Here is the meat of this to save you duders some time:

In 2012, I built a new computer. It was, basically, for Diablo 3. The specs are below so you can try and grasp my (admittedly arrogant and seemingly minor) concerns:

• OS: Windows 7 Pro, 64-Bit
• MOBO: Asus Z77 Sabertooth
• CPU: i7-3770 @3.4 GHz ("Ivy Bridge")
• RAM: 8GB (2 x 4GB) G.Skill Ripjaws X DDR3
• GPU: Gigabyte GTX670 "Windforce" OC (2GB...Supposedly)
• Primary HDD: Seagate Barracuda 1TB, 7200 RPM
• Secondary DD: Corsair Force Series 3 SSD (60GB)
• PSU: Silverstone ST1000-P (1000W)
• Case: Thermaltake Overseer

Now, to be perfectly clear, even now this is not a terribly slow machine but, in typical "PC Master Race" stereotype fashion "It's (barely) starting to bog in some games now man!" and I was beginning to look into a replacement. That is what led me to the forums of course: To pester fellow GB members about possible upgrades.

Again, it's not a slow machine but it has finally started to show it's age in small ways. Middle Earth: Shadow Of Mordor's latest, and I believe final, DLC is starting to bog it down at max settings. It's not a big deal to be blunt but, as the Witcher 3 gets dangerously close and the ever present specter of more demanding games looms over us all, I was wondering what I should do right now? Do I go for a more powerful graphics card and hope the older processor doesn't bottleneck it? Should I, instead, save for a while an build an entirely new PC? Before you answer, consider this:

• I run my games at 1920 x 1080, on a single monitor. Not needing anything to run two or three screens around here.
• The secondary GPU slot on the motherboard is burned out. It was my fault but it is burned out all the same so no SLI business unless I pester the hell out of Asus to get a replacement...and it's worth it of course. I know the PSU can handle it.
• It gets way too hot in this house to run something that's been OC'd. I could feasibly do it but then never be able to use it during the summer.
• I own a PS4 and an X1 so this not my only gaming device.

So what do you think duders? Run this one as is and deal with lower settings on new stuff? Suck it up and just build a new one at a later date? Run the gauntlet on a new GPU and hope the previous parts can handle it? I await your judgement...and mocking probably because this is the epitome of first world problem here.

A 970 should be all you need right now. I say 'all' as though it's pocket change but you know what I mean. ;)

I'd just pick up a 970 and call it a day. Your CPU is fine, the 970 is perfect for 1080p gaming, and heat won't be an issue. Once the 390x comes out we'll probably see a slight drop in price for NVIDIA cards, but if you also plan on getting The Witcher 3 or Batman Arkham Knight then you can get both for free with a 970. If it's in the cards, I don't see any reason not to do this. Here's some benchmarks to show you how much the 970 will blow your card out of the water at a higher resolution.

@grtkbrandon: @dave_tacitus: I'm gonna piggy-back off this thread since I have a similar build. Only main difference is I have an i5-3570k @ 3.4GHz. Would my i5 change your guy's recommendations in any way?

@tearhead: You're going to have to get a new GPU anyway so my advice would be to buy one and see how it handles new games in your current PC. If you suspect the CPU's bottlenecking then go for something like a 4690k in addition.

I'm running a 4670k and an Nvidia 780 and am not expecting big problems with Witcher 3 at 1080p. The game's pre-loaded and sitting there, taunting me...

This. The build is still solid, no need to go crazy.

@tearhead: Nah, the benefits of an i7 are mostly hyper-threading, and the performance that has on gaming is negligible. I went from an i5-2500k to an i5-4690k and noticed no difference in performance while I was running a r9 290. Plus you can overclock your CPU and make up any performance "gap" plus some.

Jesus, man, you don't need a new PC. A new graphics card and you'd be good to go. I have an i5 from 2012, I just put a 970 in there and everything runs great.

I have a 2011 build that's just slighty worse than yours and I'm just going to update the video card later in the year when it comes with the right free game, I'm hoping for mad max we'll see. It was the first pc I built where it was perfectly lighting fast for everyday computing. Feel like this computer will be good for something for a long time. The only thing that makes me want to upgrade ever is when I have like six video tabs open during e3 or when I was searching for that boxing match a couple weeks ago that'll slow her down.

@dave_tacitus: Plus you'll be within the recommended specs for the oculus rift when it comes out should you decide to try it out.

I game on a single monitor & went for a 980 in case the requirements for Valve's VR headset are a bit more than the Rift.

Well now I'm kind of bummed to learn I missed out on getting a free Arkham Knight key by a week.

Pick up a 970 and maybe score some more ram and you should be okay for awhile. Or do what I did and go bat shit insane and build a "future proofer". Of course my former PC was also a lot older than yours.

Send a message to the retailer. I've seen quite a few people get a key from Amazon and Newegg this way.

I had pretty much the same setup (560 gtx instead of a 670) and got a 970 gtx as an upgrade. It's pretty much perfect again. The only minor issue I have with the 970 is that it doesn't really have 4GB of memory - Google a bit on it and you'll read plenty about the known issues.

It's still the biggest bang for your buck, by a long shot.

Just get a 970 and maybe a bigger SSD if you want to store games on it since games are getting huge now.

Im in the exact same boat when I built one for diablo 3 and Witcher 2. i7 and 670, thanks for the recommendations duders

If you really have money to burn, you might want to pick up a bigger SSD along with the 970. I'd recommend a 250GB or even 500GB Samsung 850 EVO. They really don't break the bank like the used to.

