I7 2600K or i5 2500K?

Futureproof: Actually, the i5 is more futureproof than the i7. You want to know why? Because $100 and an i5 will be better in the future than just an i7. Which would you rather have today? a P4 3.4GHz with hyperthreading or a P4 3.3GHz without hyperthreading but and extra $100 in your pocket? In 2-3 years at the very least you will be able to get an equivalent performance CPU for $100. At least, that is my prediction, but none of us are psychic. All we can do is base it on the past. So I base my prediction on:
Q6600 came out 4 years ago this past January at $800. Now you can get an overall better Athlon IIx4 3.1GHz for $110:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/53?vs=188
The Q9400 came out about 2.5 years ago at $266.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/76?vs=188
Like I said though, it is a guess. Especially if AMD's upcoming processors prove competitive, it could drive prices down and clockspeeds up.
Just my opinion though.


Heart vs Brain: Up to you. Sometimes you just want the best and sometimes you just want to spend the extra. If it's any consolation though, some of those other programs you use will perform better on the i7:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/288?vs=287
Worth $100? No. The only reason for an i7 is that you need the extra performance or you just want the best like your "heart" says. So up to you.

Its just for this particular build. should i spend more money and get the i7 along with my other components, or put the money i save from forgoing the i7 and put it towards an second card for SLi/better mobo/more RAM etc. for this current build. i will be gaming 75% of the time and video/photo editing and 3D modeling the other 25%.

the i7 offers hyper-threading which very few games take advantage of, get the i5. just about every PC game now is a console port or MMO so you will be "future-proofed" (   ) for some time....

you are right! haha...... i guess part of the reason i want the i7 is because of the name.

I should've gone 2500k but my heart got the best of me and I had to go 2600k. Oh well, I have the money...

It only a 100 bucks not a huge deal. I mean think about 980x at 1 grand. We spend 3 to 500 on a gpu so what 100 bones...

well, i'm only 13 years old, so $100 is a fairly big deal.

i guess i could hold off on the completed build for a couple months though..... if you really think its worth it. keep in mind that my primary use of this machine will be gaming, i will not use many programs that utilize 8 threads

i looked at the features of Z68. i don't think i will use any of them.

yea. it not all that important to me. i also have heard that they will cost a lot ($250-$400+)

I'd say 2500k as well, since the only place (given your uses) that you'd see benefit with hyperthreading is video encoding, but with SB if you get the LucidLogix Virtu for quick sync that won't even matter because the EPUs are way faster at it. Toms just did a review on it with the Z68 board. I'm not sure that it works properly on P67.

For straight gaming the 2500k is the best cheapest bet but the 2600k is good for gaming and more as in decodeing,photoshop and such.

where are you getting an i7 2600k for $279? I want in! XD

I'm in the same boat as you, when you're our age, we have a completely different perspective on how much money is a "big deal".

Personally $100 is a big deal.

I got the 2600k. I think we will see more threading support, so in a year or two there could be a noticeable difference in more apps and perhaps even games. I build my computers in terms of the mobo, CPU combination to last 3-4 years, so it was worth it. All hyper threading dose is make the OS thing you have a 8 core CPU. The 2600k is higer binned too and many users have reported better overclocking results compared to 2500k. BF3 will likely have the best multi-threading game support, so lets see how that runs on a 2500k versus a 2600k, and as said above, sometimes you just want to have the best.

2500K is good enough and the 2600K cannot justify the $100 difference right now, both are very future proof.

Consider this, if an i3 2100 can compete agains and beat many Quad Cores certainly in some inert way, HYPERTHREADING has a profound enough effect. One cannot say that the 2500k can perform the same as the 2600k or what will be the point of the later. If you want everything then the i7 is the way, but if you want more than enough and future proofing, as well as an extra $100 in your pocket, then the 2500k is the way to go.

This old post didn't really need to be resurrected I think