Hello I used to post here a long time ago and remembered how knowledgeable this forum was. It was so long ago that I forgot my password and have changed my email so I cant retrieve it!! Anyway the successor to The Elder Scrolls, Oblivion is coming out soon and I want to upgrade my PC enough to play the game. But really I haven't got much cash so the bare minimum for a decent experience is all I'm after. My PC at present is this: Motherboard: Asus M2NPV-VM which is an AM2 board with PCI-Express (I gathered from a friend that there is a second generation of this technology now?) CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Single core. GFX: Nvidi 7600GT with 256mb memory RAM: 3gb of DDR2 (I used to be really proud of this...) PSU: Decent (newly bought) 550 watter Win 7 64 17'' monitor at 1280x1024 (I think a small monitor might be my saving grace?) I was thinking of just sticking in a new GPU but then was stubbed by the fact that my mobo probably won't take any of the new cards and that there will probably be hectic bottlenecks elsewhere that'll make a nice GPU pointless. What do I need? Thanks
Exactly how much do you have to spend because I would highly recommend upgrading your RAM, motherboard, CPU, and GPU. Let me know so I can help you out better. *Edit* I was just looking at the minimum system requirements for Skyrim, you're diffidently going to have to upgrade all of the components I mentioned.
Ok cool, if I'm going to have to upgrade I want to do it properly. What would you recommend? Please suggest a good budget rig for me that will probably cope with Skyrim at medium graphics settings. I'm completely out of sorts with the current hardware so I don't know what to set as a budget. Thanks!
http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=17629492. This would be the ideal build for you. I assumed you'd be using the same case, HDD, and optical drive. For now the PSU should be fine, but if you ever decide to buy another 560 ti or even upgrade to a higher end GPU than you would also have to invest in a new PSU. If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to ask.
I was in my local shop today and asked for a rig that should handle Skyrim at medium settings. They offered me this at what seems a really cheap price for my country: CPU: i3 3.1ghz Mobo: Foxconn h61mx-v ram: 4gb jetram 1333mhz msi rageon R6670 1gb ddr5 What do you think?
As for the CPU I would stick with the core i5 2400, or you could go with the 2300. The reason I suggest these at the minimum is because the core i3 that they are suggesting will play Skyrim. Though not on medium settings but on low, and because Skyrim is more CPU dependent then other games you will want a Quad core processor. The dual cores make the game skip, freeze, hesitate and lag because it can't really handle the game. I know this because my cousin has the exact processor that you're looking at and he gets frustrated while playing because the game will randomly freeze and he has to wait for the CPU to catch up. We know it's not the GPU because he has a GTX 570. So I would stay away from a dual- core CPU. For RAM I wouldn't recommend 1333MHz, because for gaming you really need 1600MHz. And for $20 more you're not only getting more memory capacity but you also get a huge speed boost. If you don't wanna spend the extra $5 on the G-Skill memory this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148463 or this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144477 would be good alternatives. I would stay away from Foxconn when it comes to just about anything, a lot of their products are poor quality and their customer service is a pain in the rear and hate helping you. I tend not to recommend mirco atx boards because of how close fitting everything is. As for that GPU I would recommend staying away from the 128-bit memory interface the 256-bit is the best for gaming. MSI is a great brand and I recommend them a lot though if you plan on playing any other modern games you're going to want to go with one of the higher end GPUs. I'll make another build for you and post it by the end of the day. Just because I wouldn't want to see you spend your money on the build your local shop is recommending to you, the best you'll get out of that system is low settings in windowed mode.
This https://secure.newegg.com/WishList/MySavedWishDetail.aspx?ID=15479591 again would be really good for you though I would recommend my first build, though if you're just looking for bare minimum to just play skrim, then this http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=15479871 will suffice, though this last build has next to nothing in upgrade-ability. Again I would highly recommend the first build if you want to do things right the first time, as you have more room to expand later on for newer games coming out and its the best price/performance ratio. Let me kow what you think.
The problem with the i series seems to be that you can't get cheap motherboards that will run DDR3 1600mhz... So if you get a Phenom II Quad 965 Black Edition, which is slower than thn the i5 but also cheaper, you can get a MUCH cheaper motherboard that will run the faster DDR3 1600mhz. The other way is to get an i5 and a 1333mhz capable motherboard and run slower RAM. Which is the better compromise?
Its not so much that you're paying to be able to run certain RAM it's the different North Bridges and expansion slots and what not. You also have to remember ATX motherboards are generally more expensive then Micro ATX. This is a good board http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130576 . Don't go with AMD for a gaming CPU
