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E8400 to i7 920 - is now the time to upgrade?

K

KutterMax

Member
I currently have a system with:

E8400 at about 3.2 GHz
EVGA 280GTX
EVGA 680i motherboard (not compatible with quad-core Wolfdale)
4GB OCZ Gold RAM
Windows Ultimate 32bit OEM


I'm thinking of upgrading to:


Core i7 920
Asus P6T Deluxe X58
Patriot Viper 6GB-12800 DDR3
Windows Ultimate 64bit


My other components would remain the same (X-fi soundcard, bunch of hard drives, dual 24inch monitors, etc.)


I use my system for gaming (1900x1200), video editing (light duty but now doing H.264 encoding for Bluray), photo edit, web/general duty, watching Slingbox, etc.

I also have an older second system that I use to access work remotely and is set up as a VPN. I would put by old processor and motherboard into that machine to upgrade it.


For the most part, I'm still very happy with my current system. I did bring it down to its knees last weekend though when I encoded a 60 minute video I recorded on my Canon HD camcorder and made a Bluray disk. It basically had to run 8 hours to finish this. Now, this is not something I do that often, but it's the first time I really saw my machine struggle badly.

Reading the Nvidia was optimizing their drivers for Quad-core has sparked my interest in upgrading as well.


The questions I have - is now a good time to upgrade or is it best to wait a few more months. The i7 920 is available locally for $229.00, but will it be a worthy upgrade to my slightly overclocked E8400? Should I really be thinking of a faster i7? The entire upgrade would be about $1000. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 
It will be a pricey upgrade. Going from 3.6 to 4.050Ghz on my 8400 in gaming was like night and day. Fortunate for me, I already have 2x2Gb DDR3 1600 modules so the i7 920 I bought for 229$ this morning at 10:04 am won't be as painful on the pocket ... I'd try to overclock it a little higher and see what you think. 444 or 450 is about where you want to shoot for.

Good Luck!
 
I wouldn't upgrade just yet, an i7 system will be pretty fast at then encoding you're talking about, but I'd suggest waiting a few more months before you upgrade. Your system isn't weak by any means, and you said yourself that you don't do the encoding too often, which is the only real benefit you'd see from going to an i7 system.
 
spend $1,000 + a few hours of work to build and to reinstall everything.
- or -
need a couple of extra hours to encode each video.

I'd keep the $1,000 for now and by Summer you'll either spend only $600 or you'll get a better, faster upgrade.
 
Buy a quad. That should help with the encoding times. It can tide you over for a while until i7 components get cheaper. If the rumors are true, Intel is ganna drop prices on it's Core2 line-up at the end of this month. The Q9550 is supposed to drop to $270
Q9550 $320
 
Originally posted by: zerocool84
Buy a quad. That should help with the encoding times. It can tide you over for a while until i7 components get cheaper. If the rumors are true, Intel is ganna drop prices on it's Core2 line-up at the end of this month. The Q9550 is supposed to drop to $270
Q9550 $320
Click to expand...

Unfortunately my EVGA 680i MB doesn't work with the quad core 45nm processors, only the dual cores, which limits upgrade options.

Based on the comments, I'm definitely going to hold off on the upgrade for now. I'm going to play around a little pushing the overclock on my Zalman aircooled E8400 and see if I can squeeze a little more speed out of it.

Also, reading the early feedback on Windows 7, it seems it may be worth waiting for the release of the new OS before the next major upgrade.
 
I would say hold on to what you have now. The price to performance improvement isn't there yet. After 6 months I would look again. Since the i7 requires a new MB and RAM, it's probably better just to get a new machine when you pull the trigger than to upgrade the current one.
 
Unless you've got money to burn, I'd hold off as well. Thats really more of a side grade than an upgrade.

In AT's review of the Phenom II, they stated that Intel may slash some prices in the next month or so, which might make the i7 more attractive.
 
Personally I'm holding on to my e8400 until this fall/winter when Westmere launches (32nm i7 refresh). By that time many more motherboards will be available, at lower cost, and DDR3 should have fallen significantly also. And the Westmere chips will run cooler/faster (much like 45nm Penryn versus earlier 65nm Conroe processors) with lower power consumption and probably 5% or so faster clock-for-clock.

One thing to consider if you find yourself hamstrung by the e8400: q6600 + good cooler. OC to 3.0-3.6GHz and your video work will go much faster.
 
Hey Kuttermax I was in the same position as you with Evga 680i - E3110(Xeon E8400 Equivalent) - Evga 8800gts 512MB - 4GB (2x2GB) OCZ Reaper 1066 - 32bit Vista +++ I took the plunge with Evga X58 6gb - 3x2gb OCZ gold 1600mhz ddr3 - 64 bit vista- 300gb raptor - i7 920 (oc' 3.6ghz) easily on stock air, sdtill have more headroom. I respect what they say about the cost but I was having constant problems with my E3110 and my 680i even with the new bios patch, the way I looked at it I did not want to spend any more money on old tech if you buy a quad or e8400 thats buying old tech and you still have ddr2 ram. Even if you go out and buy a ddr3 compatible motherboard for that E8400 which i though about doing it still buying old tech. I couldn't justify buying a new mother board and other things to support old tech. I sold my Xeon E3110 for 100 and didn't but another new motherboard for it which would have been 230 for a 780i or more for the 790i, add what i didnt spend on new motherboard and sold old chip for it negates my justification worry easy. Once I recieved all of my new parts and put system together with old video card and old hard drives x-fi gamer sound card the x58 i7 920 system is rock solid cool and fast in everything not just video coding. I can now justify the system paying a little more to upgrade to new tech just based on the raw horse power. I'm just waiting for GTX 285 now and I will be having a ball.
READ these articles: http://www.guru3d.com/article/...i7-920-and-965-review/ http://www.guru3d.com/article/evga-x58-sli-review/

Thanks and if you have any question about old setup and new let me know soon as i get the rest of software installed ill put up some benches of old system vs the new motherboard and new processor upgrade with 64 bit vista.

Thanks, Oldsoul
 
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