SOLVED Upgrading a lower end PC

A friend of mine asked if I could upgrade her computer. She wants to play games like the witcher 3, diablo 3, ... She doesnt need to play it maxed out but wants to be able to keep up with games of this genre in the future. 1 Monitor, 1080p.

The components she currently has are

• Intel 4130
• Intel DB85FL
• 8 GB RAM (E1)
• Chieftec 350W
• Samsung 840 Evo 120GB

She's not really on a fixed budget but it should be as cheap as possible.

I thought throwing in a GTX 960 or a AMD R9 280X. I'm not sure about the different Feature Layers of these two cards. Feature Level and energy would speak for the GTX 960, the benchmarks I saw would make me prefer the R9 280X. A GTX 970 was considered overkill by me due to the CPU and the overall premise to stay cheap. If needed she could go for it though.

The PSU has to be replaced in any case. I was thinking either the http://www.mindfactory.de/product_i...e-Power-L8-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_857814.html or the http://www.mindfactory.de/product_i...wer-7-Bulk-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_822193.html depending on which GPU to get.

It's a pre built PC shipped to enterprises for office use. Will I encounter some problems or can all the parts be swapped without any hassle? I did not see the PC yet, however the case is too small for said GPUs. So we will either have to buy a 20 € that fits everything or I have to get my dremel and get rid of the HDD cage.

Any input would be greatly appreciated

The CPU really wont be holding anything back much if at all (perhaps CPU heavy titles since its a dual with HT not a true quad).

That said, I would go no lower than a quality 450W model for a 280x. It is a 250W card by itself. Add the 55W CPU, and then another 25-50W for the rest of the system.

The EVGA 500B or GS550 or Seasonic M12ii 520 would be where I'm at for PSU. Without knowing what the PC is, you'll have to wait and see if a GPU will fit in the current case, or if you will need to get a new one.

I asked her to measure the PC therefore I know a GPU would fit if I remove the HDD case. When I could see it for myself I will know if it's worth the headache or if we just go for a cheap 20-25€ case that does the job. Probably the better option in case a HDD for data comes in.

I thought with 250 + 50 + 50 = 350W a 400W PSU might cut it. However thereÄs nothing wrong with going for the EVGA 500B. It has a reasonable price point, too. Would have looked into the Corsair VS Series or the Seasonic SS-500ET. However the price range is pretty narrow and I think I'll go with what was recommended.

So everyone thinks the R9 280X should be fine? I know the 280X and the 960 are great cards, I'm just not sure what to decide. I kind of hoped the 250W would make her say "No way" so I didn't have to make a decision but it didn't.

We went with the EVGA 500B and the Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Vapor-X Tri-X OC. But right now I'm worried that 500W might not cut it for the OC version of the 280X. Should we send back the EVGA and go for a PSU with more Watt?

Do you have the parts? If so, throw it all together, install Windows, drivers and IXTU and 3DMark. Then open IXTU, click on "Stress Test" in the left menu, check off "CPU stress test" and input like 20 minutes, then click "Start Testing". Open 3DMark, and start Firestrike. If the PSU isn't enough, the system will shut off sometime during the tests.

Yep, all parts are there. I'll swing by tomorrow evening and set everything up. I will do stress testing and hope everything works.
I just figured sending back an unopened PSU would be less of a hassle than a used one.

I got you right that you want to run ixtu and 3d mark simultaneously? At least that will be more stress than she could ever put on the system during gaming. Plus we're having a heat wave in Germany right now, so of neither the PSU nor the cooling fails she's all set

I felt safe with your recommendations of PSUs. I didn't take the extra draw of an overclocked 280X into the equation. All in all I'm actually confident with the 500W, I just googled a bit and some people claimed 500W won't work, so I got scared a bit.

Yes, simultaneously. The uninformed will tell you that 500w isn't enough, because manufacturers overspec for PSUs. They do that because there are so many low quality ones (the ones the uninformed buy), that if they recommended "500w", which is a realistic value for quality PSU to power a mainstream Intel system, and someone buys a no-name 500w PSU to power their FX8350 and the 280X, they'll have a whole lot of issues running that setup. If they recommend 750w (not sure what the actual recommendation is), there's less of a chance that people will have power issues, even with a cheap PSU.

