Need to upgrade PC but don't know what to add next

ignatzatsonic said:

DeathByMayson said:

ignatzatsonic said:

If you get an Intel CPU, you will also have to replace the motherboard and probably RAM. Those 3 things are the primary components of the PC, should be compatible with your case, monitor, hard drives, keyboard, mouse, Windows, etc.

I don't use video cards, so I'll let others comment on that.

Most Intel processors include graphics capability that is good enough for non-gamers like me and for some people who do mid-level gaming also.

Here are some good SSD brands: Crucial, Intel, and Samsung.

Before choosing an SSD, you need to decide how much capacity you need. My C partition uses only about 40 GB, so I'm fine with a 128 GB SSD that costs about $75.

If you have 500 GB occupied on C, you'd need a much larger SSD than me.

But maybe you can do what a lot of people do: use the SSD just for Windows and applications. Put all personal data on a regular internal hard drive. If you do that, maybe you don't need a big SSD.

Motherboard: if you want to overclock, you'd likely need an ATX motherboard with a Z170 chipset. If not, an H170 chipset is fine.

Look around for that from Asus, Asrock, and Gigabyte in the $120 to $170 range. There's a bunch of them and the difference will be mostly in features--that you may or may not need. Depends on if you have a lot of peripherals that need to be plugged in or have a lot of doo-dads or want to do serious overclocking. I've never spent over $160 on a motherboard.

So you're saying if I got an Intel CPU then some of my other components would not work?

I said this. Did you read it?

"If you get an Intel CPU, you will also have to replace the motherboard and probably RAM. Those 3 things are the primary components of the PC, should be compatible with your case, monitor, hard drives, keyboard, mouse, Windows, etc."

The key words in that are "should be compatible".

Unless you have a weird case (unlikely) or a weird power supply (also unlikely).

I'm not making any comments about the video card since I don't use them.

Sorry I was just making sure. My case is pretty normal and I just had a power supply failure so I had to replace it with one that I had in another PC of mine. The new one is a good brand though (I can't remember the brand name). So if I got an Intel CPU, a gigabyte motherboard, and Corsair or Crucial RAM would they work together?

ignatzatsonic said:

DeathByMayson said:

ignatzatsonic said:

If you get an Intel CPU, you will also have to replace the motherboard and probably RAM. Those 3 things are the primary components of the PC, should be compatible with your case, monitor, hard drives, keyboard, mouse, Windows, etc.

I don't use video cards, so I'll let others comment on that.

Most Intel processors include graphics capability that is good enough for non-gamers like me and for some people who do mid-level gaming also.

Here are some good SSD brands: Crucial, Intel, and Samsung.

Before choosing an SSD, you need to decide how much capacity you need. My C partition uses only about 40 GB, so I'm fine with a 128 GB SSD that costs about $75.

If you have 500 GB occupied on C, you'd need a much larger SSD than me.

But maybe you can do what a lot of people do: use the SSD just for Windows and applications. Put all personal data on a regular internal hard drive. If you do that, maybe you don't need a big SSD.

Motherboard: if you want to overclock, you'd likely need an ATX motherboard with a Z170 chipset. If not, an H170 chipset is fine.

Look around for that from Asus, Asrock, and Gigabyte in the $120 to $170 range. There's a bunch of them and the difference will be mostly in features--that you may or may not need. Depends on if you have a lot of peripherals that need to be plugged in or have a lot of doo-dads or want to do serious overclocking. I've never spent over $160 on a motherboard.

So you're saying if I got an Intel CPU then some of my other components would not work?

I said this. Did you read it?

"If you get an Intel CPU, you will also have to replace the motherboard and probably RAM. Those 3 things are the primary components of the PC, should be compatible with your case, monitor, hard drives, keyboard, mouse, Windows, etc."

The key words in that are "should be compatible".

Unless you have a weird case (unlikely) or a weird power supply (also unlikely).

I'm not making any comments about the video card since I don't use them.

