Do i need to look at upgrading?

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:11

ok, I bought the ASRock Z68 Extreme4 (first version) for my 2500k, now im thinking I might upgrade to IB when it comes out, will my motherboard support it fully (if a bios update comes out) or will I be limited, so should look at replacing motherboard soon?

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:22

What for the IB chips to come out and see if there is a BIOS update, should be

You only gain PCI-E3.0 with a newer Gen3 board, this has been tested with a 7970 and the improvements over 2.0 is negligible.

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:26

stulid said:
What for the IB chips to come out and see if there is a BIOS update, should be

You only gain PCI-E3.0 with a newer Gen3 board, this has been tested with a 7970 and the improvements over 2.0 is negligible.

that's good to know

is there anything better than the Z68 chipsets out at the moment?

beejjacobs · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:26

paradisiac said:
that's good to know is there anything better than the Z68 chipsets out at the moment?

Not for an i5 2500K

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:47

what about the Z77 chipsets, are they going to offer anything worthwhile with IB that my current motherboard possibly wont?

beejjacobs · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:51

I doubt it without an IB chip aswell to use the features. Not something I know much about. When they are released properly we will know more

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:52

paradisiac said:
what about the Z77 chipsets, are they going to offer anything worthwhile with IB that my current motherboard possibly wont?

Native USB3.0 support.

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:53

stulid said:
Native USB3.0 support.

I only have 1 usb 3.0 external drive.
so nothing majorly different like the lucid was with the Z68 chipset, just more SATA 3, native USB 3 and PCI-e 3?

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:54

paradisiac said:
I only have 1 usb 3.0 external drive.
so nothing majorly different like the lucid was with the Z68 chipset, just more SATA 3, native USB 3 and PCI-e 3?

Nope, some of the boards previewed just have more SATA ports, more USB3.0 ports ect.

http://www.techpowerup.com/161609/Gigabyte-G1.Sniper-3-Z77-Motherboard-Pictured.html

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:56

and the jump to 2011 setup is expensive with little gains?

beejjacobs · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:56

stulid said:
Native USB3.0 support.

Ah good to know. Is this similar to SATA3 where the native ports are generally much better?

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 17:58

paradisiac said:
and the jump to 2011 setup is expensive with little gains?

For gaming very little.

i5 2500K vs i7 3820 (cheapest chip) - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/288?vs=523

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:13

stulid said:
For gaming very little.

i5 2500K vs i7 3820 (cheapest chip) - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/288?vs=523

but IB should be better than the 2500k?

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:17

paradisiac said:
but IB should be better than the 2500k?

The IGP is better, apart from that, looking at these chips,

http://cpuforever.com/intel-ivy-bridge-official-specifications-leaked/

Theres a small speed increase, some have a bit more L3 cache and some have Hyperthreading which again is pointless for gaming.

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:18

stulid said:
The IGP is better, apart from that, looking at these chips,

http://cpuforever.com/intel-ivy-bridge-official-specifications-leaked/

Theres a small speed increase, some have a bit more L3 cache and some have Hyperthreading which again is pointless for gaming.

so I would be better off sticking with what I have now?

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:19

paradisiac said:
so I would be better off sticking with what I have now?

Yep,

Is it overclocked? hope so with that heatsink you got.

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:21

stulid said:
Yep, overclock it also, get it over 4.5Ghz.

its been running @ 4.6GHz now pretty much since I got it, which wasn't long after you got your Z68 Extreme 4.

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:22

paradisiac said:
its been running @ 4.6GHz now pretty much since I got it, which wasn't long after you got your Z68 Extreme 4.

Good

, then you have nothing to lose sleep over.

If all you do is play games and browse the net, stick with your setup.

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:24

stulid said:
Good, then you have nothing to lose sleep over.

If all you do is play games and browse the net, stick with your setup.

I recently got a BD-RE drive, so I have been having a bash with some encoding and stuff, and it seems to be pretty quick at that. just kind of fancy an upgrade, and well, there was a bit of a mess up with my graphics card, so I might have £150-£200 to play with.

stulid · 5 Mar 2012 at 18:25

Seen the 7850/7870 reviews? look interesting pricing is about £230-£270 respectively.