Upgrade CPU or GPU?

FeignFeign

FeignFeign

New Member
Time for an upgrade :). The question is, do i upgrade the CPU or GPU?

My specs
-ATI Radeon 4850
-Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.00 GHZ
-4GB ram
-monitor 1280 x 1024
-PSU:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171031

Playing the Witcher 2 right now and fps cant keep up. I suspects its the CPU causing the lag since the game recommends a quad core but just wanted to get a second opinion. Suggestions for a cheap quad core? Also, will I have to upgrade my PSU when i get a new CPU?
 
I would go with the CPU. The 4850 should be fine for gaming at that res. I woudn't think that you need to upgrade your PSU.

If you can I would update the CPU to a different socket. A bit more money but it would last you longer
 
AMDs are perfectly fine, and the new lines of CPUs that are coming out supposedly will be the best. But unless you wanna change your MoBo, you'll have to go Intel.
 
Having actually owned an e8400 I can easily say its a beast of a CPU and your bottleneck is your GPU. You can test this yourself pretty easily actually.

If you can do any of the following and your FPS stays the same:
-adjust resolution to be larger
-adjust video quality
--including upping AA or AF
--shadows
-etc.

And not changing things like physics, interaction, etc.

Then your bottleneck is your CPU.

If you change those graphical elements and your FPS does drop/increase accordingly, then I'm right, and your bottleneck is your GPU.

Besides: The requirements say you have the bare minimum for GPU and exceed the CPU requirements.

Anyway, upgrading the CPU without changing socket is going to be a waste anyway (unless you get a heck of a deal). The quad core equivalent of the e8400 is the q9550. Well over 250$ on ebay. You could get a new mobo and an AMD cpu that would be on par for that price.

Which leads me to my final point: tkim113. Whoever told you that AMD should be avoided is mistaken. AMD is a very reputable and good brand. Often chosen for their cheaper prices without too much of a cut to performance. Their new Bulldozer series is supposed to be very good come June 11th.

Did I miss anything?

EDIT: salvage-this makes a good point, That is strange you're getting low FPS at that low of a resolution. You might look into cleaning up and speeding up your computer before buying hardware.
 
kobaj said:
Having actually owned an e8400 I can easily say its a beast of a CPU and your bottleneck is your GPU. You can test this yourself pretty easily actually.

If you can do any of the following and your FPS stays the same:
-adjust resolution to be larger
-adjust video quality
--including upping AA or AF
--shadows
-etc.

And not changing things like physics, interaction, etc.

Then your bottleneck is your CPU.

If you change those graphical elements and your FPS does drop/increase accordingly, then I'm right, and your bottleneck is your GPU.

Besides: The requirements say you have the bare minimum for GPU and exceed the CPU requirements.

Anyway, upgrading the CPU without changing socket is going to be a waste anyway (unless you get a heck of a deal). The quad core equivalent of the e8400 is the q9550. Well over 250$ on ebay. You could get a new mobo and an AMD cpu that would be on par for that price.

Which leads me to my final point: tkim113. Whoever told you that AMD should be avoided is mistaken. AMD is a very reputable and good brand. Often chosen for their cheaper prices without too much of a cut to performance. Their new Bulldozer series is supposed to be very good come June 11th.

Did I miss anything?

EDIT: salvage-this makes a good point, That is strange you're getting low FPS at that low of a resolution. You might look into cleaning up and speeding up your computer before buying hardware.
Click to expand...

its a common enough sentiment. I honestly don't know about AMD's cpu but I can certainly attest that AMD's gpu line is less than stellar. Rather horrible drivers and update support compared to Nvidia.
 
kobaj said:
Having actually owned an e8400 I can easily say its a beast of a CPU and your bottleneck is your GPU. You can test this yourself pretty easily actually.

If you can do any of the following and your FPS stays the same:
-adjust resolution to be larger
-adjust video quality
--including upping AA or AF
--shadows
-etc.

And not changing things like physics, interaction, etc.

Then your bottleneck is your CPU.

If you change those graphical elements and your FPS does drop/increase accordingly, then I'm right, and your bottleneck is your GPU.

Besides: The requirements say you have the bare minimum for GPU and exceed the CPU requirements.

Anyway, upgrading the CPU without changing socket is going to be a waste anyway (unless you get a heck of a deal). The quad core equivalent of the e8400 is the q9550. Well over 250$ on ebay. You could get a new mobo and an AMD cpu that would be on par for that price.

Which leads me to my final point: tkim113. Whoever told you that AMD should be avoided is mistaken. AMD is a very reputable and good brand. Often chosen for their cheaper prices without too much of a cut to performance. Their new Bulldozer series is supposed to be very good come June 11th.

Did I miss anything?

EDIT: salvage-this makes a good point, That is strange you're getting low FPS at that low of a resolution. You might look into cleaning up and speeding up your computer before buying hardware.
Click to expand...

Must be the cpu than. I tried messing around with the settings yesterday and had similar results with all; i thought that was very peculiar at the time.

And damn, forgot that AMD/Intel supports different mobos. Any quad Intel cpu recommendations? Want to go frugal as possible, under $150? :D
 
As far as I know you won't get one for that price. If you are not going to switch sockets/platform then I would do what kobaj mentioned and do a cleaning of your pc to get some performance back. (would be a good thing to do anyway) I would think that OCing that CPU might give a bit more life to it but not like getting a new quad core.

EDIT: This is the lowest priced quad core that I can find

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115057

I would still recommend saving up for another platform (whether that is AMD or Intel) rather than getting this.

Just wondering... what motherboard do you have?
 
Last edited:
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