Tough Choice more upgrades

[-MikeR-]

Hey guys, my first post but been a lurker for years. Here is my problem. I built my system around 2007 and the last few months ive been doing some upgrades with the hope I can get at least another year out of it. Most recently i added a 5870 replacing my SLIed 8800GTS(g92) 512s. I'm not totally happy with the improvement, dont get me wrong its better but I [strike]need[/strike] want more.

Here is my current system..

Lian Li PC A70b w/ 11 120mm Panaflows
Win7 Ultimate
EVGA 780i
E8400 3.0 @ 3.6
HD 5870 w/ 2GB
8GB GSkill DDR2 1200
2 150GB Raptors Striped
2 500GB WD storage Mirrored
27" ASUS 1920x1080
PCP&C 750

My goal is to not have to touch my PC for at least 2 years (wishfull thinking?) after i upgrade and i would like to get a min of 60FPS in games (BF3) with higher settings. I figure i have 3 options, all 3 have 2 stages. Stage 2 would happen 4-8 months down the road. I dont want to drop over a grand right now because i just purchased the GPU and monitor in the last week and i need to keep the wife happy too. So I would like to keep it in the $500 range. Here is what im thinking..


1.1 New MoBo/CPU/Memory (looking at AMD)
1.2 Add second 5870/Power supply

2.1 Q9650
2.2 Add second 5870/Power supply

3.1 Add second 5870/Power supply
3.2 New MoBo/CPU/Memory (more options as far as Intel or AMD chips)

Number 1 should give me the biggerst performance upgrade but at the second biggest cost.
Im not sure how much of a performance gain number 2 would give me and is still almost 3/4 of the cost of number 1.
Number 3 would be the smallest initial gain, if really any and is the most expensive but would be best down the raod, in 6 months the same $500 should get me a better MB/CPU/Memory. Not to mention my budget may be a bit more.

Is the E8400 really hindering my system? How much of a gain can i expect going to a quad core? Do i really need a bigger power supply running an AMD 6 core/i7 OCed and 2 5870s? All the PS calculators are recommending in the very low 700 watt range but Sapphire recommends a 900 watt?

Opinions? Am I missing something?
TIA MikeR

 

[WR2]

Hello -miker-;

I think you summed up your choices pretty good.
Here is a CPU benchmark comparison for stock Core 2 Duo E8400 - 3.00GHz vs Core i5 2500K - 3.3GHz Both CPUs overclock nicely.
When you check the gaming benchmarks you notice not all games get a major boost in performance.

 

[WR2]

Here is the other comparison you're thinking about: Core 2 Duo E8400 - 3.00GHz vs Phenom II X6 1090T - 3.2GHz

You can use that tool to do other head-to-head comparisons.