i recently upgraded my waifu, i have a z77 mobo with 8gb ram gtx 650 and i upgraded my i3 3220 3.3ghz to i7 3770k 3.5ghz.
i did some testing before and after the upgrade however when i ran Crysis 3 on MAX 1080p i got 9fps with my i3 however when i did the same test with my i7 i got berly any extra frames even tho it ran smoother than the i3. i also played far cry 3 on MAX 1080p and i berly got anything differennt in performance i got 22fps with the i7 and with my i3 just 20fps. so does this mean that my system is bottlenecked? before you judge me i have my reasons why i got the i7 instead of a new gpu or i5. and i know my system is unbalanced i just want to make sure to see if my hypothesis is correct. and if it is, do you think OC my cpu will make the situation better? and how
that is because your gtx 650 is not nearly powerful enough to take advantage of the extra cpu power that the i7 can provide. At this point the only way you are going to get better fps is to get a better video card.
I'm definitely going to agree with ragingh4vok. It's generally a good idea to upgrade your GPU first when considering gaming applications as the GPU will have a far greater impact than the CPU will.
I used to have a similar setup, (3770k, gt640) and upgraded to a 760, and it made all the difference. I recommend you go for a GTX 760 or 770 (770s can be found as low as 320$)
CPU doesn't seem to make a big difference for gaming until you get into upper mid range/high end GPUs from what I've seen.
Unless your like me and were using a gtx 650 with a core 2 duo and then went to a FX-8320
You may want to try a different psu it maybe causing the gpu card to throttle back i went threw a similar problem were i upgraded cpu and gpu and was not seeing any improvement in performance. When i switched to a higher psu it got alot better. Try a diffrent one from microcenter or what ever hardware store you have. If it doesn't work take it back.
You are gpu limited 650gtx is just a weak card and go for around a 100 bucks your i3 was good for up to a $300 gpu like 770 and 280x. like you would have 2x to 3x the amount of fps if you went will a gpu upgrade over your cpu. the good news now is that you have a good foundation and just need a new gpu.
so there is no need to OC?
overclocking your cpu wont really change your fps i bet your cpu is only at 30% to % 40 when gaming when it is stock. you can over clock your gpu and gain a good 5% to 10% not realy game changing.
Unless you have a card that overclocks like a beast for whatever reason.
I have a gigabyte GTX 760 and I was able to push the memory clock a full GHz and the core clock a full 100MHz. It was a 10-15% improvement in most games. I'd say that is a game changer.
As for CPU overclocking, yeah, you're not going to see a whole lot of difference there. Overclocked my 3570k to 4.4GHz, and there was no noticeable change in framerates.
Now i do agree with all the comments above,but i will say that i don't think your system is bottlenecked.Its just the fact that games benefit more from GPU's more than CPU's.I have a asus gtx 650 DC, and i overclocked (1058-1200MHz gpu clock,1.10-1.12volts,memory 5000-5200MHz) and i got a 15-20 frames increase in bf3.So yeah,id look for a new gpu.btw what PSU are you using.
GPU is bottle necking the system big time. If and when you upgrade your GPU, make sure your PSU is adequate. 450-550watts 80+ bronze should be good enough for something mid-range.
If your upgrading the video card soon I'd just overclock the hell out of it, worst case is that it breaks and then you just limp on the integrated graphic till you upgrade and put the gtx650 in the trash, so no big deal and its unlikely to happen. I think this is a good idea because you gain more than a few frames a second for games now, you learn about overclocking (even if you've done it a hundred times before you still learn every time you play with something you don't mind breaking). Besides with a case fan or two pointed straight on you graphics card you'll actually be able to push it fairly hard, I got 320mhz on my GPU, 130mhz on my memory and pushed the shader clock a full 500mhz faster. All with just barely over stock voltage, so heat only climbed about 5-7 degrees C in doing so (although i did lock fan to 100% in game to stop in running up and down, the change in noise was more noticeable than the noise itself). That same overclock gives about a 30% fps improvement in game, enough to make new titles that ran slow on low settings before playable, even with a couple of things turned to medium.
my psu is overkill
is a seagate platinum 1000w 80+ platnium
,i choose 1k because i am planning to do SLI if its not this year then next year for sure