How much more powerful have PCs gotten in 3 years?

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snapple232

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I built my last desktop almost three years ago (August 2010), and I stopped paying attention to new hardware because I was more than satisfied with its performance.

But I'm curious how much better PCs have gotten since then. My current one is an i7-930, 6GB RAM, and single Radeon 5870. Roughly how much faster, percentage-wise, would a brand new $1500 build be? And are the new Haswell cpus going to be a big upgrade in performance?
 
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ksham

ksham

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Mar 29, 2013
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I don't know an exact scale, but in terms of the GPU itself, you can get about 400-500% in performance with some of the modern cards. Your processor is fine. 6GB RAM is decent though, probably want to go 2x 4GB configuration. If you are planning to upgrade, just upgrade the GPU. And maybe get a SSD if you don't have one.

But speed is all relative. It comes down to what your build is for.
 
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RetiredChief

RetiredChief

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Feb 22, 2007
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^ OP did not Identify MB, he may be using 3 x 2 DDR3 in triple channel mode and if that is the case may not be a good idea going 4 x 2.
On the other hand if his MB uses DDR3 in daul channel mode then YES as daul channel (for a given channel) only works if ram is in pairs.

Totally agree on GPU upgrade, but that could depend on PSU.

CPU processor, maybe a 20% gain, but i7-930 still has good Horsepower - somewhat dependent on apps.
A case could be made that the Upgrade of the MB would be worth it.
.. Native support for Sata III. (SB and up)
.. Native support for USB III. (IB and up)
.. PCI-e Version 3.0 - NOT a biggy today, but who knows may be worth it in the near term.
.. Plus the improved eff of Other MB chipsets.

I alternate between My i5-2500K OCed to 4.2 GHz (HD 7850) and a i5-750 OCed -> 3.2 GHz (just upgraded the GPU to a HD 7770 from a HD5770). Both Have 2 SSDs Plus HDDs. And for much of what I do There is just not a big diff - Games Yes, But for General apps such as Word and Excel, Surfing the Web, Whating a Blu-ray - Just not a big difference. BUT do like the upgrade to native SATA III and USB 3.
 
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jackspeed

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Retired chief is correct that we could use more information. I would wait for the haswell to come out because that way we may see price drops on gpu as the next generation is coming out and then you can look at the performance of the next gen cpus as well. And it still may not be the performance gains you want.

Option 2:
If I were to suggest upgrades It would be the ram replace sticks with 4GB sticks if the mobo/os can support it and the GPU could be upgraded as well if the psu can support it and save the rest of the money.

Option 3: sell the pc on ebay/craigslist and subsidize the new pc.
 
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snapple232

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Exact specs:
CPU: i7-930
Motherboard: Asus Rampage III Gene
Video card: Radeon HD 5870 1GB
Hard drive: 80GB SSD
Memory: 3 x 2GB DDR3 1600 RAM
Power supply: 650W

Thanks guys, I'll keep in mind a video card upgrade. I'm still able to run most games at 60 FPS on high settings on a single 1920x1080 monitor, but with stuff like Crysis 3 and games for next-gen consoles coming out in the near future I'm guessing that won't be the case.

My motherboard supports USB 3.0, although can you explain what the benefits of SATA III are? Also if I do upgrade the GPU, what would you guys recommend? How powerful a card do I need to make it on par with my CPU in terms of not being a bottleneck?
 
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snapple232

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For just a GPU upgrade, maybe $200-300. Would it make more sense to add another Radeon 5870 for a dual configuration (that was my original plan but I never ended up doing it) or replace it with a new card?
 
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RetiredChief

RetiredChief

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1) Checking your MB (hopefully I linked to the correct one):
... It uses a NEC 3rd party USB 3 controller. - Mixed results on performance with high end USB 3 Thumbdrives. Native support from Intel started with 7 Series Intel based MBs. Not an issue unless you are using one of the Higher end USB Thumdrives May have lower performance on USB 3 External HDD - But this is also affected by the encluser Interface.

.. Sata III, You have the Intel® ICH10R controller. You have two sata III ports controlled by older 3rd party Marvell® PCIe 9128 controller - A LOUSY Sata III, OK for SATA III HDDs, but not for SATA III SSDs. Native SATA III (Start with Intel series 6 MBs) is ONLY benefitial if you are using the Newer SATA III SSD. A HDD does NOT saturate a SATA II interface and a SATA III HDD only benefits on sata III is in the "Short" Burst speed and has NO performance gain in sustained throughput.
Sequential reads and writes for a SATA III SSD are capped by a sata II port.
However if I linked your MB correctly you do have 2 sata III ports

650 Watts is good upto a 7850 or 7870, for a comparision in Performance See:
5870 1GB

Qualifier NOT all 650 Wat PSUs are created Equal. PSU should be at least a tier 3 PSU.
Ref: http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/323050.aspx
 
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Someone Somewhere

Someone Somewhere

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Sep 23, 2012
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What? You can run something like a 7970GHz on even a good 550W with no problems! It's the quality that's an issue.

You'll be fine with a SATAIII SSD on a SATAII port - it will cap sequential at ~280MB/s, but won't cause trouble with random IO. It's very difficult to find something to do with all that data anyway.

USB3.0 isn't a major problem - unless the chip at the other end is seriously good and it's a very fast drive, you won't see much of a difference.
 
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ncmike

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A new rig will not be significantly faster at that price point; by the time you buy the case, the MOB, and and the CPU to get equivalency you've burned up a lot of your budget. The biggest advances have been mostly in GPU, disk drives (SSDs/SATA III), USB 3.0, and wireless networking (802.11ac). You can gain parity with near top of the line keeping the old i920/930 and upgrade just the GPU (if you are only a gamer), or also upgrade to SSD and maybe more memory if you use apps that can take advantage of them.

I just built a new super-rig (a 6-core i7 3930 OCed to 4.8GHz) to go side by side with my once-super-rig, an i7-920 OCed to 4.0GHz (which remains in full service) that was already upgraded to SSD, memory etc, and the new rig - even with a 6-core is maybe 25-50% faster on average (which matters a lot for my kind of work), but that overall growth comes from upgrading ALL of the components. I am not a big gamer like it seems most here are, but if I was I'd have also focused more heavily on GPU than anything.

Regards,
Mike

 
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