My current system specs (approximate, as I'm at work)
AMD FX-4170 4.2 ghz quad core AM3+ , (stock cooler, kicking myself now), can OC to 4.6 ghz with a little instability
Asus M5A97 R2.0 AMD 970 motherboard
HyperX Genesis 8GB DDR3-1600MHz CL9 Dual Channel Kit (2 x 4GB)
2 TB mechanical hard drive (can't remember brand now) + 2 other smaller mechanical drives
ZOTAC GeForce GTX 650 Ti 1 GB memory
Corsair VX550 550 Watt power supply (specs in German on English page, don't know why, so need translation link)
Audigy2 ZS soundcard
Samusng 22" 2253BW 1680x1024 monitor (sometimes 50" 720p Panasonic Plasma when I feel like living room gaming single player so my missus can watch)
Windows 7 OS
I probably can't get BF4 until Christmas, at which time I might have around $100 for an upgrade. I'd rather not upgrade the board or CPU at this time (I know I should probably get a hex core, but I've never done a CPU upgrade myself before). With boxing day/week sales, I might be able to get an SSD, another 4 gb of RAM, or a video card upgrade. Which of these would provide the best bang for my buck?
With an SSD, can I get the performance increase when keeping the OS on the mechanical drive but running BF from it, or do I need to do a fresh install of the OS on the mechanical drive?
I can still get the same kind of memory. Given the rest of the system, is another pair of the Kingstons good, or should I look at a different (faster) memory type in 2x8 gb? I've read elsewhere that BF4 eats more then 8gb of memory; is that true?
Given I'm running at max 1680x1024 (not likely to change monitor soon), would a video card upgrade be worthwhile? Would moving up to a 2 gb 650TI boost be worthwhile upgrade, or do I at least need a 660? Can my power supply handle a 660? And do I either have to put the OS in out-of-box mode or do a fresh OS install if I want to move to a worthwhile AMD card, or is a driver uninstall enough? Which AMD card would provide an inexpensive upgrade over the 650 TI?
Thanks, everyone!
BF4 Hardware Upgrade Questions
