Looking for advice on a desktop upgrade
It's been a while since I've kept up to date with what is out there, and I'm now out of touch enough to know it's time to ask for advice. As a Conservative Enthusiast my 5 priorities are:
1: Reliability
2: Endurance
3: Performance
4: Value
5: Price.
Those that don't care about what my current setup is jump to the bottom, those that want to know the details of what I'm after read on.
- What I am after - long version
My current setup is my most reliable ever. in 5 years it's travelled 18,000 miles, been in and out of different houses, cars, countries, and still survived. My old hard drive only failed after 32,000 hours (6k cycle), my old heatsink didn't struggle until it faced a French summer of 40C. The key reason for me to upgrade isn't because what I have is failing; I want the 3d transistor technology and the Haswells have caught my attention far more than the underambitious ivy bridge did.
I've mostly steered away from overclocking because I know that even a stable OC will reduce the lifespan of the parts. I understand that that is less a problem now as processors are increasingly designed to OC and as the temperatures drop. I still don't want to push too hard: moderate OC for a moderate boost suits me, doubly so if it is a preset configuration that someone has spent much time testing for me at the manufacturer's side.
My usage ranges from programming and data crunching, some script and processor heavy games, and some graphics heavy games, and some low intensity general use in between. Noise matters a fair bit since I use speakers rather than headphones, but cooling comes first.
For a CPU heatsink I want something radial, or a suspended top down. I consider it important that a CPU heatsink provides airflow over the chipset heatsinks, RAM, and Motherboard
- What I plan to replace
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400
8GB Corsair DDR3-1333 CAS9
ASUS P5Q3 Duluxe
WD 500GB HDD
Arctic Freezer 7 pro CPU heatsink
- What I plan to keep
Seagate Baracuda 3GB HDD
GTX680 Direct CU II (factory OC, Triple slot heatsink)
Silverstone 1000W gold PSU
- What I'm looking to get and need advice on
i7 4770K
Z87 Motherboard - so far the ASUS z87 pro and ASRock Z87 Extreme6 seem to stand out
16 / 32GB DDR3 - probably 1887, but not fixed on that yet
SDD - probably around 256GB for apps, saves and OS, keeping my large HDD for large storage.
Radial heatsink. There seems to be mixed reviews on everything I've seen so far.
I will be keeping to windows 7, budget is flexible as long as it is something that will last me long enough to be worth it. I have no problems with going up to £1000 if I know it will last me 5 years of top notch gaming
It's been a while since I've kept up to date with what is out there, and I'm now out of touch enough to know it's time to ask for advice. As a Conservative Enthusiast my 5 priorities are:
1: Reliability
2: Endurance
3: Performance
4: Value
5: Price.
Those that don't care about what my current setup is jump to the bottom, those that want to know the details of what I'm after read on.
- What I am after - long version
My current setup is my most reliable ever. in 5 years it's travelled 18,000 miles, been in and out of different houses, cars, countries, and still survived. My old hard drive only failed after 32,000 hours (6k cycle), my old heatsink didn't struggle until it faced a French summer of 40C. The key reason for me to upgrade isn't because what I have is failing; I want the 3d transistor technology and the Haswells have caught my attention far more than the underambitious ivy bridge did.
I've mostly steered away from overclocking because I know that even a stable OC will reduce the lifespan of the parts. I understand that that is less a problem now as processors are increasingly designed to OC and as the temperatures drop. I still don't want to push too hard: moderate OC for a moderate boost suits me, doubly so if it is a preset configuration that someone has spent much time testing for me at the manufacturer's side.
My usage ranges from programming and data crunching, some script and processor heavy games, and some graphics heavy games, and some low intensity general use in between. Noise matters a fair bit since I use speakers rather than headphones, but cooling comes first.
For a CPU heatsink I want something radial, or a suspended top down. I consider it important that a CPU heatsink provides airflow over the chipset heatsinks, RAM, and Motherboard
- What I plan to replace
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400
8GB Corsair DDR3-1333 CAS9
ASUS P5Q3 Duluxe
WD 500GB HDD
Arctic Freezer 7 pro CPU heatsink
- What I plan to keep
Seagate Baracuda 3GB HDD
GTX680 Direct CU II (factory OC, Triple slot heatsink)
Silverstone 1000W gold PSU
- What I'm looking to get and need advice on
i7 4770K
Z87 Motherboard - so far the ASUS z87 pro and ASRock Z87 Extreme6 seem to stand out
16 / 32GB DDR3 - probably 1887, but not fixed on that yet
SDD - probably around 256GB for apps, saves and OS, keeping my large HDD for large storage.
Radial heatsink. There seems to be mixed reviews on everything I've seen so far.
I will be keeping to windows 7, budget is flexible as long as it is something that will last me long enough to be worth it. I have no problems with going up to £1000 if I know it will last me 5 years of top notch gaming
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