EVGA has wonderful customer service, I wouldn't worry at all about getting your money back (minus restocking fees) for that PSU if it doesn't work. However, I'm pretty sure you're fine. The stress test will confirm one way or the other. As far as the heatwave you are having, the parts will start to throttle if they get hot enough, so you shouldn't need to worry too much about heat. You probably will want to run a monitor on the system (HWMonitor from CPUID would work for this) just to see what the temps do, but with everything stock, it should be fine.

The reason I want you to run the stress tests at the same time, is because it'll put both GPU and CPU at close to full load. Therefor, that is the most the system can possibly pull. If the PSU doesn't quit, it'll handle anything you can do on the system.

I know that manufactueres overspec, I think even 700W were recommended. I talked to a MSI guy a few years back over the insane PSU recommendations and he had the exact same explanation as you. I read in some forums that the general recommendation would go into a 550W-600W direction that's what got me

We set everything up tonight. Stress Test was OK. Her SSD had only 4GB left of free space so we installed firestrike on an external HDD. I didn't knew how I could bring my 3DMark Version since it's associated with steam, so we ran the demo. I'm pretty sure there was a second part to follow, however it didn't load in reasonable time. I'll have to come over again to clean up that SSD anyway and we'll redo the testing then. So far everything looks fine and the temps were good too. The CPU barely cracked 75 °C. GPU stayed below 70 °C. Only thing that got me wondering: My gf's got the same CPU and prime95 easyly pushes it to 95 °C (I know that prime95 is heavy when it comes to the stress it puts on the CPU and that it's far from anything you would see in your every day work). Might have to reapply paste there soon or test it with IXTU too. Nothing to worry about really since she doesn't game and doesnt hit anything over 50-55 °C during her workloads. But that's just a side note

We fit everything in an antec VSP-5000, which is a really nice case for the price. I was positively surprised. And the Vapor 280X just looks plain beautiful, the Vapor Logo even lights up.

Thank you all for your input and help It's been a time since my last build and I wasn't too sure about the pre assembled PC we took as a basis.

Firestrike barely touches the cpu is why. P95 js another ballgame in that regard.

I think he was referring to that even while running IXTU and Firestrike, this CPU doesn't get anywhere near as hot as his girlfriend's.

P95's newer revisions push Intel's CPUs harder than IXTU, and doesn't really allow you to use the system while you're testing. I recommended IXTU because that way, even though the CPU is only at about 98-99% (not pegging at 100%), the GPU isn't being limited by it, and thus will be utilized more fully (and consume more power). That should, in turn, provide a more accurate and concrete result as far as determining whether or not the PSU can handle the system.

idkfa said:

We went with the EVGA 500B and the Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Vapor-X Tri-X OC. But right now I'm worried that 500W might not cut it for the OC version of the 280X. Should we send back the EVGA and go for a PSU with more Watt?

Click to expand...

No.

bob4933 said:

Firestrike barely touches the cpu is why. P95 js another ballgame in that regard.

Click to expand...

FS beats the tar out of the CPU in the Physics test. Which is required for a score. So while the GPU tests don't stress it hard, it sure does 'get it' when the Physics test rolls around...that said, its a short one so unless you loop that test, it won't get very hot in 30s.

I'd be comfortable with an i3 and 290X on a quality 500W unit, that 280X is a piece of cake.

Dlaw said:

I think he was referring to that even while running IXTU and Firestrike, this CPU doesn't get anywhere near as hot as his girlfriend's.

Click to expand...

Exactly!
Its the same CPU though as in my gf's build. I was surprised to see such low temps on this machine with ixtu. I thought with the stock cooler and a smaller case with poorer airflow 95 °C in prime was to be expected on these chips. I'm sure I mounted the fan correctly (quite experienced actually), and aside from redoing it with another thermal paste I'm almost out of options here. I'll definitely check on that in the near future.

Thank you all for your input! Combined with the positive results of the stress test I have no doubt anymore if 500W will do