To upgrade CPU/Mobo/GPU or not

[IndieSnob]

Right now I am sitting on some extra money that I can spend, and so I am wondering if right now would be the time for me to upgrade my CPU, mobo, and video card.

I'm not a heavy gamer, but that said I do like knowing that if I want to play something I can without it looking like a slide show. I run everything at 1920x1080, but I'm not really too picky whether I can have all eye candy on (meaning full AA, the like). Beyond gaming, I mostly do a lot of music and video encoding for my HTPC needs. So with that said here is my current setup.

i5-750 - running at stock as I'm not an overclocker
Gigabyte P55-UD3R
8 gigs of A-Data PC-1600 DDR3 (2 x 4)
XFX 2GB 7850 Double D Edition video
XFX Core Edition 650W PSU
Samsung 840 series 128 gig SSD

I was thinking of going the route of the cheapest i5 Ivy-Bridge, MSI board, and possibly a Radeon 7950 or 7970.

I think my two big questions are how much of an upgrade is going from my i5-750 to the newer ivy-bridge i5s, or whether the GPU would be the bigger upgrade, OR, I should possibly upgrade both.

Thanks for any input.

 

[Dangman]

What's the model number of that A-Data RAM?

For the video card, only upgrade if your HD 7850 is currently not meeting your performance wants and needs. So is your HD 7850 not meeting your performance needs?

 

[IndieSnob]

What's the model number of that A-Data RAM?

For the video card, only upgrade if your HD 7850 is currently not meeting your performance wants and needs. So is your HD 7850 not meeting your performance needs?

The model # on the ram is AX3U1600GB2G9-2G.

Also sorry I probably should have made my post a little clearer as to why I am thinking about upgrading.

I'm not finding any games that aren't running how I want them too, it's more that since I have the spare cash now, should I upgrade and hope for about a good two year run on the new hardware, or should I wait for a little bit to upgrade, as I don't really know how large of an upgrade is, especially the difference between my i5-750 and an ivy-bridge i5. I've looked at lots of benchmarks, but they don't always tell the tale, so I was hoping maybe someone could give me a clearer view of whether it's that large of an upgrade or not.

Thanks!

 

[Dangman]

There is a decent performance upgrade in video editing/rendering and gaming going from a Core i5 750 to the Core i5 4570. But in everyday web browsing, word processing, music playing, etc, you won't notice a difference between the Core i5 750 and the COre i5 4570. You can reuse that A-Data RAM in the new setup.

Now would be a good time to upgrade. The Intel CPUs coming in 2014 won't be that much of an upgrade over current Intel Haswell CPUs. The Intel Skylake CPUs that are supposedly coming out in 2015 will more than likely use rather expensive DDR4 RAM. It probably won't be until 2016 when we'll see a mainstream Intel CPU that'll be a cost-effective and worthwhile upgrade over a Haswell or even an Ivy Bridge setup. Or that DDR4 pricing might drop down to more reasonable levels.

So if you upgrade the CPU and mobo now, you can probably hold off on another CPU, mobo, and now RAM upgrade (DDR4 now) for another three years when it'll be cost-effective again to do another upgrade.

However, again, since you haven't said anything about really needing the GPU power, I don't see a reason to upgrade the GPU. You can always upgrade the GPU later on with far less hassle than a CPU and mobo upgrade.