What's the slowest CPU I can get without bottle-necking my GPU?

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feriner

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I'm going for a bare bones but powerful rig here. I'm planning on getting a GTX 970 for my mini-ITX board, and was wondering how little can I spend on a CPU without limiting the potential of my shiny new graphics card. I'm partial to getting i5's for gaming (I'm an Intel fan) but if anyone else has more wisdom on this topic please fill me in! Thanks!
 
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clutchc


Then any i5 from the Sandy Bridge era forward will do the job. I don't know what socket you have now, but if it is an 1155... A relative of...
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Forever Oleg

Forever Oleg

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i5-4460, i5-4590, i5-4690 for LGA1150.

i5-6400, i5-6500, i5-6600 for LGA1151.

i5-3570 for $125 on eBay for LGA1155.

Discover and choose according to your socket. If you have a Z-board, you might want to look at the K-series i5's if you want to overclock.
 
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The BEST way to (re) look at your situation is:

1: What is my budget for a CPU; very important
2: What motherboard/chipset am I going to put that CPU into; do you already have one on hand, if not another budget consideration
3: Am I going to OC that CPU or not; if not and going Intel, can save you $
4: What other tasks besides gaming will I be doing besides gaming that will be CPU reliant/dependent

 
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feriner

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I'm just trying to save money on this build since I'll only be using it for about a year. My only intent for this build is to run some silky high settings, and from my knowledge a crazy CPU won't improve that much. I assume you know more about this than I, of course. If you have any more advice, I;d love to have it. Thanks!
 
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clutchc

clutchc

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Then any i5 from the Sandy Bridge era forward will do the job. I don't know what socket you have now, but if it is an 1155... A relative of mine is running my previous GTX 970 FTW+ with his i5-2310 and playing at max/near max settings @ 1080p.
Maybe let us know what board this will be going into.
 
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Forever Oleg

Forever Oleg

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You can get an i5-2500 off of eBay for $80-85 and buy a new motherboard for LGA1155 socket for about $50-60.
 
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feriner

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Thanks for the tip. It's a new build from scratch, so it can be any ITX board; I don't really plan on adding expansion cards either. I'm also not going for longevity so any socket will work as well lol

 
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feriner

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I plan on playing games like The Division, which from my knowledge is quite a beastly game, and some less intensive stuff like the new Mirror's Edge and (to a MUCH less intensive degree) CS:GO.
 
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