Help me decide......920 or 860

[ehume]

If you go 860, do consider whether you want the UD3 or the UD3P. The latter has 12-phase VRM and some other stuff.

 

[bob5568]

Well let's see, the Core2 Quad Q6600 released about 3 years ago at $850-ish. Can be had as we speak on the FS/FT forum for under $150.

What procs are about to drop for around a grand that will play nice in a 1366 chipset? Oh right, those shiny new hexes... that I'll be happy to pick up relatively cheap in 2-3 years. Let alone something that launches a year from now and I can pick up used a year or two after that... I think it's a perfectly valid consideration.

I can't help but be amused by the comments present in the new review threads for the hexacore. Not a single x58 owner is excited by the upgrade potential. At least 6 comments from x58 owners state they plan to wait until Sandy Bridge for their next upgrade (as I plan to do). This idea that people should consider buying x58 to avoid a mobo purchase in their next upgrade has always been 90% marketing, 10% technical logic. Today's article on overclocking even prompted one poster to point out the foolishness for anyone who would buy such a processor to use an "old" motherboard, just because they could.

 

[RaistlinZ]

sure, I wish you luck. My sense of this is folks always overvalue future upgrade concepts. Imagine that I save money on an 1156 mobo/cpu now. I won't state a value, cuz it always makes folks defensive. But we both know there is some savings. You chose to buy x58 and not save whatever that amount was and you did that so you could have cheaper upgrades in the future.

Ok...now its 3 years later. We both plan to install a hexcore.

You smile as you are able to avoid the cost of a motherboard, I must buy an x58 motherboard. You are counting on price reductions on the CPU....doncha think the same notion applies to the mobo? So my purchase of the x58 motherboard will be made at a price lower than you bought and I'll be spending money three years after you, so I'll have had the use of that money in the interem.

Wouldn't it be a reasonable approximation that the money I save now, which gained 3-8% per year over three years would be about what I need to buy the 3 year old x58 board?

Its got to be so close as to render moot any decisions based on upgrade path.

I agree with bob. If you're not going to upgrade again for 3+ years it's really not that big an issue which platform you go with. 3 years from now you'll likely want to upgrade to a new chipset anyway.

If you were looking to keep this setup for only a year or so, then yeah, I'd say go with the 920 since you won't have to buy a new motherboard. But 3+ years usually calls for a complete system overhaul.

 

[bob5568]

I agree with bob. If you're not going to upgrade again for 3+ years it's really not that big an issue which platform you go with. 3 years from now you'll likely want to upgrade to a new chipset anyway.

If you were looking to keep this setup for only a year or so, then yeah, I'd say go with the 920 since you won't have to buy a new motherboard. But 3+ years usually calls for a complete system overhaul.

But....now look more critically at your "short term" logic, comparing the cost vs benefit of gulftown between now and 1 year from now. For the modest gains in most areas, would anyone spend 1K for a processor upgrade?

 

[Markfw]

But....now look more critically at your "short term" logic, comparing the cost vs benefit of gulftown between now and 1 year from now. For the modest gains in most areas, would anyone spend 1K for a processor upgrade?

I might. But I can also use all 6 of those cores, all the time with my folding, and at the same watt usage as a quad.

 

[bob5568]

Roger that, Mark. I was thinking of the folks that viewed a p55 board and an x58 board as a wash and were looking for the one consideration that would help them decide. For those folks, I'll bet the chance to spend an additional 1K is not a motivator.

 

[darckhart]

go with 920. it's cheap at MC. 200x19 for no brainer oc on (relatively) cheap mobo with minor bump in volts. go dual channel ram nice and cheap. when you get an itch in a few years, drop in 6? 8? core and done. maybe add more ram if you feel like you need it, will also be cheap.