Sorry just making sure. So If I got an Intel CPU, a gigabyte motherboard, and Crucial or Corsair RAM would they work?

ignatzatsonic said:

DeathByMayson said:

So If I got an Intel CPU, a gigabyte motherboard, and Crucial or Corsair RAM would they work?

Those are good brands.

BUT.................you can't just buy any Intel CPU and any Gigabyte motherboard and any Crucial or Corsair RAM.

Some motherboards will NOT take an Intel CPU. Motherboards are divided into "AMD compatible" and "Intel compatible". You need an Intel-compatible board if you want an Intel CPU.

The current generation of Intel CPUs requires DDR 4 RAM, not DDR 3 or DDR 2.

Some DDR 4 RAM is slower than others. Some DDR 4 RAM won't work in certain motherboards,

Etc etc.

You have to study and plan or know someone who can guide you through the choices.

Off the top of my head, these 3 things should be compatible with each other.

Intel Core i5-6400 6 MB Skylake Quad-Core 2.7 GHz LGA 1151 65W BX80662I56400 Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 530 - Newegg.com


GIGABYTE G1 Gaming GA-H170-Gaming 3 (rev. 1.0) LGA 1151 Intel H170 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 2133 (PC4 17000) Desktop Memory Model CT2K4G4DFS8213 - Newegg.com

Total cost probably around $350.

Maybe add an SSD and a new power supply to get the total around $500.


But there's a lot of other ways to go.

Alright thank you very much. I will ask this guy I know who has made a bunch of PCs.

Recommend this
Model US$ Newegg code

GA-Z170-HD3P $116 9SIA24G3KG3274
i5-6600K $220 N82E16819117561
F4-3000C15D-8GVR $63 N82E16820231897
PNY CS1311 2.5" 120GB $40 N82E16820178966
EVGA 650 GQ $70 N82E16817438059

Total US$ 509

Megahertz07 said:

Recommend this
Model US$ Newegg code

GA-Z170-HD3P $116 9SIA24G3KG3274
i5-6600K $220 N82E16819117561
F4-3000C15D-8GVR $63 N82E16820231897
PNY CS1311 2.5" 120GB $40 N82E16820178966
EVGA 650 GQ $70 N82E16817438059

Total US$ 509

Thank you too, I will look those parts up.

Buy a SSD. You have no idea what it can do for you.
As mentioned, you don't need a big SSD. I have a 120G SSD with Win 7 and Lubuntu and there is still a lot of space on it.
You install Win 7 and programs on the SSD and move (sysprep) \users to the HDD.

As new MB doesn't have USB2 and Win 7 doesn't have the USB3 drivers, you will have to add them (and also SATA drivers) into the Win 7 installation disk.
Let me know what you buy and I'll guide you.

Megahertz07 said:

Buy a SSD. You have no idea what it can do for you.
As mentioned, you don't need a big SSD. I have a 120G SSD with Win 7 and Lubuntu and there is still a lot of space on it.
You install Win 7 and programs on the SSD and move (sysprep) \users to the HDD.

As new MB doesn't have USB2 and Win 7 doesn't have the USB3 drivers, you will have to add them (and also SATA drivers) into the Win 7 installation disk.
Let me know what you buy and I'll guide you.

So if I got an SSD and did what you said, my computer would run faster?

ignatzatsonic said:

It would start up faster, load applications faster, and do anything related to the hard drive faster---such as a virus scan.

But it would NOT cause the CPU to run faster.

The most notable advantage of SSDs is boot speed. You might be ready to go in 20 or 30 seconds rather than a minute.

It has little effect on gaming.

Some people don't think they are worth the extra cost. Don't expect "night and day" differences.

But they are generally worthwhile for most people unless you are in a severe budget jam.

They are about triple the price of regular hard drives and used to be 5 or 6 times as expensive--per gigabyte.

Okay I will consider buying one because it does take a minute to boot up my PC which is annoying when I need to just do something quick. Thanks again for the help.