Originally Posted by
WhyFi
Oh. Well, uh, yeah, I wouldn't put any money in to upgrading that. Some Intel processors from 5-6 years ago might still be capable enough to warrant just a new GPU and SSD, but it'd be very easy to outperform your Phenom II. If you're going to use it for productivity (in addition to any gaming), and have applications that would take advantage of multiple CPU cores/threads, I'd stick with AMD and look at some of the recently replaced 3000-series Zen processors, like the 3600, which is a good sweet spot for value/performance.
In addition to competitive pricing, Microcenter usually has an additional discount if you buy a CPU and compatible motherboard at the same time. They often have open box stuff, too, and I think that the CPU/mobo discount still applies.
You might be able to get away with just replacing the core of the computer at first (CPU, motherboard and RAM), though it would probably be advisable to replace the power supply too, while you're at it (good ones aren't as expensive as they were 10-12 years ago). Replace the GPU when you feel like it, though I'm pretty sure that I've got something in a pile of spare parts that I could donate that would be a couple steps up.
I very much appreciate the advice, and I am enjoying learning a little bit about this kind of stuff.
The thing is - I really don't use my computer for much more than web browsing and listening to music. Occasionally I will screw around in some music recording software but even then it's not like I'm trying to stack hundreds of audio tracks on top of one another and make my CPU try to handle it. I'll also very occasionally play something like Flight Simulator X, or maybe Portal on Steam, but I'm not a huge gamer. The graphics card got updated because for a period of time I was playing Kerbal Space Program and I lamented to my brother how slow it ran, so he bought me the GPU and power supply for Christmas.
Honestly, I'm a great candidate for something off the shelf. But I just can't help wanting to mess around with things that don't need to be messed around with
