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upgrading soon and been out of the loop

S

Sniper82

Lifer
Been a couple years and its that time again. I been out of the loop for a while and am looking to upgrade for another 2-3 years. Gaming is my main thing but thats about it other than web,email,music,ect. Might do some video editing here and there.

Have a:
Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-UD4H
x3 720BE 4th core unlocked at 3.4Ghz
4gb DDR2
XFX 5770 1gb.

Looking to stay in the $400 range give or take. I thought about a Phenom II x6 and a 6850. Or would going with something on the intel side be worth going over $400? Haven't had a intel since the E6300 dual core first came out.
 
mnewsham said:
If the OP doesnt want to do a full re-do the i suggest the following,
Click to expand...

Don't know how your recommendation is any less of a "full redo" than what Anomaly suggested...

I would agree with Anomaly and expand by saying go with the i5-2500k. Ridiculous overclocking ability. Pick up any motherboard with the P-series northbridge and your choice of accompaniments. Your choice of some quality DDR3 memory. You really can't go wrong with this setup. Awesome bang for the buck.... and an awful lot of bang at that. 🙂
 
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Just saw your budget. With only $400 give or take, you pretty much know what your options are. Keeping the mobo you have now and just swapping out the processor and video card.

....but you already knew that...
 
well if the performance is worth it compared to the PII x6(I can see a big difference) I don't mind spending 2-3 hundred more. More so if the i5 can hold me over for longer than 2-3 years thats even better.

mnewsham wouldn't that setup be a waste? I hardly think there would be that much difference in that combo and the one I have.
 
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Sniper82 said:
well if the performance is worth it compared to the x6(I can see a big difference) I don't mind spending 2-3 hundred more. More so if the i5 can hold me over for longer than 2-3 years thats even better.

mnewsham wouldn't that setup be a waste? I hardly think there would be that much difference in that combo and the one I have.
Click to expand...

well knowing you would spend an extra 300 would have been good info in the op 🙄
 
Sniper82 said:
well if the performance is worth it compared to the PII x6(I can see a big difference) I don't mind spending 2-3 hundred more. More so if the i5 can hold me over for longer than 2-3 years thats even better.
Click to expand...

I would say so. Read up on the 2500k specifically. There's tons of info on it out there.
Check out this note from Tomshardware:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-core-i5-2500k-amd-e350,2843-5.html

"Even at stock clocks, it meets or beats the $1000 Core i7-980X Extreme Edition when it comes to gaming."

and

To summarize, while we recommend against purchasing any gaming CPU that retails for more than $225 from a value point of view (sink that money into graphics and the motherboard instead)

And here's the post from right here at Anandtech:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/...-core-i7-2600k-i5-2500k-core-i3-2100-tested/3
Claims over 4.5GHz ON AIR COOLING.

So:
$300 This CPU/RAM combo deal
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboD...t=Combo.591612
$150 decent mobo
$250 Radeon HD 6950 or 5870 (or something similar)

That will smoke a lot of rigs out there for a $700 upgrade. Provided your power supply etc hold up.... you'll be good for years. While swapping out to a different CPU and video card will obviously give you a bump in performance, you'll be kicking yourself when you wish you'd have spent the extra $200.
 
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You effectively have a Phenom II X4 965 with your unlock and overclock, so I would not recommend upgrading to an X6. For a $400 gaming upgrade, your best bang for buck is going to be to get a GTX 570/6970 (and PSU if necessary). If you're willing to drop another $400, then go for the 2500K/mobo/RAM.
 
mfenn said:
You effectively have a Phenom II X4 965 with your unlock and overclock, so I would not recommend upgrading to an X6. For a $400 gaming upgrade, your best bang for buck is going to be to get a GTX 570/6970 (and PSU if necessary). If you're willing to drop another $400, then go for the 2500K/mobo/RAM.
Click to expand...
Thumbs up
 
vx550 should be plenty. Not the best in the Corsair line-up, but still better than many on the market today.
 
With you system I would strongly consider just upgrading the graphics card for now and save the rest to accelerate the core upgrade when you can comfortably afford it. Off course if that really is now go for it. Although if you expect the new system to last for three or four years, I would consider waiting another six months for PCIe 3.0 to arrive. I think that will speed up a lot more than just increasing the graphics bandwidth.

And for graphics cards, I favor nVidia now because of CUDA which I think will become more prevalent in future gaming software give nVidia cards a real advantage, unless you expect to use 3 monitors.
 
Cody1174 said:
i5 2500k will do 5ghz on air with the right case and cooler.
Click to expand...

Over volting to hell and running the risk of burning out your chip in 18 months :awe:

I figure if the chip can get 4.0 ghz on air (4.4 is easy enough) with reasonable voltage (below 1.35v) then i see no need to push it further.
 
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