should I upgrade from core i7 920 to skylake

acrobatbat · Oct 26, 2015

I have a core i7 920 2.66ghz , it works but my motherboard doesn't support ahci so my ssd's are nerfed. Is it worth it to upgrade to the new skylark platform.

profoundnoah · Oct 26, 2015

What's sklylark? Just kidding, anyhow, if you're on an i7 920, you may want to go ahead and upgrade as its pretty outdated, and I think its worth the upgrade.

sadams04 · Oct 26, 2015

Your CPU performance is still OK with Sandy Bridge, but the issues are with other components being out-of-date like you are seeing. It is probably time to start planning an upgrade... Guessing you will be happy to get something with a little less heat output as well. The 920 ran pretty hot.

What components do you have that can be re-used? ...or what is your current setup (please be specific)? Have a budget in mind?

dudeman509 · Oct 26, 2015

sadams04 :

That's Nehalem, haha. Sandy Bridge got a pretty significant performance bump in single-core and multithreaded speed - an increase that we haven't seen since. Sandy Bridge chips are still a lot more viable today than 1st-gen Nehalem Core series chips.

acrobatbat · Oct 26, 2015

256gb 850 Evo ssd
2tb 7200rpm hd
8gb ddr3
Amd 7850 graphics card
550w corsair psu
Blu ray drive
Windows 7

Used for gaming, Adobe lightroom

1080p monitor

Plan to reuse hard drives and graphics card(until pascal next year)

Budget for new components 1000

acrobatbat · Oct 26, 2015

Lol @ skylarke, damn spell check

dudeman509 · Oct 26, 2015

What's sklylark?

A terrible Buick product from the 70s-90s

johnnyb105 · Oct 26, 2015

Wait Wait most cars from the 70s held up better then the plastic cars we have today lol .. As to the Op go with a new build use your old drives and your gpu if you like do a I5 OR 7 OR SKYLAKE you be very happy with it.

logainofhades · Oct 26, 2015

I don't care much for Skylake i7, when you can get the 6 core Haswell-E for not much more.

acrobatbat · Oct 26, 2015

logainofhades :

Does 6 core make much sense for my applications. Also , I am likely to keep this pc for at least 6 yrs. So shouldn't I just go with the newer platform?

Bossyfins · Oct 26, 2015

OR, you can do what everyone wants to do. Bby that statement, i just mean me. Since I have no idea if anyone eles likes this idea.

The Xeon X5650. A 6 core 12 tread best, and you can buy em for about 120$ on ebay. IF your motherboard supports it, buy that, OC it, and you basically have new life in your rig.

dudeman509 · Oct 26, 2015

Bossyfins :

Except that newer-gen processors (even AMD) still smash that one in single-threaded performance. Only recently have games been written to take full advantage of 3+ cores.

logainofhades · Oct 26, 2015

acrobatbat :

For adobe maybe. The future is supposed to be multithreaded, so it might be a better idea, given how long you intend to keep it.

Bossyfins · Oct 26, 2015

dudeman509 :

Once you get a decent OC on the 5650, it competes well with 6 core haswell e chips.

sadams04 · Oct 26, 2015

acrobatbat :

Non-overclocking, single GPU setup...

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231 V3 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($242.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H97M PRO4 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($79.89 @ OutletPC)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($72.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 980 4GB STRIX Video Card ($479.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Case: Corsair 300R ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA GS 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($69.99 @ NCIX US)
Optical Drive: LG WH16NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer (Purchased For $0.00)
Total: $1010.84
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-10-26 15:10 EDT-0400

...or sacrifice a bit on the GPU for an overclocking setup that can accept a second GTX 970 in SLI down the road....

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($322.95 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($22.89 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Asus Z97-E ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($89.99 @ NCIX US)
Memory: G.Skill Sniper Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($71.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB SSC ACX 2.0+ Video Card ($315.19 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair 300R ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH16NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer (Purchased For $0.00)
Total: $987.99

In order to get into Skylake or the X99 platform (Haswell-E) you will need to up the budget a bit, or lower the GPU yet again to make up for the cost offset. If you can't up the budget, I personally wouldn't lower the GPU any more than the GTX 970 and would look toward the Z97 build above.

EDIT: Sorry... It took a minute to sink in that you don't need to purchase a GPU at the moment (unless you wanted to).

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($369.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U12S 55.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($64.75 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: ASRock X99 Extreme4 ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($154.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Video Card: MSI Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition 2GB Video Card (Purchased For $0.00)
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 w/Window (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($98.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH16NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer (Purchased For $0.00)
Total: $893.69

...or...

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($369.99 @ B&H)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U12S 55.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($64.75 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Asus Z170-A ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($151.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($89.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For $0.00)
Video Card: MSI Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition 2GB Video Card (Purchased For $0.00)
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 w/Window (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($98.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH16NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer (Purchased For $0.00)
Total: $875.70

acrobatbat · Oct 26, 2015

Thanks for the options. i need to take a look at the i7 58/59 series they look interesting. Not looking at the old xeons i will keep the pc for a while so it needs to be a bit modern

sadams04 · Oct 27, 2015

acrobatbat :

No problem. That Xeon is Haswell Refresh and, at the moment, is your best bang-for-the-buck option if you aren't into overclocking. If you are going to overclock, go with the 5820k, overclock to an easy 4.2 - 4.5GHz and don't look back.

should I upgrade from core i7 920 to skylake

Distinguished

Distinguished

Splendid

Dignified

Distinguished

Distinguished

Dignified

Dignified

Titan

Distinguished

Splendid

Dignified

Titan

Splendid

Splendid

Distinguished

Splendid

Share this page