Should I swap my Phenom II x4 for an i5/i7, or wait for the Zen to come out?

[dstarfire]

I'm currently running a Phenom II X4 955 BE, on an ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3, with 6GB ram, with a Radeon HD 6950 handling the graphics.

I'd like to add more ram*, but this mobo only support 8gb (4 slots, max of 2GB per stick). If I'm going to upgrade the mobo, I figured I might as well go all the way and switch to a newer processor family as well. I'm also hoping the newer generation will run a bit cooler, since most of the recent cpu development seems to focus on running cooler and on less power.

I'm looking at an i7 processor with a Z170 mobo as my preferred upgrade option. I like intel because of the hyperthreading. I'm also hoping it will run a bit cooler

So, should I make the switch now, or wait for the Zen to come out?



* I'm using virtualization (specifically, Hyper-v) to learn other OS'es and generally brush up my tech skills.

 

[Gam3r01]

Considering you are running a Phenom II (Me too!) you would greatly benefit from a skylake i7. I see no reason to wait for Zen, I doubt it will live up to its hype.
I see it (generously) a gen or two behind current intel processors, priced a bit cheaper. It may keep AMD going, but I dont see it passing up skylake.

 

[Snipergod87]

If I were you I would go to Intel. AMD's Zen wont have major availability until 2017 and its performance is still unknown. By the time Zen is available I believe Kaby Lake will be as well.

 

[Isokolon]

The M89 supports 16GB RAM to my knowledge?
That means 4x4GB

But an update will drastically improve the performance. I too use a 955 BE and my friend bought an i3 last year and it's drastically faster. So upgrading to Skylake will see a fireworks of performance improvement - if your wallet can take it

 

[inerax]

Remember the hype over AMD bulldozer? Everyone saying it will be the fastest ever blah blah blah BS..... I was a loyal AMD user. Always opting for AMD. But AMD is not longer focusing on the desktop market. AMD has even said they are baking out of the fight against Intel. Link below on that story. After that, I sadly moved to a 6 core i7 and an Nvidia card. Let me first start by saying, I have no plans to go back to AMD. The i7 CPU is a beast. So I support moving to Intel.


http://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-intel-cpu-apu-processors,15741.html

 

[viewtyjoe]

Remember the hype over AMD bulldozer? Everyone saying it will be the fastest ever blah blah blah BS..... I was a loyal AMD user. Always opting for AMD. But AMD is not longer focusing on the desktop market. AMD has even said they are baking out of the fight against Intel. Link below on that story. After that, I sadly moved to a 6 core i7 and an Nvidia card. Let me first start by saying, I have no plans to go back to AMD. The i7 CPU is a beast. So I support moving to Intel.


http://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-intel-cpu-apu-processors,15741.html

That article is 4 years old. Companies can, and do, change their targets in that timeframe, and AMD has made a decision to try and be competitive at the top end of consumer processors once again.

Whether or not Zen lives up to that hype, that is yet to be seen.

To weigh on OP's decision: are you willing to wait 6+ months to update? If not, get the i5/i7 now. Otherwise, you can wait and see how Zen competes against Kaby Lake.

 

[matt4x4]

Guess it comes down to what you are doing and if AMD can handle it. I think gamers are a different breed, I dont understand why they are always fussing over FPS maybe my logic is wrong but I thought 40 FPS would hack every game, in World of Tanks its fine, maybe others games need higher I do not know. Then there are the video editors, I mean seriously how many do that? Whats the 3rd one, photo editing? I just dont know man. If you are spending $500 then why not $600 or $700. Some of us are cheap, so we go AMD.

 

[dstarfire]

Guess it comes down to what you are doing and if AMD can handle it. I think gamers are a different breed, I dont understand why they are always fussing over FPS

As a recently converted PC gamer, I remember thinking that same thing until somebody explained it to me. The reason people keep pushing for higher fps is so they can enable more eye candy* (which lower your fps since each frame takes more effort to render) before the game becomes a choppy unplayable mess.

*eye candy refers to things like anti aliasing, higher res textures, dynamic lighting, more detailed shadows (or hair, leaves, and other things you don't directly interact with), longer clipping distance (the point at which dynamic things like enemies, npcs, targets, etc. are no longer rendered and only the background is displayed), etc.

 

[Gam3r01]

Here is my take on the FPS debacle.
If I can maintain playable FPS (~35+ minimum, I dont like drops under 30 as I can notice that) I am perfectly fine with whatever.
My 965 can do that in any game I want it to, however my 760 cant handle ultra settings in some of my games. I cant easily upgrade my graphics card to fix that because of my (now weak) processor will bottleneck anything better.

Throw a little extra money at the processor now so you dont have to replace it nearly as soon. I spent ~170 bucks on my processor+motherboard. Had I spent maybe 50 bucks more I could have got a 4460 and an H97 board and been set for years.

 

[matt4x4]

I wonder out loud if my GTX 650 graphics card is up to snuff. At the time it was not cheap, and I am cheap sometimes. I just wanted something for WoT. But I realize for myself I need a new system. With all the mention of benchmark this, benchmark that, its confusing cuz it seems all so random. But if I look into the games, I bet they are not cheap, nor free like World of Tanks (WoT). So I stay in my routine.