New parts this summer?

[fultonloyn]

Right now I run my 920 at 4.01ghz. Another option could be to drop some big money on a high end card then piece my new parts together over summer. I mainly want to upgrade to ivy bridge for a few reasons: 1. Obviously higher proccesing and OC capability. 2. SATA III support. I'm currently running II on my x58 chipset. 3. USB 3.0 and thunderbolt. 4. Lastly, my fiancé needs a good setup and what I have now would be more than alright.

Either the z68 or z77 chipset for me. Oh! And my h100 is silent as a mouse now!

Should I go ivy bridge with the z77? Or save some dough with the z68 and like an i5 2500k. System is mainly for gaming and small video rendering.

So: drop money at the beginning on a sweet vid card? ( 7970?$ and piece together a new build.

Or build the other parts then get video card..hmm.

 

[Onus]

You have a competent system. If you weren't planning to pass it to your fiance' you probably wouldn't need to upgrade it; you'd need to tell us what isn't running as well as you'd like.
You'd have to look at benchmarks between SB and IB, in context; 120FPS vs 140FPS in some game is meaningless, but ten minutes off a professional render might be worthwhile if you do lots of them. My own suspicion is that the cheaper Z68 will be easily enough, especially if it lets you buy a better GPU for games. If your rendering software can do any GPGPU processing, choose AMD vs. nVidia based on which cards will accelerate your specific software. If you can, wait another few weeks to see what Kepler can do, even if that is nothing more than lower prices on existing cards.

 

[fultonloyn]

For my use I woul definitely like to see a higher performing GPU. I have a MSI R6950 right now. (TFII OC) If I weren't passim it along I would just upgrade that an leave it be.

I am leaning more towards what you were suggesting as well. Go with the cheaper chipset and 2500k and spend the big money on a GPU. That way I can still get a great system and save some money.

 

[geekapproved]

Upgrading to SB would be pretty dumb, and a waste of money.

Upgrade your video card.

 

[fultonloyn]

Thanks for the input geekapproved.

So are suggesting the IB we be any better or just as dumb? Haha
I would like to give my fiancé a system so either way we have to get her something. Wether that's new or my old rig.

 

[Rockdpm]

Well if you built here a I5 sandy bridge....shed be happy, and may be happy enough lol. As for your setup. All you need is a newer Video card. either NVIDIA Kepler or high 500 series or a 7000 series

 

[hotthree]

Wait till summer then start a thread or when your actually gonna buy.

If you can wait. Go for IB. If not go for SB. It all comes down to your needs because SB isn't all of a sudden become trash when IB comes out. People who already have SB won't upgrade for the most part until Haswell anyways. If you buy IB and Haswell comes out with 6cores and performs way ahead of IB then you'll be regretting it. What I am saying is IB will be good but not amazing (benches show already that the gains aren't that big)..pci 3.0 is a gimmick atm even with IB. Very Marginal gains are seen.

If your waiting..Sure buy a gpu now if you really need the boost, but I'd wait for kepler next week just to see what happens. If your not dying to have one..then wait for the gpu as well.

Buy what you can afford..check out some reviews and see where cards stack up. 7870, 7970, 7950 all are great cards atm.

 

[DXRick]

So, you are in early beta testing with your girl, which really doesn't end until after the 1st year of marriage (aka the honeymoon year). It is actually like many game releases, that continue to require patches for the first year. However, her fiancée status, and her need of a computer, qualify her as someone you can give your current (still very capable) PC too, giving you the justification needed to build a new one.

Or you can just buy a new video card.

Hmmm. Does she really need/want a gaming desktop rig? Or would she really prefer an iPad or netbook? This is a critical question that determines whether you can justify dumping your desktop on her.

Obviously, if she wants to start playing games (especially with you), the answer is obvious: Dump and buy.

If all she wants to do is surf the net and send emails, your justification for dumping your computer on her becomes rather tenuous, since your i7-920 OC'ed is still very adequate for gaming. In this case, you could buy a new GPU and get her what she wants, scoring huge pre-marriage points.

Well, good luck with your decision.

 

[fultonloyn]

Haha I laughed pretty good at the first part! Thanks for the response. And yes, it gives me a good reason to upgrade! Haha she isnt too much of a gamer so an Ipad or small laptop would be good for her. Mostly, I want to give her something she can depend on and me not have to fix. Since all she would need (in addition to my extra parts) is a HDD and cd drive it looks like and easy option.

Definitely going to be thinking on it though. Thanks!

 

[fultonloyn]

Best answer selected by fultonloyn.