Need a new CPU

[naminaterzzz]

Hey guys! I currently have this computer:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01463061&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=3753813
I replaced my power supply to a 450 watt and my graphics card with an NVIDIA GTX 550TI. I'm an all out gamer and I want to upgrade my stock CPU which is at 2.4 ghz. I was looking at the intel i5-2500k but I really don't want to spend that much also considering that I have to replace my motherboard also. Any suggestions?

P.S. Do I have to replace anything else besides my mobo if i want to replace my cpu? Also, if you think I should jsut wait a little bit for better processors to come out please say so and be specific I'm really bad at computers : (

 

[e56imfg]

You could start OCing (if your mobo supports it). Tell us how much you're willing to pay for the upgrade and what games you play on what settings. Ivy Bridge processors are coming in March next year but they aren't going to yield a huge performance increase from Sandy Bridge.

I would suggest to get a i5 2400 ($190) or a i3 2120 ($120).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115074 - i5 2400
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115077&Tpk=i3%202120 - i3 2120

For the mobo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131759 - Maximus IV Gene-Z (if you can afford it) ($170)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157271 - Asrock Extreme3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130598 - MSI H67 (if you don't OC or you can't afford above)

Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231310 - G. Skill 4GB

You really don't more than 4GB these days but you can always upgrade later.

 

[naminaterzzz]

alright amd sounded cheaper in all i want to spend under 300 dollars but do you think i should just wait till march so sandy bridge prices might drop?

 

[AxemanACL]

First see if your motherboard supports overclocking. If it does, buy a decent CPU cooler, and overclock that Q6600. I have mine running at 3.3GHz with a CPU cooler that cost me $25 (normally $55). With the trusty Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo/Plus ($25-35), you could hit 3.0 with ease. At these speeds my heavily overclocked GTX 460 is still the bottleneck in Battlefield 3.

 

[e56imfg]

If you can just save up for a cheaper Sandy Bridge next year or a Ivy Bridge 3570K. If you just want to game right now, the i3 2120, MSI H67 mobo, and the G. Skill RAM will do fine for now. But my suggestion is that you get either the Asrock or Maximus mobo with the i3 2120 and G. Skill and upgrade to an Ivy Bridge since 1155 sockets should be compatible with Ivy Bridge.
If you want to save even more money get a Intel G530 that could run pretty well and save money for Sandy or Ivy.
Try OCing the 550 Ti with MSI Afterburner.

You could budget AMD APUs but not their Phenoms because the i3 2120 beats most of the Phenoms on single-core and most games don't use more than one core. Phenoms eat a lot of juice, too. The APUs are really nice if you have a 6570 (which you don't) and run hybrid mode with them. If you get a APU, then you'll only be using the processor and the integrated GPU which is what APUs are meant for.

 

[cbrunnem]

honestly you can afford to do anything right now if you only want to spend 300 dollars. you cant afford to buy a sandy bridge rig cause that atleast 350 if you do it right and you cant afford not to get a sandy bridge rig.

anything less then a sandy bridge rig is going to be a waste of money. Amd will not give you anything that will be worth its weight in metal in 2 years so dont go that route.

id too recommend the asrock mobo
http://****/api/click?format=go&key=984ed3ed6aa9a69986f88d56d10e7616&loc=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tomshardware.com%2Fforum%2F322102-28-need&v=1&libid=1325021056572&out=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newegg.com%2FProduct%2FProduct.aspx%3FItem%3DN82E16813157271&ref=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tomshardware.com%2F&title=Need%20a%20new%20CPU&txt=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newegg.com%2FProduct%2FProd%20%5B...%5D%206813157271&jsonp=vglnk_jsonp_13250212909325
cpu(wouldnt go less then this)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115072
ram
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233186

total is about 400ish.

anything less then that will not give you a good long term return of your money.

To whoever said ivy brdige will not bring big gains in performance should reconsider. if 20% isnt a lot then lets just take that amount out of your salary lol. IB will bring good performance gains.

