PC Upgrade Decision

[ROBYROGERS]

I want to upgrade my PC since it is really old now (around 4 years I think)

Current setup:
Core i3 2120
Gigabyte H61M-S2PV
MSI GTX 550Ti
8GB 1333Mhz Ram in Dual channel

I am really restricted on budget and I will be upgrading really slowly, maybe over a course of 6 months. I am confused about whether I should just buy a 3rd Gen Core i5 (either brand new or 2nd hand) and keep the mother board since I have faced no problems and I also updated the bios or buy a 4th Gen Core i5 and a good enough motherboard (both processor and motherboard will have to be 2nd hand since I really don't have any money).

I am currently looking at a GTX 950 since I am mostly gonna be doing some 1080p gaming(Mostly Dota and some of the new AAA titles at moderate settings) and some simple coding for my studies. I plan on keeping the ram, my 1Tb Western Digital Blue Hard Drive and 550V Power Supply from Gigabyte.

Also any suggestions for a good monitor will be highly appreciated.

The current plan that I have is first get a good monitor then Graphics card and finally changing my processor. My current system is doing okay but the resale value has already dropped quite a bit and I wanna sell it off to get some upgrades done.

Thanks in Advance!

[furiousTaher]

try getting core i5 for 950gtx.... i wont say difference between i3 and i5 is great for 950, but core i5 definitely better, particularly for many multiplayer games. many multiplayer games specially early access ones dont run well on core i3

[kaziishan]

3rd gen core i5 is still a great option. GTX 950 is a great bang for the buck graphics card as long as you get the gigabyte one (under 16K probably); however, if you cannot find that, you might want to (not sure about your PSU though) check GTX 960.

Or, you might check some older gen cards for greater bang for the buck. Second hand deals for both CPU and GPU should be pretty good right now.

And for monitor, any 1080p 21.5" is pretty cheap. But, just get the Asus VX229H.

[MusharratC]

vx229h>GPU>3rd gen i5/whatever other CPU u can manage at that time. I'm planning on upgrading in the same serial.

[ROBYROGERS]

How about dell s2216h? It seemed nice as well and the price is a bit lower!

[dmos]

How about dell s2216h? It seemed nice as well and the price is a bit lower!

+1 nice monitor.
if you can wait go for 4th gen.3rd also a good option