My PC is getting fairly old. It still handles some games reasonably well, but newer and more demanding titles are becoming difficult to run. I'm trying to decide whether upgrading individual parts makes sense or whether I should save up for a newer computer and sell whatever I can from my current system. My budget is roughly $800–$1,500, and I work at Walmart, so I can get 10% off certain PC parts, although the selection is limited. Current specs: RTX 2060 Super, Ryzen 5 3600, MSI B450 Tomahawk motherboard, 500GB SSD, 16GB DDR4 RAM, and a 500W power supply.
5 Answers
A used prebuilt could give you newer parts, such as a Ryzen 7000 processor and an RTX 4000-series card, but compare the exact components carefully. Some inexpensive prebuilts cut costs with weak power supplies, poor cooling, or limited upgradeability. Since your current motherboard, case, and RAM can still be useful, upgrading piece by piece is likely the safer value unless you find an unusually good complete-system deal.
Check whether your motherboard BIOS supports the Ryzen 5000 chips before buying one. A 5800X3D is one of the strongest gaming CPUs available for that platform, but a 5700X is usually a better value. The graphics card will still matter most for higher resolutions and newer games, so put as much of the budget as possible toward the GPU after upgrading the CPU if necessary.
A nearby Micro Center-style bundle or sale could make a platform upgrade worthwhile, especially if the CPU and motherboard pricing beats online prices. I’d only make a two-hour trip after checking inventory and calculating the total savings. Your current system isn’t obsolete, so there’s no need to rush into buying an entirely new PC.
Your motherboard still gives you a pretty good upgrade path, so you probably don’t need to replace the whole PC. A Ryzen 7 5700X or 5800X3D would be a major CPU upgrade, and you could move to 32GB of DDR4. You could also add a larger SSD. If you eventually install a much faster, more power-hungry graphics card, plan on replacing the 500W power supply too.
The best choice depends on what performance you’re aiming for, but with an $800–$1,500 budget I’d lean toward upgrading your existing system first. Something like a Ryzen 7 5700X, RTX 4060-class graphics card, and 32GB of RAM would be a sensible value upgrade, and you may be able to keep your current power supply if it’s a quality unit and you don’t choose a high-power GPU.
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