• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EST 11:52
CET 17:52
KST 01:52
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
RSL Revival - 2025 Season Finals Preview8RSL Season 3 - Playoffs Preview0RSL Season 3 - RO16 Groups C & D Preview0RSL Season 3 - RO16 Groups A & B Preview2TL.net Map Contest #21: Winners12
Community News
ComeBackTV's documentary on Byun's Career !8Weekly Cups (Dec 8-14): MaxPax, Clem, Cure win4Weekly Cups (Dec 1-7): Clem doubles, Solar gets over the hump1Weekly Cups (Nov 24-30): MaxPax, Clem, herO win2BGE Stara Zagora 2026 announced15
StarCraft 2
General
When will we find out if there are more tournament ComeBackTV's documentary on Byun's Career ! Weekly Cups (Dec 8-14): MaxPax, Clem, Cure win RSL Revival - 2025 Season Finals Preview Weekly Cups (Dec 1-7): Clem doubles, Solar gets over the hump
Tourneys
$5,000+ WardiTV 2025 Championship RSL Offline Finals Info - Dec 13 and 14! Master Swan Open (Global Bronze-Master 2) Winter Warp Gate Amateur Showdown #1: Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament
Strategy
Custom Maps
Map Editor closed ?
External Content
Mutation # 504 Retribution Mutation # 503 Fowl Play Mutation # 502 Negative Reinforcement Mutation # 501 Price of Progress
Brood War
General
FlaSh on: Biggest Problem With SnOw's Playstyle How Rain Became ProGamer in Just 3 Months screp: Command line app to parse SC rep files BGH Auto Balance -> http://bghmmr.eu/ [BSL21] RO8 Bracket & Prediction Contest
Tourneys
Small VOD Thread 2.0 [Megathread] Daily Proleagues [BSL21] WB SEMIFINALS - Saturday 21:00 CET [BSL21] RO8 - Day 2 - Sunday 21:00 CET
Strategy
Game Theory for Starcraft Current Meta Simple Questions, Simple Answers Fighting Spirit mining rates
Other Games
General Games
PC Games Sales Thread Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread Nintendo Switch Thread Path of Exile General RTS Discussion Thread
Dota 2
Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion
League of Legends
Heroes of the Storm
Simple Questions, Simple Answers Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug Heroes of StarCraft mini-set
TL Mafia
Mafia Game Mode Feedback/Ideas Survivor II: The Amazon Sengoku Mafia TL Mafia Community Thread
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread Russo-Ukrainian War Thread Things Aren’t Peaceful in Palestine The Games Industry And ATVI YouTube Thread
Fan Clubs
White-Ra Fan Club
Media & Entertainment
Anime Discussion Thread [Manga] One Piece Movie Discussion!
Sports
2024 - 2026 Football Thread Formula 1 Discussion
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
Computer Build, Upgrade & Buying Resource Thread
TL Community
TL+ Announced Where to ask questions and add stream?
Blogs
The (Hidden) Drug Problem in…
TrAiDoS
I decided to write a webnov…
DjKniteX
James Bond movies ranking - pa…
Topin
Thanks for the RSL
Hildegard
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 1647 users

What one thing should I upgrade?

Forum Index > Tech Support
Post a Reply
Clicker
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
United States1012 Posts
June 15 2011 21:49 GMT
#1
I can stream okay, but I'd the quality to be just a little better.
Pretty much I can afford 200-250ish to upgrade right now.
What should that be?

Current system specs
CORSAIR XMS2 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 Yorkfield 2.83GHz LGA 775 95W Quad-Core
GIGABYTE LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 260 896MB 448-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16
750w PSU
Win 7 64 bit.

Would http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127510 provide a worthwhile performance increase for streaming?
Or go the route of more RAM? ;x
skyR
Profile Joined July 2009
Canada13817 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-06-15 21:51:49
June 15 2011 21:51 GMT
#2
Streaming is dependent on the proocessor. The graphics card won't improve Starcraft II performance as the GTX 260 is already quite powerful enough to run it on high smoothly.

