Upgrade to 4690k?

[Eric1987]

Any difference I'll see at 4k resolutions from my 2500k? I can upgrade for 100$.

 

[frozentundra123456]

What is your gpu confuguration, and I assume the 2500K is overclocked to ????.

If you have a good overckock on the 2500K, 4690k would be a minimal upgrade. You might think about 4790k for the the hyperthreading, some games are starting to show some benefit, but nobody knows how much future games will use it. At 4k you will probably be gpu limited anyway though.

 

[mistersprinkles]

Z97 would get you more SATA 3 ports, PCIE 3.0, and that's about it. If you have a high OC on your 2500K then a 4690K is a minimal upgrade. More a platform upgrade than a CPU upgrade. 4790K or 5820K would be a real upgrade.

If you are using the CPU's iGPU then yes, the better iGPU on the 4690K would be better for 4K (if it even supports it?). If using a discrete GPU, either CPU would be just as good.

 

[Dave3000]

If you are only going to spend $100 on an CPU upgrade and your already have a 2500k then I don't think it's worth upgrading.

 

[Denithor]

I would make it $200 and upgrade to i7-4790K.

 

[monkeydelmagico]

Any difference I'll see at 4k resolutions from my 2500k? I can upgrade for 100$.

iGPU yep. dGPU nope.

$100.- is fairly cheap to upgrade though.

 

[RussianSensation]

Any difference I'll see at 4k resolutions from my 2500k? I can upgrade for 100$.

1. Buy a $40 cooler like Thermalright TrueSpirit 140 and overclock 2500K to 4.5Ghz+. Now you are 99% GPU limited at 4K. Problem solved.

2. Upgrading from a stock 2500K to 4790K only gets one 6% improvement in games on average from BFG's testing with a Titan. At 4K, that's more like 1-3%. Don't bother wasting $ on another i5, instead buy a faster GPU.

 

[Eric1987]

1. Buy a $40 cooler like Thermalright TrueSpirit 140 and overclock 2500K to 4.5Ghz+. Now you are 99% GPU limited at 4K. Problem solved.

2. Upgrading from a stock 2500K to 4790K only gets one 6% improvement in games on average from BFG's testing with a Titan. At 4K, that's more like 1-3%. Don't bother wasting $ on another i5, instead buy a faster GPU.

I have a 290x and my 2500k at 4.3GHz is on an H60.

 

[mistersprinkles]

I have a 290x and my 2500k at 4.3GHz is on an H60.

2500K's run fast and cool. Aim for 4.8Ghz. Get a big boy cooler to help you out. What motherboard are you on? What's your case cooling like?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

2500K's run fast and cool. Aim for 4.8Ghz. Get a big boy cooler to help you out. What motherboard are you on? What's your case cooling like?

I agree with all of this. Folks urged me to upgrade my gfx card early this year. I might have waited, but it was worth it. Consider also -- unless you simply sell a complete rig outright -- you can harvest parts from it to use in the next one.

I haven't finished exploring the performance options of my Sandy Bridge yet. I still want to try "per-core" overclocking.

And frankly? I don't think a switchover to Haswell Refresh buys you a helluva lot that you don't already have with the 2500K. The only reason such a perspective might change: you have some flaw or damage to critical components -- like motherboard or processor -- and you can't easily replace the component in question.