"Should I?": An Upgrade Tale

[fl0oUMP]

Hi all,

First time poster, long time stalker. I'm looking for advice - I currently have an i7 4790 and Gigabyte Z97X-SLI and am thinking of upgrading possibly sometime this year to an i7 7700K and compatible mobo. I've been researching and can't come to a concrete decision whether I should upgrade or not.

Reason for me wanting to upgrade is that my cpu isnae 'clockable and it is now appearing on the "Recommended Settings" which I find to be a "just about" benchmark at best these days. As with most of my tech, I want to squeeze 3-4+ years out of it, hence the willingness to invest. Plus I'm a game-tart and like to have more than the "recommended settings".

As for my reluctance - GBP is weak, AMD is pushing back and I'm waiting for more from Intel.

For interest's sake my gpu is a 1070, if that helps with the advice giving.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Supahos]

I'd just buy a 4790k and a good cooler and oc the thing. The actual gainst from devil's canyon to kabylake are miniscule clock for clock. The price difference between a 4790 and 4790k in the used market isn't gigantic. Might could get the 4790k and a cooler for a net of $60-75


A 7700k+board+at least 16gb memory would run you nearly $600 for a 10% increase in speed or so. And mostly pointless speed in most programs. I'd go the cheap route and see how the next Intel generation shakes out or if ryzen gets widely adopted by programers

 

[koreanoverlord]

You can perform a BLCK OC on that CPU as you have a Z series motherboard. It will give you diminished results, but it should allow your chip to handle the 1070 perfectly fine.

A 7700K is not going to be worth your time unless you absolutely need DDR4 support. It is still just a Quadcore after all, albeit with some IPC improvements.

 

[Supahos]

You can't get but maybe 120mhz max with w Bclk of on haswell. You can get the 4 core speed 200 MHz above boost speed with a multiplier oc however

 

[theonerm2]

I'd keep the Core i7 4790 a while longer. The 7700K will give you 10-15% better performance at 1080p and that diminishes as you go up in resolution. Not worth the money in my opinion.

 

[fl0oUMP]

Cheers for the input, folks. Considering that a 4790K isn't much cheaper (£20 or so) here than a 7700K, I'll wait and see what comes out this year.

 

[Supahos]

Buy one used, and sell yours if you need more performance. Don't buy a new one