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Is it worth going from an i7 970 to 4930K

K

Kippa

Senior member
I know there are benchmarks, I just want you qualitative feedback and want to know is it worth upgrading from an i7 970 six core to a 4930K six core? Or would I really be better waiting another year for an 8 core haswell?
 
sniffin said:
What makes you think there will be 8 core Haswells? Seems unlikely anything like that will happen on 22nm
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Hmm? Haswell-E will be 8 core as a baseline, unlike prior E CPUs which were hexa core as a baseline.

Additionally, the X99 platform for Haswell-E will support DDR-4 and SATA express.

Anyway to answer the OP, the 4930k will definitely be a big jump for you. I say go for it.
 
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Go get the 4930K,I was in the same situation as you as I was running a 6 core 12 thread L5639 overclocked to 3.6Ghz and the 4930K is going to be at least 40% faster at stock then your 970 due to the higher ipc.
Plus there is going to be a huge overclock head room which will widen then gap even farther along making it closer to 50% faster if not more.
 
What do you do with your PC? Is there something that you would like faster than your 970 is doing? Is it something better suited by disk, memory, or GPU upgrades?
 
Kippa said:
I know there are benchmarks, I just want you qualitative feedback and want to know is it worth upgrading from an i7 970 six core to a 4930K six core? Or would I really be better waiting another year for an 8 core haswell?
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i'm on a 970 and on the fence about it.

I think you are still better off waiting for Haswell E.

And for the poster above there isn't a 40% gap in IPC from gulftown to IVY-E.

And the gap in overclocking also isn't has high as you think.

Most Westmere cpus top out around 4.2-4.4

And from what i've seen Ivy-E is doing 4.6-4.8

I also think the new chipset will be worth the wait.
 
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I'm anxious to see how Haswell-E will do. At work we are currently on a contract bringing in big money so maybe by the end of the year I could drop the money on the top line monster and not blink an eye over it.. waiting to see
 
My old rig was dying. Got BSOD and it is generally unstable. I have had a good 4+ years out of it. I have decided to get an Ivy E rig with the option to upgrade to an Ivy xeon in a few years time on the same mobo (possible 10 or 12 core). So much for waiting for Haswell E.
 
blackened23 said:
Hmm? Haswell-E will be 8 core as a baseline, unlike prior E CPUs which were hexa core as a baseline.

Additionally, the X99 platform for Haswell-E will support DDR-4 and SATA express.

Anyway to answer the OP, the 4930k will definitely be a big jump for you. I say go for it.
Click to expand...

Off by 2 cores there, it's going to be 6 as a baseline, unlike 4 as a baseline for sandy/ivy E. But yeah I have a 980X and I'm tempted by Haswell E, though regular Z87 or Z97 would probably be enough for me, and would let me go ITX...
 
Haswell-E will be 2 8 core models and 1 6 core model.

Haswell-E-platform.jpg


With FIVR as well if anyone should be in doubt.
 
I would say wait for Haswell-E, as it's going to be a complete beast. Just be aware it is about 9-10 months away if you do want to wait. Otherwise get a 4930K, it will be a massive upgrade.
 
I would seriously wait. Those Core i7 970 6-core CPUs are still no joke in terms of performance by today's standards. Clock for clock, Sandy Bridge is only about 10% faster than Nehalem (err, Westmere) anyways, and Ivy is only another 5% on top of that. If you're going to spend that kind of money for an enthusiast setup, I would wait for Haswell.

Seriously, wait until Haswell. I know you're probably itching to upgrade just for the fun of it, but you'll thank me in the long run.
 
Nehalem / Westmere is hard to get rid off. I cheated when upgrading to Haswell - "retired" ye olde i7 920 to the folks' 🙂
 
wasabiman123 said:
Off by 2 cores there, it's going to be 6 as a baseline, unlike 4 as a baseline for sandy/ivy E. But yeah I have a 980X and I'm tempted by Haswell E, though regular Z87 or Z97 would probably be enough for me, and would let me go ITX...
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I'm pretty sure that there are mITX enthusiast boards. no reason to believe that Haswell-E won't have some too.
 
Has well E looks cool, will probably be my next platform upgrade.
 
If I had had a 6 core 970 I don't think I would have made the jump to the 3930k. I figured I would get a 2x speed up for software that used the 2 extra cores and the IPC advantage combined with the better overclocking. In reality my overclock fell short (just 4.3Ghz stable) and those 2 extra cores don't get used very often at all. It has been worth having the extra IPC for certain things (Arma 3) but it wasn't a big jump, and that was 2 years ago.

Eventually those IPC improvements add up to something tangible and worthwhile but it sure takes a long time. Cores is where its at and the current crop of games seem to be using the cores much better, and software is slowly working its way into being more parallel.
 
Techhog said:
I'm pretty sure that there are mITX enthusiast boards. no reason to believe that Haswell-E won't have some too.
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There are no X79 mITX boards, and I would be happily surprised if there were mITX X99 boards for Haswell E, but I have a feeling that it wouldn't be practical.
 
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