I-5 750 + 5850 vs X4 955 + 5870

[GlenK]

Basically, I have the budget to do one or the other right now. I don't quite feel like spending the extra for the I-5 + 5870.

Is it worth it to jump to the 955 with the 5870? Should I just stick to the 5850? I could actually even save a bit of money and do the 955 + 5850 instead of the 5870.

Eventually, I want to run eyefinity most likely with 3 22" monitors. It's fine if I have to crossfire for that down the road.

Is the 955 going to cpu limit me? Would two 5850's with the 955 be enough later on?

I realize there's a lot of different questions above, but basically, just trying to figure out which one's going to be better for me between the two options for now.

 

[hunter315]

The 955 and i5 both give nearly identical gaming performance, but the 5870 will be a fairly significant bump over the 5850. The 955 wont limit you and when paired with a 5870 will let you go longer without needing to upgrade.

 

[MadAdmiral]

What are you doing with the computer? If you're gaming, the 5870 is much better. However, if you're doing more CPU intensive tasks, the i5-750 would be better. The CPU is almost never the bottleneck in gaming PCs. In fact, assuming you don't need to do other tasks, I often drop even futher to afford the bigger GPU.

The 5850 would be a bit slow for upcoming games, especially when DirectX 11 starts being used a lot. It would definitely slow down in Eyefinity.

To put it in more definite terms: right now, the 5850 can handle most games at 1900x with max details, with the main exception being Crysis.The 5870 can handle Crysis at 1900x with max details. While not many people care about Crysis as a game, it is often used as an indicator of what future games could require of GPUs. So the 5850 would not be able to handle the future demands of games while the 5870 would.

 

[osu43130]

The 955 and i5 both give nearly identical gaming performance, but the 5870 will be a fairly significant bump over the 5850. The 955 wont limit you and when paired with a 5870 will let you go longer without needing to upgrade.

+1 and that for Mads as well.

 

[GlenK]

What are you doing with the computer?

Gaming and programming. But, I don't really care about faster visual studio compile times while I'm at home. I work enough at work, I try to avoid working at home as much as possible. Gaming, web browsing, and occasional video streaming is what it'll be used for most of the time.

Sounds pretty unanimous to go for the 5870, which is what I was wanting to do anyways.

I haven't done a build for a few years and when I was looking into everything I started hearing people mention the current GPU's being fast enough where the CPU was limiting frame rates. I could care less about hitting 100FPS in games, but as I mentioned before, I would eventually like to run eyefinity and possibly pick up a second card in maybe 6 months. I just don't want to be held back by the CPU, which doesn't sound like I will be.

Thanks for all the help.

 

[GlenK]

Best answer selected by GlenK.