Any suggestion for PC upgrade plan please

[guanyu210379]

Hello everyone,
until now, I am still using a PC like can be seen on my signature.
Several good years has passed and currently I am considering of getting some updates/upgrades.
I know I can still run Skyrim on relatively high settings but an upgrade could be good.
The consideration is to replace proc, mobo and RAM and keep the rest.
Currently there are many new procs in the market and it is confusing to me.
I need some help to choose the correct proc.
My candidates are:
Budget reason (I hope these are worthy successors for my Q6600):
i5 2500 or i5 3550...or any other procs in the price range
If it is really really really worth the price:
i7 3820 or i7 3770 or i7 2600

Info, other planned upgrades:
16GB DDR3 1600 (4x4)...I believe I will not need more until the next upgrade proc
new mobo following the proc (ASRock, Gigabyte, or ASUS...depends on the price I can find).

Any suggestions here?
Thanks in advance

 

[o1die]

I'd look for a used sandy bridge cpu on craigslist or anandtech's for sale forum. Some folks are already upgrading. I've found some for about half the original price. Ivy bridge shows the most improvement in video performance. If you're going to use a separate video card, then you won't notice enough improvement over sandy bridge to make much of a difference. Is your vender newegg or some european source?

 

[Scotty99]

If i were you i would get a motherboard that is crossfire capable, 8gb's of 1600mhz memory, a core i5 2500k and then get a second 6850 for crossfire mode. This would make your gaming rig good to go for many years to come. You will also need an aftermarket CPU cooler to allow for solid overclocking, but quality units can be had for cheap (30 bucks for cooler master hyper 212+).

 

[guanyu210379]

First of all thank you for your replies.

@o1die: I live in Europe, Germany to be exact. and I do not plan to use the included graphics in Ivy/Sandybridge.
The thing is, the prices between Sandy and Ivy are minor...this really confuses me...mobo prices are also almost the same..

@scotty99: I want to go directly to 16GB and do not plan to go XFire at the moment,but I always pick a mobo with XFire to leave the option open. I prefer to replace the GPU when the time comes, but who knows An extra fan is already planned for OC ;p ...after I decided which proc I should buy.

 

[guanyu210379]

Forgot to mention....will it be a waste of money to buy i7 3820 for gaming? I read that this is one of the best procs currently available...

 

[Scotty99]

Go with a 2500k if you plan on overclocking, 3570k is only slightly faster but reaches far higher temps at much lower voltages. (this is bad )

I personally think z68 is the smart choice, as you get more features for your money.

The 3820 does not game better than a 2500k.

 

[guanyu210379]

@scotty99: thanks. I did also some research,I am now tend also to choose 2500k.
I have still to look the differences between z68 and the z77. There is a lot of articles for this and I think it will not be difficult to choose.