 

[naminaterzzz]

wait can my mobo support ocing i cant tell my mobo is in the link i posted before

 

[e56imfg]

Actually, you can get a decent rig with $300. The 8GB of RAM is an overkill because right now 4GB is all you need and you can upgrade later. If he can't afford a 2500k, he should just get a G530 with the Asrock and RAM and upgrade to IB later.

 

[AxemanACL]

wait can my mobo support ocing i cant tell my mobo is in the link i posted before

From a quick google it looks like it might be locked, meaning you can't Overclock. I would still suggest going to your Bios yourself and seeing if it allows you to change the CPU frequency. If it does great, you will be able to overclock (buy a good CPU cooler before overclocking), if it doesn't you could maybe flash (install) another Bios letting you overclock (this is getting above my area of expertise).

Do realize that overclocking is a small increase in performance compared to getting an i5, but doesn't cost you anything since you should be able to reuse the CPU cooler on your next build.

 

[naminaterzzz]

Alright so what I'm basically looking at is buying a mobo that can overclock my current cpu and a new cpu cooler which can be used if i buy an ivy bridge later. Are there any pretty good mobos out there that can work with my current cpu and that will work with an ivy bridge ? b.c i may as well get a good mobo right now b.c ill get some more moeny later

 

[e56imfg]

Your CPU is a 775 socket while Ivy Bridges are 1155 sockets. There is no such thing as a compatible 775 and 1155 socket mobo. Just get a cheap G530, a Z68 mobo with RAM and you'll be set to upgrade IB.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116409 - G530

The G530 will be faster even though it a dual-core at 2.4 Ghz. The Sandy Bridge architecture makes the CPU a whole lot faster.

 

[naminaterzzz]

will RAM help me performance and does it need to be compatible with mobos? or does all ram work with any mobo?

 

[e56imfg]

RAM usually doesn't affect the performance that much and your RAM is DDR2 with less DIMS than DDR3. So you will have to get DDR3 RAM for a new mobo

 

[esrever]

I wouldn't buy a new board just for a i5 if you have a 550 ti since its a lot of wasted power.

just try to OC your current cpu. The 550 ti is not exactly a great video card. if you can sell it and buy a 6850, it should be better than upgrading your cpu.

you may want to rebuild a brand new pc if you have the money in the new future as the psu, gpu and cpu are all about as good as you can do working with each other without much bottle necking.

 

[cbrunnem]

Your CPU is a 775 socket while Ivy Bridges are 1155 sockets. There is no such thing as a compatible 775 and 1155 socket mobo. Just get a cheap G530, a Z68 mobo with RAM and you'll be set to upgrade IB.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116409 - G530

The G530 will be faster even though it a dual-core at 2.4 Ghz. The Sandy Bridge architecture makes the CPU a whole lot faster.

hope he doesnt play battlefield... if so hes worse off

 

[naminaterzzz]

doesnt all this overclocking cause the parts to last a much shorter time?

 

[cbrunnem]

doesnt all this overclocking cause the parts to last a much shorter time?

if you keep the heat down then no, also not running a lot of voltage helps to but heat is more important

 

[naminaterzzz]

alright i guess ill just wait until march im not in a hurry so yeah

 

[e56imfg]

alright i guess ill just wait until march im not in a hurry so yeah

Good choice, save up by March and get a 3750K. Your patience will pay off.

 

[naminaterzzz]

Hey all!!! So intel is releasing ivy bridge in a few months and I am deciding to get one. However, Im building it off of my current computer:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01463061&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=3753813
The only touches I added was a 450 power supply and an MSI GTX 550TI cyclone2 graphics card. I understand that if I want to upgrade to ivy bridge, I need to replace my motherboard and my ram buy another windows operating system. Any suggestions for a new mobo and RAM? I am a gamer and the main thing i want out of my new parts is not better graphics but better over computer performance and more quick multitasking because my framerates in game are fine but when i tab it my computer starts getting slower and I want just a faster computer overall with some improvements in gameplay

 

[amuffin]

You can't use your case with the new motherboard you will have problems with either the sizing and f panel. Either you can wait till they release newboards upon ivybridge's release, or you can buy a mobo now.

