Planning building a new rig - wait for new tech or pick up old for cheap(er)?

[joe360]

I'm sure we'll all face a similar dilemma, should I "wait" for the latest tech or should I get the discounted old products when the new ones are released. My ol'reliable core2duo is going in for retirement in the coming months. I haven't been too up on this stuff as I'm normally but im wondering if:

1) it's worth waiting for Skylake?
2) it's worth getting a PCI-e SSD?

I'm looking to building sometime late the summer, but it's honestly flexible at this point. I guess I'm wondering if the performance gains would be significant? I mostly use simple produtivity apps, light gaming ...but I have terrible patience for slow bootup, and slow application launching and slow performance when lots of applications are running simulanteously. I'm not sure I these upgrades would actually help these problems so I'm open to hearing people's thoughts.

Thanks!

 

[joe360]

Oh and I'm not sure if this makes a huge difference or not but I'm planning on building smaller board than ATX...not sure which yet

 

[rchunter]

Rumors are that skylake will be out in August. I'd wait.

 

[Ken g6]

I have terrible patience for slow bootup, and slow application launching and slow performance when lots of applications are running simulanteously. I'm not sure I these upgrades would actually help these problems so I'm open to hearing people's thoughts.

Do you have a (non-PCI-e) SSD now? Also realize that you probably don't have SATA3 with a Core2, and your throughput will nearly double with that.

How much RAM do you currently have? (I.e. are you swapping to disk a lot?)

What's your budget?

 

[mfenn]

I'm sure we'll all face a similar dilemma, should I "wait" for the latest tech or should I get the discounted old products when the new ones are released. My ol'reliable core2duo is going in for retirement in the coming months. I haven't been too up on this stuff as I'm normally but im wondering if:

1) it's worth waiting for Skylake?
2) it's worth getting a PCI-e SSD?

I'm looking to building sometime late the summer, but it's honestly flexible at this point. I guess I'm wondering if the performance gains would be significant? I mostly use simple produtivity apps, light gaming ...but I have terrible patience for slow bootup, and slow application launching and slow performance when lots of applications are running simulanteously. I'm not sure I these upgrades would actually help these problems so I'm open to hearing people's thoughts.

Thanks!

The difference between Hasewell and Skylake for light usage is going to be barely noticeable. Add to that the fact that both are a huge leap forward from Core 2, and you can't go wrong with either.

PCIe SSDs are a similar situation. If you don't have any SSD at all at this point, then a SATA SSD will be a huge leap forward. Also, PCIe SSDs are more about (a) reducing component count on small form factor systems and (b) providing extremely high bandwidth and low latency for intensive enterprise and scientific workloads. A typical desktop use case won't notice a difference in latency or bandwidth between SATA and PCIe. And of course, PCIe SSDs don't come cheap.

So overall, I would say that neither technology will make a fundamental difference in your use case. Skylate will come in at around the same price as Haswell, so if it happens to be out when you're ready to buy, then of course go with that. PCIe SSDs are a different story because the run roughly twice as much as SATA SSDs in terms of cost per gigabyte, so they wont' be worthwhile in a typical desktop system with a finite budget for a while.

 

[joe360]

Do you have a (non-PCI-e) SSD now? Also realize that you probably don't have SATA3 with a Core2, and your throughput will nearly double with that.

How much RAM do you currently have? (I.e. are you swapping to disk a lot?)

What's your budget?

Oh I'm still running a stone-age HDD; currently have 2Gb of RAM..I think I build this computer in 2007...

 

[joe360]

The difference between Hasewell and Skylake for light usage is going to be barely noticeable. Add to that the fact that both are a huge leap forward from Core 2, and you can't go wrong with either.

PCIe SSDs are a similar situation. If you don't have any SSD at all at this point, then a SATA SSD will be a huge leap forward. Also, PCIe SSDs are more about (a) reducing component count on small form factor systems and (b) providing extremely high bandwidth and low latency for intensive enterprise and scientific workloads. A typical desktop use case won't notice a difference in latency or bandwidth between SATA and PCIe. And of course, PCIe SSDs don't come cheap.

So overall, I would say that neither technology will make a fundamental difference in your use case. Skylate will come in at around the same price as Haswell, so if it happens to be out when you're ready to buy, then of course go with that. PCIe SSDs are a different story because the run roughly twice as much as SATA SSDs in terms of cost per gigabyte, so they wont' be worthwhile in a typical desktop system with a finite budget for a while.

Yeah good point that anything I get now is going to be leaps and bounds better than what I have now. I guess what I'm trying to avoid is settling for a Haswell or SATA SSD then regret it a couple months later if I can see an appreciable difference with Skylake and PCIe. Although I can appreciate the double cost per GB of the PCIe, if it's double the performance, I may be more inclined as I have a NAS for my storage needs anyway.

Oh and budget wise is probably sub-$1000 ...although I hope I am not being naive with that figure..I really haven't shopped for this stuff since '07

 

[dbcooper1]

For general use, upgrading to an e8400, almost any SSD, and 4-8GB RAM will get you much of the perceived performance you're looking for, for surprisingly little depending on if you buy new or used. Gaming of course is a different matter.

 

[mfenn]

I guess what I'm trying to avoid is settling for a Haswell or SATA SSD then regret it a couple months later if I can see an appreciable difference with Skylake and PCIe.

The thing I should reiterate is that for your use case, you will not be able to see an appreciable difference with Skylake over Haswell or a PCIe SSD over a SATA SSD. So, no I would not consider either of the currently-available options to be "settling".

Although I can appreciate the double cost per GB of the PCIe, if it's double the performance, I may be more inclined as I have a NAS for my storage needs anyway.

Again, a PCIe SSD performs noticeably better in a few limited use cases that don't apply to you. What you will notice however, is running out of storage space on a smaller PCIe SSD, especially considering your budget is <$1000.