Upgrade AM4 or start fresh AM5? $1000 budget

Build - Help

I have a terrible Frankenstein of a build. It was cobbled together in 2018, my mom had bought me a Ryzen 7 1700, and I bought a matching AM4 Mobo and 32 GB of DDR4. I meant to buy a GPU shortly after but money was tight and a friend had a 970, a case, and CX750 PSU laying around and gave them all to me as well. I threw that all together and technically had a gaming PC. Flash forward so many years and I am still running this terrible thing. I have a soft spot for it though and kind of like the idea of pushing it to AM4's limit. That said I am wondering what the best option is financially.

Currently the build is:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 1700

RAM: Crucial Ballistix 4 X 8GB DDR4 2666MHz

MOBO: MSI X470 Gaming Plus

GPU: NVIDIA RTX 970

PSU: Corsair CX750

I have about $1000 to upgrade. If I keep the old build all I really would be keeping is the Mobo, Ram, SSDs, and Case. I'd spend the money on a new PSU, a used 3080 or some other comparable GPU I can find used, and a Ryzen 7 5800X3D. That fills out most of the $1000.

If I start fresh I'd go with an AM5 build of course. With DDR5 prices so high I feel like I would spend a lot of my budget on just that, and have to compromise in GPU and CPU quality. Probably doing a Ryzen 5 build with a 5060 or so. I am in Phoenix so I have access to Micro Center's opening sales still for the next week or so.

I know the new AM5 build will still be leaps and bounds better than the current build so either option works but I'm not sure which is better. I also don't know how much of my judgment is clouded by nostalgia, part of me feels like I am leaving behind an old friend if I do start completely clean.

Posted Nov 14, 2025, 1:51 PM UTC

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