upgrading desktop for games

Discussion in 'New Build / Upgrade Advice' started by lando, Oct 5, 2013.

  1. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    Mainly because I have pre-ordered Battlefield 4, but also for future games, I want to upgrade my pc, but I have no clue on what is the most cost-efficient way to do so. I have:
    Intel Quad core Q9650 @3.0 GHz
    4 GB RAM (DDR2)
    Radeon HD 7850 Royalking 2GB used to be (GeForce GTS 250 1.0GB)
    Motherboard is P5Q- vm
    OS:windows 7
    (I also included snapshots of SystemRequirementsLab's test on Battlefield 4)

    will increasing my RAM from 4(min settings) to 8(recommended)GB improve performance, or only if I also improve my graphics card
     

    Attached Files:

  2. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    PSU? 8 GB RAM and better video card should improve BF4 performance to acceptable levels. Also consider overclocking CPU.
     
    lando likes this.
  3. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    how to look up my PSU, any example of how the needed info should look like, also what does it affect?
    And if you have any suggestions on what video cards would work well my set-up(without overclocking my CPU preferably)
     
  4. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    PSU model (exact model) is enough. Open case and look for label side of PSU.

    Check out PSU first.
     
  5. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    the PSU has a label with S/N D0718847 on it, that's all i can find, but that's probably just the serial number, no?
     
  6. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    No results with google.

    Take picture with camera from label and upload it somewhere, then link to picture?
     
  7. Big B

    Big B HWF Godfather

    Likes Received:
    145
    Trophy Points:
    63
    That PSU should say something about the wattage if nothing else, but should probably have the +12V, 5V & 3.3V rails listed.
     
  8. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    there is a label on the fan of PSU, it says :
    DC brushless fan
    model A8025M12s
    DC 12 V 0.22 A
    AC 230V
    is this the right one ?
     
  9. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
  10. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
  11. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    Not the best but not the worst. I recommend getting Radeon HD 7850 or similar graphics card with 2 gigs of RAM.
     
  12. Big B

    Big B HWF Godfather

    Likes Received:
    145
    Trophy Points:
    63
    Agreed. The 7850 is a great value right now. Depending on the memory size, I've caught them running for as little as $129 and they're quite a bit of card. I just popped one in my main box recently and it runs Crysis 2 and Tomb Raider (2013) as smooth as glass.
     
  13. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    knowing the performance of a PSU degrades, do you think my PSU will still have enough power if it's at least 3 years old?
    Also wondering about increasing up to 8GB RAM instead of 6, would this increase game performance further or is it bottlenecked somehow, and will my PSU support this as well
     
  14. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    PSU should be able to handle Radeon HD 7850.

    Unless you are using memory intensive programs in background, you won't notice any difference in games with 4, 6 or 8 GB RAA.
     
  15. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    thanks for the great help, going to order the Radeon this week :)
     
  16. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    hmm... I waited with ordering, because I compared the 2 graphic cards(GeForce GTS 250 and Radeon HD 7850) because:
    1) I wonder, it's DDR5, will I be able to use this one?
    2) will it improve the performance significantly because the clock speeds are 750 vs 860 Hz, witch doesnt seem a big difference for spending this money.
    But there seem to be lots of other factors where the difference are much bigger, pixel rate and bandwith, but I don't know what the effects are. Can someone please explain me.
     
  17. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
  18. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    sorry for all the nagging, but another question, Battlefield 4 runs just so slow on my current setup, especially the loading times(this last also counts for other games), would switching to an ssd instead of a 5 year old hdd help much? Because some people say it can bottleneck the performance of the entire system. I always thought,however , that it just affected loading times.
     
  19. Wicked Mystic

    Wicked Mystic Big Geek

    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    28
    SSD will most probably help load times, yes. It will also speed up almost all usage that has some HDD activity.
     
  20. lando

    lando Geek

    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    6
    thank you for awesome advice, the game is finally playable on medium settings, haven't tested any ohter games yet, but I'm probably going to test lots of games tonight :p
     

Share This Page