Upgrade advice

Howdy Count Mike,
Sounds like the AMD still have good stuff worth the look! I listed $500 as my maximum and I really don't want to spend that much. I will have to get some info on the different ssds and their speeds and idiosyncrasies.
Thanks

Here's another way to attack it, given a 500 budget:

Decide on the board first, which means thinking about the boot hard drive and AMD/Intel. If you want NVMe as a boot drive, OK. Make sure the board has your required features. Quite possibly mATX rather than ATX.

Figure on mid-level 8 gb RAM. DDR 4 2666 probably. Name brand, say G Skill or Crucial; figure 70 max

Then the drive. Look at 240 to 256 GB Samsung, Intel, Crucial, WD. You might appreciate NVMe rather than SATA for speed. Figure 40 to 70 bucks, depending on whether you want 2.5 inch, m2.2280, SATA, or NVMe. Maybe the Crucial MX500 2.5 inch SATA at the low end and the WD SN750 NVMe M2.2280 at the upper end.

Then everything else to the processor, maybe stretching to the last dollar, eating Ramen for a week.

I know nothing about RAID. You may have to make compromises if you insist on RAID.

I don't see why you would need a full ATX board unless RAID forces you to it.

Board: 135; memory 65; drive 65; leaves 235 for the CPU. Eating Ramen for a week might bring that to 275 or 300.

CountMike said:

Do you have a half decent GPU like Gt1050(Ti) for instance ? That's important because Intel CPUs don't have good graphics and AMD PUSs with better graphics (APU) don't have stronger CPUs.
Best of AMD is R5 2400g with Vega 11 graphics but CPU is 4 cores and 8 threads. Higher core/thread count CPUs don't have graphics. Your old machine is too obsolete to keep anything but case and HDDs.

The gpu is to replace the onboard video that died. It is minimum. No gaming so thinking that onboard graphics will be okay. Unsure of the benefits of any hyperthreading...... What is an APU?? Won't my power supply work? Aaaargh this is getting complicated.

ignatzatsonic said:

Here's another way to attack it, given a 500 budget:

Decide on the board first, which means thinking about the boot hard drive and AMD/Intel. If you want NVMe as a boot drive, OK. Make sure the board has your required features. Quite possibly mATX rather than ATX.

Figure on mid-level 8 gb RAM. DDR 4 2666 probably. Name brand, say G Skill or Crucial; figure 70 max

Then the drive. Look at 240 to 256 GB Samsung, Intel, Crucial, WD. You might appreciate NVMe rather than SATA for speed. Figure 40 to 70 bucks, depending on whether you want 2.5 inch, m2.2280, SATA, or NVMe. Maybe the Crucial MX500 2.5 inch SATA at the low end and the WD SN750 NVMe M2.2280 at the upper end.

Then everything else to the processor, maybe stretching to the last dollar, eating Ramen for a week.

I know nothing about RAID. You may have to make compromises if you insist on RAID.

I don't see why you would need a full ATX board unless RAID forces you to it.

Board: 135; memory 65; drive 65; leaves 235 for the CPU. Eating Ramen for a week might bring that to 275 or 300.

Thanks for your time and patience. Since I am upgrading I am thinking about eventually maybe putting in a graphics card in the future. From a quick check, I don't think I need NVMe. So that would limit it to a real quality SSD of 250GB. My data is RAID 1, 1 drive data and 1 drive copy. Going to have to remember how I set that up.... The RAM you've mentioned and the amount sound fine.
With $235 for CPU, what are you thinking in terms of? Still unsure if I need hyperthreading. The eventual upgrade to separate graphics and minor gaming might make a difference.

Come to a conclusion on AMD versus Intel. Board shop rather than CPU shop.

I wouldn't let the possible need for a graphics card at some unknown point in the future influence any decisions now. Think about graphics cards when you need one.

I haven't used a video card in at least 10 years. I don't game and have no need for one.

If you don't want NVMe, the Crucial MX500 is a well-regarded standard 2.5 inch SATA and is available for 40 bucks now at Newegg for the 250 gb model. The m2.2280 variation of the same drive is the same price. Add the savings to your CPU budget.

Have you bothered to check how much RAM you are using at any given moment?

You can always add some "like to have, but can't afford right now" stuff later--like a PSU replacement--or graphics card--or even more memory.

For now, concentrate on AMD/Intel, board, and drives.

CountMike,
The AMD Ryzen 5 2400G is a dual core with hyperthreading? i3-8100 is a quad core, seemingly and price and performance comparable, or am I reading wrong?