? What you could do is run the benchmark while using FRAPS and Afterburner in the background and see if its to do with your clock rate - I had a similar issue with my HD5750, but it only happened in one game. Might be worth a look. Also check if there are Nvidia beta drivers, often they're working on a fix for the game and only patch it in the next update even if lots of people are having issues with it.

[Toxxyc]

I'm going to ask the most mind-blowingly dumb question out there - you do have the latest drivers, right? One of the main reasons Nvidia put up new drivers was directly because of issues with BF3.

[Chuluka]

@ Wesley, Geometrix, Toxxyc and McDangerous

Thanks for the help guys, just placed the order.

[Wesley]

@ Wesley, Geometrix, Toxxyc and McDangerous

Thanks for the help guys, just placed the order.

Once you've got it all in and tidied up the cables, put some pictures up :-)

[McDangerous]

BF3 is an absolute resource hog. Adding more RAM to your system will definitely help getting into and out of a game quicker, I guarantee it.

As for triple buffering, the option you can enable in your graphics drivers only works with OpenGL games, not DirectX games. That's why you need D3DOverrider. Personally I'm a massive D3DO fan, as I use it in all of my games except competitive online shooters, as it intensifies the input lag I experience with vsync enabled.

[-Bouncer-]

Hey guys so I'm just looking for some advice on buying a laptop. I am looking for a laptop that can play games but I'm not too worried about playing something like Crysis 2/Battlefield 3 on top settings as I play most of my games on consoles. I would need to use the laptop for 3D animation and design work (3DS MAX/After Effects/etc) so I would like something that can do all that with and not have much trouble.

I thought it would be better posting this here, instead of creating a new thread. My budget is around R6500 but I can push it a bit if I need to. I would like to add that I am going to the US in 3 months for a while so I can always buy one there. Would it be the cheaper option? I don't need it urgently but I would like to start looking out for one so long.

[Wesley]

Hey guys so I'm just looking for some advice on buying a laptop. I am looking for a laptop that can play games but I'm not too worried about playing something like Crysis 2/Battlefield 3 on top settings as I play most of my games on consoles. I would need to use the laptop for 3D animation and design work (3DS MAX/After Effects/etc) so I would like something that can do all that with and not have much trouble.

I thought it would be better posting this here, instead of creating a new thread. My budget is around R6500 but I can push it a bit if I need to. I would like to add that I am going to the US in 3 months for a while so I can always buy one there. Would it be the cheaper option? I don't need it urgently but I would like to start looking out for one so long.

Budget? Read my column below:

LAPTOP BUYER’S GUIDE: MAY R9000 TO R15000

Depending on your budget, I'd keep an eye on Lenovo's Y570 or HP's Envy 17, especially for design work. I prefer the Envy though because of the backlit keyboard ^_^ If your copy of 3DS Max has graphics accelleration, you'd probably be better off with the Y570 with the GT555M accelerating certain commands and features. You'll also need to upgrade to Windows 7 Pro, not sure if you have that already.

Edit: It does support the GT555M, go for the Lenovo.

Edit: If you're looking for something less anemic, you could go for the Mecer P170HM. You'd have to add on Windows 7 Pro, the quad-core Core i7, 16GB of RAM and whatever hard drive you choose. Even with the GTX460M, it should be more than enough for games and definitely enough for graphic design (more memory).

[-Bouncer-]

Thanks Wesley. I will have a look at that column as soon as possible. I don't only use 3DS Max, I use other 3D programs as well but Max is my main program. My current PC is on basically 24/7 as I either play games on it or it will be busy rendering something. I have not used laptops much in the past but I take it that it will be fine if I leave it on most of the time?

[Wesley]

I have not used laptops much in the past but I take it that it will be fine if I leave it on most of the time?

It should be okay, though I recommend you use it with a cooling pad and without the battery plugged in, as overcharging the notebook will destroy the battery life over time.

If you tend to work on a desk more often, then get a wireless mouse and keyboard as well, it'll make you more comfortable.

[-Bouncer-]

Yes I might go with the wireless mouse and keyboard. It won't be an issue if I buy the laptop in the US and then bring it back to SA? As far as I know, it is universal.