$500 'sandy bridge' upgrade possible?

[IeraseU]

Is a 'sandy bridge' upgrade possible for about $500? By upgrade I mean motherboard, CPU, and RAM. Everything else I can recycle from my current build.

The machine would be used for photo and video editing. I gave up gaming on PCs when I crossed over into the dark side of 30 (although I still game on videogame consoles).


For that price, would I be better off going with an AMD build?

 

[stahlhart]

How much RAM are you planning to install?

 

[IeraseU]

How much RAM are you planning to install?

You tell me. The camera I use is a Nikon D7000.

All I care about is being able to work on the RAW files and video without too much trouble. Can I get by with 4GB, or do I need to go to 8GB? Operating system will be Windows 7.

 

[LuluTheMonk]

2500k: $220
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...5072&Tpk=2500k

MSI P67: $180 (sold out)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130574

8 GB Ram: $80
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231422

$480

The motherboard I am waiting for is the ASRock P67 Extreme4 which will hopefully be about $150, so that would save you $30. FWIW, the rig I am upgrading is also going to be 95% photo editing with LR3 and will be using similar components.

 

[IeraseU]

^^^

The link to that motherboard is not working for me, but is this the same one?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130571

I see it's a socket 1155 and it's $125.

 

[LuluTheMonk]

That is not the same one, I tried linking to:
MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) LGA 1155

Other options:
ASUS PAP67 Pro or Normal which will be less than $200

 

[IeraseU]

That is not the same one, I tried linking to:
MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) LGA 1155

Other options:
ASUS PAP67 Pro or Normal which will be less than $200

Are there any advantages to those MBs besides being Crossfire and SLI ready? I'm not going to use more then one video card.

 

[LuluTheMonk]

Somebody else should probably chime in here, but it really just comes down to whatever features you want, performance/max oc, ease of oc, RAID, # of ports, etc.

 

[IeraseU]

Ok, I went to the motherboard forum and it seems that these socket 1155 boards are just barely starting to trickle out, which explains the limited selection.

 

[mfenn]

Is a 'sandy bridge' upgrade possible for about $500? By upgrade I mean motherboard, CPU, and RAM. Everything else I can recycle from my current build.

Easily. Since you don't game, you can use an H67 board and the IGP as well.

i5 2500 $210
MSI H67MA-E35 $100
8GB DDR3 1333 $80
Total: $390

 

[mnewsham]

Easily. Since you don't game, you can use an H67 board and the IGP as well.

i5 2500 $210
MSI H67MA-E35 $100
8GB DDR3 1333 $80
Total: $390

I agree an H67 Motherboard and 8GB of RAM with the i5-2500 is a good upgrade and fairly cheap. If you want to overclock then you should get the P67 motherboard but if you arent overclocking H67 works just as well (and it's cheaper) You might even be able to only use the intel IGP (as it is quite powerful for an IGP) and not bother with a GPU as that will use more power.

 

[IeraseU]

I think I'll go with a P67 chipset because if overcloaking is so simple on the i5 2500k, then why not? I looked at some power supply calculators and it seems I should be fine with my 'old' 480watt PS.

 

[mnewsham]

I think I'll go with a P67 chipset because if overcloaking is so simple on the i5 2500k, then why not? I looked at some power supply calculators and it seems I should be fine with my 'old' 480watt PS.

Do you have a dedicated GPU? If not you will need one if you are going with P67 as P67 requires it.

 

[IeraseU]

Do you have a dedicated GPU? If not you will need one if you are going with P67 as P67 requires it.

Yes, I have one from my current build. It's nothing state of the art, but since all I'm looking for is 2D performance, I think it will do.

 

[mfenn]

Yes, I have one from my current build. It's nothing state of the art, but since all I'm looking for is 2D performance, I think it will do.

In that case a reasonable choice would be the GA-P67A-UD3 for $135.