Here's the comparability list for your motherboard. Upgrade the bios if you haven't yet
https://www.asrock.com/mb/amd/fatal1ty%20b450%20gaming%20k4/index.asp#CPU
I searched on ebay and 😂 there's a big jump in price between a 5700x/5800x to 5700x3d/5800x3d. ~$150 to $350-400
Yeah the CPU is going to be your bottleneck there. I would go with the most powerful AM4 processor since you're kinda stuck with AM4, which would be the 5800X3D.
That will last you through another GPU upgrade as well.
If you want something right now, you can swap that CPU out with a ryzen 7 5600x. It lolls like Amazon has it listed for $220. According to User Benchmarks you could see a 30-40% performance increase over what you have. Unfortunately with the smaller board you can't really add more ram. Any upgrade to DDR5 is going to be way too expensive.
You could save and wait for things to cool down but who knows when that will be. Once it does happen you should swap the processor, board, and ram. You can also keep an eye on the secondhand market to see if something pops up at a decent price.
You'll have to make sure your BIOS is updated to be compatible with a new CPU. It's a PITA, but you'll need to go to Asrock's site and scroll through the different versions and figure out what your board can support. I also have a cheap old Asrock B450M board. Started with a 5600, now running a 5700x. So Asrock can be good about updates.
Looks like you can get a Ryzen 5800XT with a cpu cooler and fit in your budget.
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/YGhv8Q
Thats probably fine and you dont NEED to upgrade. But if you want to you could upgrade your cpu to either a 5600 or 5600x. They're pretty cheap these days.
Not too far from my current config. I am running a 5600G and then upgraded to a Radeon RX 9060 XT. Glad I got that all done before the end of the year. It's gaming just fine with minimal effort on Fedora
Rofl and im still on an amd fx!! Works fine for me. Only cant play alan wake 2 because of missing cpu instructions.
Upgrading your CPU to anything from the last 3 generations is going to require a motherboard and memory also. It'll be very hard to do that under $300.
My advice at this point is to keep saving up until RAM prices drop. Then you'll have more money and things will be cheaper. You'll be able to get something on AM5 then.
I went for a Ryzen 7 5800xt which arrives tomorrow. As advised I updated my BIOS which was new to me - I got it done first try with no hassle in 20 minutes or so :D . So, all prepared to swap the CPU and to redo my rats nest cable management in one go tomorrow. Hooray, and thank you to all that replied.
all 18 comments