You don't need to rebuild the whole thing to be honest. You'd only need to upgrade the GPU and maybe get a bigger SSD and that's about it. Maaaaayybbee get more RAM. I'd say that the Mobo and CPU are still top of the line stuff and you don't need to swap those out for a few years. I mean, I'm still rocking an overlocked i7 920 from almost 6 years ago and that thing still isn't a bottleneck.

You could always buy a new one and send me the old one... please?

But i respect your 1920x1080 stance. None of this 4k nonsense, HD is HD, the extra GPU power needed to support those crazy resolutions is not worth the extra cost right now. Maybe when games are super detailed, and you can count Geralt of Rivia's Hair follicles, it will be worth it, but I see it as superfluous for the time being. Gaming on a TV would be the only reasonable demand for high resolution capable hardware.

That totally worked and only took 2 minutes with Amazon Live Chat. Thanks!

Depends on how much money you are willing to burn, I'd shoot for the 980 if you got the cash, otherwise the 970, like many others have said, is a great choice. I'd also say getting a bigger SSD and running all your games off of that would be ideal. Other than that, there is no reason to upgrade anything else on that machine. In terms of a complete rebuild, you won't have to do that for another 2-3 years, and only if you want to. Probably when Skylake and DDR4 RAM becomes a mainstay, you'd end up getting a new CPU, RAM, motherboard and GPU.

Just get a video card man that is still an A+ system either get a 980 or get a 970 with another SSD and just wait for that Windows 10 update even more ram really wouldn't do much.

Bigger SSD, more ram if your feeling saucy, and a 980 or 970. Everything else is perfectly fine, a 3770 will slay any game you throw at it and there is all of maybe a 12-15% performance gain from moving up to Haswell.

Personally, just a RAM upgrade to 16GB and as a few others had already commented, a GTX 970 would be all you need right now. If you had to upgrade the CPU i would be aiming at the 500$ 5 series i7, don't need the top end 8-core and its a slower thread-to-thread compared to both 6-scores.

You can't really overclock that CPU, as your multiplier is locked, anyways.

Outside of that, just drop a 970 in there and call it a day. Once you feel the need to upgrade your processor, you'll have to do your motherboard and ram, but that 970 can come with.

I'm still sporting an i5 2500k, and it's gone from 4.6ghz to 4.2ghz as I dropped it into a mitx case. I swapped the 7950 I had with a 970 and all my games are silk smooth at 1920x1200.

Good to know I somewhat future proofed it without even realizing it way back in 2012...well, as much as you can future proof a PC I suppose. Thank you all for the advice! Looks like it's time for new ram and a beefier card.

@mikemcn: Yeah I never personally understood the desire to run it at insane resolutions. Sure, it looks nice, but to my eyes at least, it never seemed worth the insane cash required to do it. Not yet anyways.

@neozeon: once you play games on a high end PC and monitor, you'll understand. It's hard to imagine what a monitor like the Asus ROG Swift is like until you can actually use it.

You may be better off not caring, because a day after seeing the above monitor in person I dropped close to $1,000 on the 2560x1440 144hz hotness. It's so good, normal 1080p monitors look like blurry messes to me now.

I second this. I just bought a 34" 3440 x 1440 ultrawide and now I'm already looking for the 144hz models coming out. It never ends. In music we call it GAS (gear acquisition syndrome), but it's relevant to everything.

@mb and @grtkbrandon: Yeah that just sounds like an absurd amount of money for just a monitor. I know, I know, you folks love and I don't blame you but that is well beyond my budget! Maybe with some overtime...maybe. I usually feel the GAS welling up when new consoles are announced but, luckily, that seems to be it (for now).

Pfft the Swift is the old and busted. The new hotness is the Acer Predator XB270HU. Straight up 1440p 144hz G-Sync with an IPS panel, none of this TN drivel.

@korwin: Pretty much, but it didn't exist when I bought the Swift, otherwise I would have bought the Predator instead.

• A new video card (GTX 970 or GTX 980, or wait for the upcoming ti models)
• A larger SSD. They're getting down to $1 a GB or less, so you can get some nice SSDs without spending too much. The Sandisk Extreme PRO 240GB is like $140 and has a 10-year warranty. Currently the best performing SSD for under $200.
• A new monitor. Lots of great gaming monitors coming out that are 144hz and 1440p resolution. Asus is making some nice stuff.
• More RAM is always a good thing, and pretty cheap.

I was looking into processors the other day. Mine is as i7 2600k which i've got clocked up to 4.4 ghz. Built mine in 2011 with 2 570's. I upgraded to a 4gb 770 about a year and a half ago. After doing a little research and reading some threads on tech sites I came to the conclusion that my processor can probably make another year or two. So I opted to just upgrade to 16 gb of ram instead of the 8 I've had since the build. I also ordered 500gb ssd and also another TB SATA HDD. The ssd will be for games and the other for general storage, movies and what not. Next year I'll probably upgrade the video card again and the following year hopefully I'll do the Processor and Mother board.

From what I've read the jump in speed from processor generation to generation really isn't a huge jump. Processors are lasting longer and longer, and the most bang for your buck will come from video cards SSD's and RAM

I got a Samsung 500gb SSD for $177 on Newegg. (sale price). I ordered on Memorial day and it was on sale