You're looking at a motherboard, memory, and processor upgrade to something like a P67 / Z68, core i5 2500k, and DDR3 if you want to improve streaming quality.
Lyzon
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United Kingdom440 Posts
June 15 2011 21:52 GMT
#3
SSD, will give your computer a very noticable speed increase. It wont up your fps but you will notice yoru systm gets alot snappier
JingleHell
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
United States11308 Posts
June 15 2011 21:55 GMT
#4
What benchmark shows SSD's speeding up streams? This I've got to see.
Habel
Profile Joined April 2011
United States123 Posts
June 15 2011 22:00 GMT
#5
Because streaming is so dependant on CPU power, as sky said, your best bet is to save up and than just do a complete overhaul. However, if that's not in the foreseeable future, and seeing as the only better processor available is a 9650 which is around 340$ due to lesser production of them, than yes you should get 8GB of ram. That would maybe increase streaming speed, definitely more so than a newer GPU.
"I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints." - Billy Joel
Sablar
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
Sweden880 Posts
June 15 2011 22:04 GMT
#6
I think you would be better of upgrading the whole system. Changing graphics card can help with fps in games but not really streaming.

If you still decide to get a new GPU, I don't see why it should be some pre-OCd expensive model. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125383&cm_re=560-_-14-125-383-_- is just better, and you can overclock it yourself.

I think it would be a good idea to overclock your CPU, and save the money for a motherboard, ram, cpu upgrade later.
Lyzon
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United Kingdom440 Posts
June 15 2011 22:43 GMT
#7
On June 16 2011 06:55 JingleHell wrote:
What benchmark shows SSD's speeding up streams? This I've got to see.


Where did I say SSD's increased stream speed? i just said it would make his pc feel snappier
FeiLing
Profile Joined March 2011
Germany428 Posts
June 15 2011 22:48 GMT
#8
A SSD would be the best thing to spend the money on, but it won't help with what the OP wants to achieve. For 250 bucks nothing will though. Needs to be a new machine.
jacosajh
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
2919 Posts
June 15 2011 22:52 GMT
#9
On June 16 2011 07:43 Lyzon wrote:
Show nested quote +
On June 16 2011 06:55 JingleHell wrote:
What benchmark shows SSD's speeding up streams? This I've got to see.


Where did I say SSD's increased stream speed? i just said it would make his pc feel snappier


He asked what he should upgrade to better his streaming. And you suggested an SSD which is not relevant to streaming.
Souljah
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States423 Posts
June 15 2011 22:53 GMT
#10
Personally, I'd get some DDR3 and save the rest of your money for a new build in the future.. At least the memory will be able to be reused.
Aduromors
Profile Joined July 2009
United States279 Posts
June 15 2011 22:56 GMT
#11
That's still a decent CPU, so maybe get an aftermarket cooler and try overclocking. if you dare
jacosajh
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
2919 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-06-15 23:36:22
June 15 2011 23:35 GMT
#12
Sell your Q9550 and you will have enough for a decent CPU/Mobo/Ram on top of your $200-250.

You might be able to get around $150 for a Q9550 (I see some on amazon/ebay listed for $160-$240 but I don't know what the demand is, if any). That can bring your total to $350-400... enough for:

2500k - $220
P67 Mobo - $110ish
4GB DDR3 RAM - $40ish

You can try to sell your old mobo/ram but I don't think you'd get much for it... if you can sell it at all.

Maybe you can even try and resell the entire system itself and just start from scratch? If streaming really is that important to you, it'll be worth it. Upgrading to 2500k will bottleneck you with the 260, but it's not important if you don't need anything more than that (just playing SC2).
skyR
Profile Joined July 2009
Canada13817 Posts
June 15 2011 23:36 GMT
#13
On June 16 2011 07:53 Souljah wrote:
Personally, I'd get some DDR3 and save the rest of your money for a new build in the future.. At least the memory will be able to be reused.


Wrong. DDR3 and DDR2 are not interchangeable. Even if the motherboard has both of these slots, you cannot use them in combination.
JingleHell
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
United States11308 Posts
June 15 2011 23:38 GMT
#14
On June 16 2011 08:36 skyR wrote:
Show nested quote +
On June 16 2011 07:53 Souljah wrote:
Personally, I'd get some DDR3 and save the rest of your money for a new build in the future.. At least the memory will be able to be reused.


Wrong. DDR3 and DDR2 are not interchangeable. Even if the motherboard has both of these slots, you cannot use them in combination.