 

[naminaterzzz]

Alright but I may as well buy RAM right now right?

 

[naminaterzzz]

I've made a few threads on this but none of them came out right so this is my last one. I currently have this computer:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01463061&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=3753813

I've upgraded the power supply to a 450 watt and the graphics card to an MSI GTX 550TI cyclone2
I mainly only play games and stream my own gameplay but when I try to stream and multi task my computer gets really laggy. I am planning to upgrade to an Ivy Bridge cpu but people are telling me I have to replace my motherboard, my case(because the new mobos dont fit in mine), and new ram. As of the motherboard, should I wait for Ivy bridge to come out or is there no point in waiting?(If there is no need to wait please suggest one that will suit my gaming needs and is not over priced 150$~) As for my case can I just get any gaming mid tower case?(Suggestions would help) And lastly for RAM people have been telling me that the GSKILL ripjaws are really good and I want the best one that will work with my motherboard since I can just buy 1 first and keep buying more later.


If I made any wrong statements or mistakes please point them out !!! Im really new to this stuff. Thanks : )

 

[a4mula]

Let's take it one question at a time.

should I wait for Ivy bridge to come out or is there no point in waiting?

If you're the type of person that goes 4-5 years between computers (or upgrading) then I'd say it's worth the couple of month wait. If however this is something you're going to replace two years from now then I see no reason the current Sandy Bridge architecture wouldn't serve you just fine. Keep in mind that Ivy Bridge isn't a new architecture, it's just the die-shrink tick cycle Sandy Bridge. While there will be certain improvements like less power consumption, higher overclock room, PCI-e 3.0, and hardware based random number generation, it's not considered to be a huge jump over the current hardware.

If there is no need to wait please suggest one that will suit my gaming needs and is not over priced 150$~

This is a tough recommendation to make because we don't know exactly what your intentions are with this rig. Do you plan to run SLI or Crossfire in the future (which would require a psu upgrade, keep in mind), how many SATA ports you need, if you plan to implement a RAID array. do you need Quick Sync (video encoding boost), or SRT (ssd caching). Assuming you just want the most basic board that will work with either SB or IB then something like the AsRock Z68 Pro 3 $111.99 is a basic budget board that will accomplish what you're trying to do. Keep in mind that there are probably better recommendations out there. I would recommend reasearching p67 vs z68, SRT and Quicksync.

As for my case can I just get any gaming mid tower case?

Of course you can. Cases and Monitors tend to be the two parts of any build that end up being the most difficult to decide on, they're both very subjective by nature. With that being said there are definitely different levels of quality for both. I don't know what kind of budget you're working with here, but based on the budget of you're motherboard I'd assume you're looking for a sub-$100 case, and perhaps lower. At $89.99, it's my opinion that the CM 692 Advanced II represents the best value at this range. Again, this is subjective and that's just my opinion. If you prefer a more pronounced gaming look you could take a look at the case I'm currently using which offers a side window the Lancool K62 $84.99. I've been using this case for almost two years now and I love every single aspect about it. It's been virtually dust free, it was a 100% tool-less design, it was easy to work in and it fit my 5870 without having to dremel hard drive cages (never fun). If both of these cases are out of your budget range, then the Antec Illusion 300 $69.99 and the Haf 912 $59.99 both represent great value cases that while might not offer the refinement of the previous two, are very solid choices.

And lastly for RAM people have been telling me that the GSKILL ripjaws are really good and I want the best one that will work with my motherboard since I can just buy 1 first and keep buying more later.

I have very low opinions concerning RAM and it's performance effect on typical systems regardless of any form of speed ratings. I'm in the camp that thinks you should just find the cheapest set (from a respectable vendor) off your motherboards Quality Vendor List and run with it. Perhaps someone else could offer a specific set they've had good success with however.

Best of luck, and don't forget research is 90% of the fun of any new build.

 

[melikepie]

Find out the RAM type And Motherboard Form Factor First If Your Getting A New Motherboard!