Tech and Talk > Gaming > PC gaming Tech > What's your long-term upgrade path?

What's your long-term upgrade path?

Bookmarking this for my input.

Damn you KrisN you got me working on my next build already.
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Judge a man by the trials of his shield, not the empty reaping of his sword.

reply to Krisnatharok
Funny because if you look up in that thread far enough, you'll see I made the same comment.

I doubt it will be much of a "path" for me. I will wait until mid 2014 and make all of my decisions then because who knows what will happen with tech and prices by then.

I do think I will keep my Antec case, PSU, and monitor/keyboard. That pretty much just leaves me with a mobo, CPU, RAM and SSD drive to get to get the next one built.

2 years is a long time to be speculating about what we will be putting in our rigs, but that's just my 2 cents worth.

reply to Krisnatharok
Right now I have:

2500k @ 4.2Ghz
16GB (4x4) DDR3 1600
2 x 64 GB C300 (One for Windows, One for OSX)
1TB Samsung HDD
ATI 5870
Antec 620w PSU
Fractal Design R3

Next upgrade cycle - all new tower)

ITX Mobo
Haswell CPU (4 core, 8 thread, unlocked)
32GB RAM
~512GB SSD for OSX
~128GB SSD for Windows
Nvidia 2GB 660Ti (or around $275 price point at the buying point)
Fully modular Gold or Platinum low noise PSU
Fractal low noise small case (Node 304)
Hopefully fully watercooled (2 Corsair H60's - one for CPU and one for GPU)

reply to Krisnatharok
You're probably better off getting 2x 256GB SSDs than getting a single 512GB. It's probably cheaper and you can set them up in a Raid 0 for additional read/write speeds.

As always, you should consider a decent back-up solution for your data.
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A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have. -MLK

You may not do an actual Raid 0. The term takes on different meanings depending on where you actually manage the raid setup. You could tell Windows to set up a striped partition or whatever the hell it calls it and it would effectively be the same thing.
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A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have. -MLK

(0 is striped) TRIM under RAID is finally enabled with the newest chipsets, I don't know if RAID 1 would cause excessive writes on the second, SSD, either.

Having done motherboard-based RAID 0 for the past 4 years, I would be happy to just avoid RAID entirely in my next setup. I feel like my data is on life support should the mobo ever crap out, and I am limited to getting exactly the same model of mobo to even have a chance in recovering my data...

All that can be solved with a 512 GB SSD + 2 TB data drive.
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If we lose this freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment, those who had the most to lose, did the least to prevent its happening.

And the read/writes on a 512GB is probably wicked fast anyways.

Yup. It will be easier to keep a half-terabyte SSD more than 50% free to ensure reads/writes are kept at their maximum.

It's pretty pathetic, my 120GB only ever has 20-30GB free at any time.
--
If we lose this freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment, those who had the most to lose, did the least to prevent its happening.

reply to Krisnatharok
I would go 512GB for simplicity sake and the read write speeds are in the 500's anyhow.

Newegg right now has the Samsung 840 500GB for $300. They are dropping in price for sure.

I wouldn't want RAID because it introduced unnecessary risk due to if one dies, they both die.

I have a 8TB RAID5 (6TB usable) for backups. I'm a-okay on that front

reply to Krisnatharok
I upgrade when two conditions are met

1. system is 3 years old

2. something dies on it that replacing with whats available would cause a downgrade.

or path B

coolness beats out logic.

path B is gaining steam.

Yep, go all out, to get the most awesome system I can then in 3-4 years its often still good enough so it comes down to if anything breaks or the new stuff is just that much more awesome.

reply to Krisnatharok
i understand upgrading video cards but is there any reason to buy a newer cpu now? i camped out newegg the eve the bloomfield 920 came out back in 2008 and i still feel it's plenty powerful today.

in the 4 years i've had this cpu i never once went "hmm, maybe i should get a faster cpu".

reply to Krisnatharok
I've got a 2500k @4.5ghz and 8GB of ram, may get some more ram not sure.

I just upgraded to a 7950, having a bit of trouble finding a stable overclock but at the stock speeds gigabyte sent it at(900/1250) it beats an overclocked 580. So I figure that should last me a couple years(nov 2014), before I *have* to overclock it, but more likely I'll just get a new 8XX or 9XXX gpu

then on 2016, maybe 2015 depending on how cpus progress and how much I need pcie 3.0, I'll get new ram and cpu/mobo.

New psu, eh it'll take a while I've got a 750 80+ bronze right now it works fine.

my haf 932 will stay until I need something else.

Gonna try to get a 1TB internal hdd for storage soon.

May get a Noctua NH-D14 when I get a new cpu/mobo

EDIT: I also just got a 1650x1050 monitor. Love it.

reply to Dream Killer
4-5 years is a good time to upgrade a cpu. Maybe when haswell comes out.

reply to Krisnatharok
Current rig:

Core i5-3750K
Asrock Z77 Motherboard
Cool-IT Closed Loop CPU Cooler
Coolermaster Scout Case
8G Gskill RAM
Plextor 120G SSD Boot
Seagate 750G Data drive
Nvidia GTX 560TI 1G
Lian Li Modular 850Watt PS
24" LG LCD Monitor

Nov / Dec 2012
Just picked up an LG 27" LED monitor from Best buy for $198.

2013
Will upgrade RAM to 16G - Gskill
Probably upgrade video card as well try to stay close to current gen Nvidia.
Upgrade Power supply as same time - going full modular as well like current PS.

2014
CPU / Motherboard upgrade - will stick with Asrock and Intel
Closed Loop cooling upgrade as well.

Every time I upgrade I flow down my parts to the family.

reply to Krisnatharok
It looks like I'll be heading to Okinawa unaccompanied shortly after the new year. Being an old married dad this time around means that instead of buying women and booze I'll more than likely be spending what little excess cash I've got on a less destructive hobby, like my computer.

Considering that I just built my computer, I'll probably salvage a good bit of its parts, especially the ones that don't become obsolete as fast (dvd drive, case, SSD, etc).

I will definitely be upgrading my mother board and CPU, more than likely to Intel. I'll more than likely end up with an i7-3770k or its equivalent at the time.

I'll probably go with an ASRock or ASUS mother board. Either the OC Z77 Formula from ASRock, or the Z77 Sabertooth from ASUS.

I'd also like to get another MSI Hawk 7870 Ghz Edition to marry up with the one I've got now. It'll make my 3x1 Eyefinity setup perform much better.

All said, it's about $1200-$1300 in upgrades, depending on market price when I start collecting the parts. It'll probably be something that takes me the entire two years I'm there to complete...but once it's done, it'll be awesome.
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McBrain#1430

Name's Ash...Housewares.