To be fair, the confusion is easy to understand, if you try to find his mobo on newegg, the only one from that line they have is a new one with a DDR3 memory controller.
skyR
Profile Joined July 2009
Canada13817 Posts
June 15 2011 23:43 GMT
#15
The OP didn't specify a motherboard and only specified DDR2. He just listed Gigabyte and the P45 chipset. Gigabyte has more than a dozen P45 models. So no it's not fair >.>
writer22816
Profile Blog Joined September 2008
United States5775 Posts
June 15 2011 23:48 GMT
#16
Probably the biggest upgrade to streaming would be to upgrade your LGA775 processor to a Sandy Bridge LGA1155, i.e. i5-2500k. However that would also require a motherboard and (I think) RAM upgrade.
8/4/12 never forget, never forgive.
JingleHell
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
United States11308 Posts
June 15 2011 23:51 GMT
#17
On June 16 2011 08:43 skyR wrote:
The OP didn't specify a motherboard and only specified DDR2. He just listed Gigabyte and the P45 chipset. Gigabyte has more than a dozen P45 models. So no it's not fair >.>


Yeah, I know, I'm trying to be a nicer person though. It isn't working well overall.
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
OSC
14:00
King of the Hill #234
SteadfastSC63
Liquipedia
WardiTV 2025
11:00
Playoffs
ShoWTimE vs CureLIVE!
WardiTV1848
ComeBackTV 1043
TaKeTV 544
IndyStarCraft 254
Rex145
LiquipediaDiscussion
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
Lowko506
IndyStarCraft 254
RotterdaM 231
Rex 145
Liquid`VortiX 93
SteadfastSC 63
BRAT_OK 32
MindelVK 18
DivinesiaTV 9
StarCraft: Brood War
Britney 24216
Calm 3299
Bisu 2161
Rain 1702
actioN 755
Horang2 703
Stork 517
Shuttle 324
Larva 154
firebathero 146
[ Show more ]
Mini 136
Hyun 133
Mind 80
Zeus 68
JYJ 63
Aegong 47
Killer 43
JulyZerg 32
Mong 30
Shinee 24
910 21
soO 19
GoRush 15
sorry 14
ajuk12(nOOB) 11
SilentControl 8
Sacsri 8
Dota 2
Gorgc6238
singsing4528
qojqva2938
LuMiX1
Super Smash Bros
Westballz19
Other Games
B2W.Neo1797
hiko506
FrodaN438
crisheroes379
KnowMe192
XaKoH 153
Trikslyr63
Chillindude40
Organizations
StarCraft 2
Blizzard YouTube
StarCraft: Brood War
BSLTrovo
sctven
[ Show 12 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• poizon28 24
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• intothetv
• Kozan
• IndyKCrew
• LaughNgamezSOOP
• Migwel
• sooper7s
StarCraft: Brood War
• BSLYoutube
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
League of Legends
• Nemesis4094
Upcoming Events
Big Brain Bouts
8m
YoungYakov vs Jumy
TriGGeR vs Spirit
RotterdaM231
The PiG Daily
4h 8m
SHIN vs ByuN
Reynor vs Classic
TBD vs herO
Maru vs SHIN
TBD vs Classic
CranKy Ducklings
17h 8m
WardiTV 2025
18h 8m
Reynor vs MaxPax
SHIN vs TBD
Solar vs herO
Classic vs TBD
SC Evo League
19h 38m
Ladder Legends
1d 2h
BSL 21
1d 3h
Sziky vs Dewalt
eOnzErG vs Cross
Sparkling Tuna Cup
1d 17h
Ladder Legends
2 days
BSL 21
2 days
StRyKeR vs TBD
Bonyth vs TBD
[ Show More ]
Replay Cast
2 days
Wardi Open
2 days
Monday Night Weeklies
3 days
WardiTV Invitational
4 days
Replay Cast
5 days
WardiTV Invitational
5 days
ByuN vs Solar
Clem vs Classic
Cure vs herO
Reynor vs MaxPax
Liquipedia Results

Completed

Acropolis #4 - TS3
RSL Offline Finals
Kuram Kup

Ongoing

C-Race Season 1
IPSL Winter 2025-26
KCM Race Survival 2025 Season 4
YSL S2
BSL Season 21
Slon Tour Season 2
CSL Season 19: Qualifier 1
WardiTV 2025
META Madness #9
eXTREMESLAND 2025
SL Budapest Major 2025
ESL Impact League Season 8
BLAST Rivals Fall 2025
IEM Chengdu 2025
PGL Masters Bucharest 2025
Thunderpick World Champ.
CS Asia Championships 2025
ESL Pro League S22

Upcoming

CSL Season 19: Qualifier 2
CSL 2025 WINTER (S19)
BSL 21 Non-Korean Championship
Acropolis #4
IPSL Spring 2026
Bellum Gens Elite Stara Zagora 2026
HSC XXVIII
Big Gabe Cup #3
OSC Championship Season 13
ESL Pro League Season 23
PGL Cluj-Napoca 2026
IEM Kraków 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter Qual
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2025 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.