Cpu upgrade

[Moots]

HI i was thinking about uprading my cpu for a performance boost on my computer, I currently have the following:

Asus P5K-E deluxe wi-fi
Intel core duo 8500 3.16 ghz (overclocked to 4216.54MHz (443.85x9.5)
BFG 800 watts cpu
GTX 285 1gb
4964 mb ram (not sure at the moment which ram it is)

Will upgrading my cpu to say an i7 give me any better performace than i currently should have. I will post some 3d mark scores shortly.

Any help is appreciated as im clueless with computers :S

 

[simon12]

Yes it would but you would need a new motherboard & RAM as well. What budget do you have for upgrades?

 

[Moots]

I dont really have a budget, but am willing to spend some money if I will see some real improvement. Lets say £200 - £250 on cpu £100 - £150 on motherboard and up to £100 on RAM. I could spend more but these sort of prices to start of with.

 

[Moots]

 

[Zenthar]

Yes it would but you would need a new motherboard & RAM as well. What budget do you have for upgrades?

^+1
Your board has a LGA775 socket and the "best" CPUs for that board would be the Q9550 and Q9650 and both cost so much that it is probably more worth it to switch to the newer Sandy Bridge CPU even if you consider you have to change MB and RAM also. A Q9550 is ~300$, but getting an i5-2500K + MB + RAM would probably cost 400-450$ and give you WAY better performance (probably at least 25-50% more).

 

[Moots]

I looked on amazon at the i7 920, 930 and 950 all in the kind of price range im looking at, are any of these worth upgrading to?

 

[Uther39]

Or you could go on ebay i saw this bundle on there for a starting bid of £150

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260785213439&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT#ht_613wt_1100

Heres the description

This bundle has no overclock on it and never has, but i believe this cpu is easily overclocked on this board.

Bundle consists of-

Intel® Core™2 Quad Processor Q9550
(12M Cache, 2.83 GHz, 1333 MHz FSB)

ASUS P5Q Motherboard
Intel LGA775 Platform
Intel® P45 chipset

4GB - 4 x 1GB Sticks of OCZ2N1066SR2GK PC2 8500 DDR2 RAM

Titan Fenrir EVO Gold Edition AMD AM3 / Intel 1366 / 1155 / 1156 / 775 CPU Cooler

 

[Zenthar]

I looked on amazon at the i7 920, 930 and 950 all in the kind of price range im looking at, are any of these worth upgrading to?

They are all LGA1366 socket, not compatible with your board. Moreover, the i5-2500K is newer, faster, cooler, OC better and cheaper (~165£)

 

[Moots]

Ok thanks Zenther Ill take a look at the i5 sometime today, can u recommend any motherboards and RAM.

 

[simon12]

Get a Z68 motherboard from £105 depending on features you need
2500K CPU £154.79 http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/CPUs+%2F+Processors/Intel+Core+I5+%281155%29/Intel+Core+i5-2500K+3.30GHz+%28Sandybridge%29+Socket+LGA1155+Processor+-+Retail+?productId=43216
4gb RAM £35 http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Memory/DDR3/Dual+Channel+1600MHz/4GB+Corsair+XMS3+%282x2GB%29+DDR3+PC3-12800C9+1600MHz+Dual+Channel+Kit+-+CMX4GX3M2A1600C9+?productId=37570
or 8Gb £75 http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Memory/DDR3/Dual+Channel+1600MHz/8GB+Mushkin+Blackline+LV+%23996995+%282x4GB%29+DDR3+1600MHz+9-9-9-24+?productId=44336
Any money left over but a new GPU.
This gives you the best Gaming CPU money can buy, games rarely benefit from more than 4Gb RAM so the money is better spebnt towards a GPU upgrade

 

[Zenthar]

Ok thanks Zenther Ill take a look at the i5 sometime today, can u recommend any motherboards and RAM.

Pretty much all boards are equal, I would recomment Asus, Asrock or Gigabyte the most and go for either P67 or Z68 chipset. Price isn't related to performance, but to features so it all depends of what you want/need.

 

[Moots]

I ended up buying i7 2600k with gygabyte z68x - ud4 - b3 with some corsair vengance 1600 ram 8gb, really has made a huge difference to my performance. Just hope I braught the right things :S.