@mastershake575 I find that very interesting/surprising. Didn't appreciate that was the case and shows how much more dependent games are on GPUs than CPUs as things stand.

More surprising as I didn't pay *that* much for that processor back in 2012, not cheap but no more than $400 (came with a barebones mobo bundle) iirc. Came in that state of overclock from a vendor here in the UK with a 2 year warranty. Has a corsair Hydro Series H60 CPU cooler on it and has been going for 4 years perfectly well.

With that info I'm now giving thought to something like a GTX 1070 once they shed some cost post-hype

Thanks for your input all. Pretty much as was expected with the bonus of not being aware that my CPU in its current tune still holds its own pretty well.

Will be waiting for the RX480 / 1060 as suggested and pick up one of the two. Thank you.

Core i5 3570k OC'd to 4.6GHz

MSI R7850 Power Edition OC 950MHz

Asus P8Z77-V LX

Corsair Gaming Series 600w PSU

8GB of Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz

Sandisk Extreme 240GB SSD

Seagate Barracuda 500GB

The above system is what I have been running since mid 2012 without any change to the clock speeds or any new parts whatsoever.

Now this has done me fine for all the games I've wanted to play, though I've not played any new titles since 2013, so new games are going going to weigh a bit heavily on the system.

Over the next couple of months I need to bring it up to speed with the likes of DOOM, Overwatch and whatever is going to be released in the next 3 years and push as much longevity from the system as possible without spending too many $$$.

As far as I understand the graphics card is by far the biggest bottleneck here for gaming. Just how far behind is the CPU (@4.6GHz) by modern standards? If I say, wait for the RX480 release and pick one up for $200, would the system about fall into line for my needs for the next couple of years - I don't need above 1080p?

What I'm not interested in doing is spending $800 on a GTX 1080 and then having my CPU bottleneck it... then having to change the CPU which will probably mean changing the mobo etc. I'm just trying to use what I've got to play contemporary games at 1080p for good value.

Many thanks for any help you can lend!

Need some help with a Windows XP boot problem.

I mistakenly reset my BIOS to factory default settings. Now whenever the computer starts it doesn't boot Windows XP, it just goes straight to 'Nvidia Boot Agent', which is fourth on the boot priority list in the BIOS after floppy/DVD/HDD.

When it loads this Nvidia boot agent thing, it's just a black screen with 'CLIENT MAC ADDR:' then a series of random characters.

I can still gain access to the BIOS by hitting DEL at the first start-up page.

I'm unsure how to get Windows to load back to normal from here, I presume it still exists in the HDD in its entirety but I have no idea how I can get it returned to normal without a full re-install of Windows.

Would appreciate any help.

$120 sounds fair since it's used. They're not too expensive anymore. But if it's in "like new" condition, then maybe $140. That still a decent discount, but still worth far less because they won't be able to get Club Nintendo points with a preregistered system.

LovePotionNo9

I'm considering buying a second hand 3DS in the UK. What are Club Nintendo points and why are they valuable enough to have a big impact on the price of a second hand system?