PC Upgrade: considerations.
Hi everyone,
first and foremost I'd like to admit I'm not sure this thread is good here, but I've seen similar questions asked in the past so...
Any moderator, please feel free to move it somewhere else if so you wish.
Now, unto us.
My machine is not bad, at all.
It quite does satisfy all the Alpha requisite and then some, but having received a sizeable bonus for Christmas I really thought that it would do no harm investing into my rig. (I.e.: My wife allowed me to do so

)
My actual stats:
GPU: GeForce EVGA GTX 660 Ti SC 2GB DDR5
CPU: Intel Core 2 Extreme CPU X9650 (4 CPUs) @ 3.20 GHz
Motherboard: ASUS ROG Rampage Formula
Memory: 4 GB DDR2<--- Weak link, 2 decks of different brands, not the fastest stuff
OS: Windows Ultimate 7
Now, my idea was to just upgrade the Memory to 16GB but lo and behold, being DDR2 (the only kind supported by Motherboard) I can only get to 8GB.
That got me thinking. I got basically 2 ways to upgrade.
Just get a bigger Case and shove in new 8GB of fast memory, some 128 GB SSD, create a RAID of 1TB HDDs (3 was my idea- I already have 1) and a sizeable new GFX Card (a 780 Ti Maybe...).
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Reasoning: CPU and MOBO are still efficient, hard to find a game that nowadays uses full 4 cores. Fast RAM, new GPU and SSD would be a good compromise.
OR
Invest in the future.
Get a brand new Motherboard, CPU and 16GB of DDR3 Memory + a SSD.
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Reasoning: CPU and MOBO more futureproof, largest single expense. I can still slowly bring in smaller stuff in the following years.