OG i7 still relevant...and used?

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WhoBeDaPlaya

Diamond Member
Sep 15, 2000
7,415
404
126
Heck yes!

I have two ThinkStation D20s with 2x X5675s + 24GB that serve as my main encoding rigs.
My OC'ed 4790K is a snoozefest compared to those boxen for non-gaming purposes.
 

ibex333

Diamond Member
Mar 26, 2005
4,094
123
106
Don't know about AAA games, but my OG i5 is handling Diablo III just fine.... Starcraft II just fine... Probably 90% other games there.

The only games it wont handle is something like Company of Heroes 2(questionable, might still run fine), Fallout 4(For sure wont run well) Latest Civilization game, and latest Anno is a big question too.

I don't discount older CPUs the same way many people do. They may be not as efficient, but even a Pentium 4 will run a good 50-60% of games available out there.
 

superstition

Platinum Member
Feb 2, 2008
2,219
221
101
If anyone has a system this old I suggest waiting until Kaby Lake and Zen are competing with each other. That is when upgrading should be the most fun.

(The exception is if you can put in one of those cheap Xeons.)
 

cbrsurfr

Golden Member
Jul 15, 2000
1,686
1
81
I too was concerned about power consumption on my i7 920. I upgraded to a newer Xeon at the same clock speed but used half the power. I had trouble with it though as it would only use 8GB out of the 24GB I had installed. Finally got my hands on an X5650 which gave me a performance boost and still uses less power than the 920 and fixed the ram issue. I did have to replace my board in 2012. This is the most use I've ever gotten out of a single socket.

I would like to upgrade my cooler. I have the original which had some janky retention system. I ended up using 4 mainboard standoffs that I ground the male side off of to hold it down. I think I had to do that when I swapped the board and case in 2012, so it has held up at least. lol
 

jimbob200521

Diamond Member
Apr 15, 2005
4,108
29
91
I too was concerned about power consumption on my i7 920. I upgraded to a newer Xeon at the same clock speed but used half the power. I had trouble with it though as it would only use 8GB out of the 24GB I had installed. Finally got my hands on an X5650 which gave me a performance boost and still uses less power than the 920 and fixed the ram issue. I did have to replace my board in 2012. This is the most use I've ever gotten out of a single socket.

I would like to upgrade my cooler. I have the original which had some janky retention system. I ended up using 4 mainboard standoffs that I ground the male side off of to hold it down. I think I had to do that when I swapped the board and case in 2012, so it has held up at least. lol

Out of curiosity, what board did you have and what board did you swap to to use with the X5650?
 

Mercennarius

Senior member
Oct 28, 2015
466
84
91
Yes indeed! Especially since I scored them cheap on CL (albeit equipped with crappy E5620s or some such and only 12GB).

Nice :).

I scored my dual X5690 D20 on eBay for $800. Added an additional 24GB of 10600R ECC RAM for $50 for a total of 48GB of RAM. Then threw in a R9 390X I got off NewEgg. For less than $1,300 total I got a pretty good work horse if I must say so my self :). Max's out all the games I play at 4K and has more than enough processing power to do anything I throw at it.

My Beast(not the cleanest wiring I know):
eazKGol.jpgp

x8f373f.png
 
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moonbogg

Lifer
Jan 8, 2011
10,731
3,440
136
Nice :).

I scored my dual X5690 D20 on eBay for $800. Added an additional 24GB of 10600R ECC RAM for $50 for a total of 48GB of RAM. Then threw in a R9 390X I got off NewEgg. For less than $1,300 total I got a pretty good work horse if I must say so my self :). Max's out all the games I play at 4K and has more than enough processing power to do anything I throw at it.

My Beast(not the cleanest wiring I know):
eazKGol.jpgp

x8f373f.png

That's pretty cool right there. Beasty 12 core monster rig based on OG i7 tech and still kicking everything's ass. Nice.