Upgrade(s) for 5 years old Desktop

[Vykranth]

9 hours ago, JHBrown said:

You are still talking about that GTX 970 heh! 

Well, when I started looking on NVidia's website, the 970 seems to be the best bang for the buck compared to the other more industrial-grade NVidia BBQ cookers.

But, now, there is no sugar coating about it: the 970 cannot go in that machine.

 

9 hours ago, SnailSlug said:

Nobody here has mentioned this yet, but a GTX 260 uses PCIe 2.0. We're now up to PCIe 3.0. If you stick a new video card into that slot, absolute best case scenario is that it will run at half the speed, since PCIe 3.0 lane bandwidth is 985 MB/s compared to 500 MB/s. This is assuming that the card actually works since PCIe 2.1 broke backwards compatibility with a higher power draw, an old 2.0 slot may not actually provide enough base power to even boot.

 

You might be hobbled already, since the version of the 640 with the GK107 chip uses PCIe 3.0. You can find out which actual chip is inside with GPU-Z. I would expect that your version of the 640 is using either the GF116 core, or the GK208 core. A 640 is probably the best video card that motherboard can handle.

GPU-Z reports PCI-2.0 and a GK107 core. 
 

Michael Scrip is right: there are limits to what upgrades can be put on a given machine with the never-ending technological arms race.

 

[dafox]

Im now leaning to a full upgrade. Get this and live like a king until its five years old anyway.....

[+JHBrown Subscriber¹]

4 hours ago, dafox said:

Im now leaning to a full upgrade. Get this and live like a king until its five years old anyway.....

Nice build, although I'd opt for the Fractal Design Define R5 for the case. That's just personal preference of course, as I like clean, professional looking cases. Additionally, I'd spend a little more for the Samsung 850 Pro, or if you want to really live like a king, the Samsung 950 Pro. 

[dafox]

41 minutes ago, JHBrown said:

Nice build, although I'd opt for the Fractal Design Define R5 for the case. That's just personal preference of course, as I like clean, professional looking cases. Additionally, I'd spend a little more for the Samsung 850 Pro, or if you want to really live like a king, the Samsung 950 Pro. 

LOL I sat way too long trying to think what case would he like, then went with a popular rated one that was black. 850 Pro is nice but only really worth it if your going to be smashing your ssd or at the 2tb range. 950 pro is still a little too premium.

[Mando]

 

18 hours ago, SnailSlug said:

Nobody here has mentioned this yet, but a GTX 260 uses PCIe 2.0. We're now up to PCIe 3.0. If you stick a new video card into that slot, absolute best case scenario is that it will run at half the speed, since PCIe 3.0 lane bandwidth is 985 MB/s compared to 500 MB/s. This is assuming that the card actually works since PCIe 2.1 broke backwards compatibility with a higher power draw, an old 2.0 slot may not actually provide enough base power to even boot.

 

You might be hobbled already, since the version of the 640 with the GK107 chip uses PCIe 3.0. You can find out which actual chip is inside with GPU-Z. I would expect that your version of the 640 is using either the GF116 core, or the GK208 core. A 640 is probably the best video card that motherboard can handle.

 

In the absolute minimum case, an SSD will, in fact, do wonderful things for load times. There was a while when games still put useful information on loading screens, but no one with an SSD would ever see it.

 

Anything over that will require a new computer.

nonsense im afraid mate, toms hardware tested a Titan X on  PCI-E  2 and PCI-e 3 and the PCI-e 2 variant was between 1-2fps slower than on PCI-e 2.0 hardly a "bottleneck" to be worried about, filter the sort of performance a 970 has compared to a Titan X and its not even worth worrying about. Just because it has twice the bandwidth, it doesnt mean a single 9x card even uses the full bandwidth of PCI-e 2, never mind 3

 

I run an i7 2600k with PCI-e 2 970 SSC EVGA and my benchmarks are right up there with PCI-e variants on 3rd-6th Gen i7s with PCI-e 3, that just wouldnt be the case if my card was held back on PCI-e 2.

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Impact-of-PCI-E-Speed-on-Gaming-Performance-518/

 

Granted the TitanXs replacement will struggle as it may be more of a bottleneck on the 9x series replacements, but current right up to non X Titan, its negligible at best, they struggle to max out even pci-e 2.0 bandwidth.

 

 

Edited February 9, 2016 by Mando

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

19 hours ago, SnailSlug said:

Nobody here has mentioned this yet, but a GTX 260 uses PCIe 2.0. We're now up to PCIe 3.0. If you stick a new video card into that slot, absolute best case scenario is that it will run at half the speed, since PCIe 3.0 lane bandwidth is 985 MB/s compared to 500 MB/s. This is assuming that the card actually works since PCIe 2.1 broke backwards compatibility with a higher power draw, an old 2.0 slot may not actually provide enough base power to even boot.

It's been documented quite a lot on various websites that PCIe 2.0 is not much slower when using the same card on PCIe 3.0. As others have already mentioned, the difference is about 1-2 fps and only under certain conditions.

 

http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/pci_express_scaling_game_performance_analysis_review,1.html

 

Honestly, i dont think that old Core i7 the OP has will be a bottleneck either.

 

that said, i still think it's time to retire that computer and get a new Skylake CPU.

[Vykranth]

Last update as things happened. I went to the local shop with the config proposed. This is a top notch config, no doubt about but it ended up being a 2400 Euros at best. Online via Amazon.fr or Materiel.net, I ended up with similar prices. Prices are much more expensive in France compared to the US for the same hardware.

So I bought a MSI Geforce 950 at 188 Euros.

Installation went well and there are visible performance gain. I can go to medium or even high in settings in XCom 2 and still get a decent framerate. Other games shows improvements too.

 

So I am good for at least 18 months. Thanks a lot for the advice, guys