Upgrade from i7 3820 to i7 3930K ?

Gripen90 · 27 Nov 2012 at 19:33

A good friend of mine has a Core i7 3930K that he is replacing with a brand new Core i7 3970X extreme CPU (DON'T ask me why!!!)

He has asked me if I would be interested in the Core i7 3930K 3.2GHz for 2500Dkk which is approx £270 (a brand new costs around 4200Dkk or £455).

I currently have a Core i7 3820 3.6GHz working in my PC so I wonder if going with a 3930K would give me a boost ? I know there's a 400MHz performance difference between the two CPU's but the 3930K has 2 more additional cores. :rolleyes:

I could probably sell my Core i7 3820 for 1500-1600Dkk approx £162~173, which would make the "upgrade cost" about £97 in total !

Is it worth it to upgrade to Core i7 3930K for approx £97 ? and will there be any benefit to it ? I mainly play games since video-rendering I don't do much any longer.

I got a compare link to 3Dmark11 where his and my Extreme scores are present.
He's running 3x GTX 680's and the 3930K running 4.6GHz.
I'm running 3x GTX 670 and the Core i7 3280 at stock settings.
http://www.3dmark.com/compare/3dm11/5042564/3dm11/5030405

I can't decide if it's worth it or not :confused:

- though I think his price for the CPU is fair.

liquidfire · 27 Nov 2012 at 20:14

For one I'm jealous

I doubt you'd notice much at all gaming wise. However it is a 6 core so will eat through any video editing you do with ease.

Easier overclocking would also be a bonus as its a k series chip.

Ill have it

Ohlawll · 27 Nov 2012 at 20:30

Its a good deal for £97. I'd go for it before he changes his mind.

Quixote · 27 Nov 2012 at 21:37

Its a great price for a great chip but I don't think you will see hardly any benefit. Your sig suggests you're a hardcore gamer who's on Socket 2011 for the extra PCI-Express bandwidth not for the extra CPU grunt. If you did CG, Compositing, Video editing or something like that then it would definitely be worth it.
One reason you might go for it anyway is re-sale value. I don't see these chips depreciating quickly, especially as it seems Ivy Bridge -E may stay 6 core & seems haswell stays 4 core.

Kaapstad · 27 Nov 2012 at 22:14

Go for it

It won't run games any better or worse than your 3820 but looking to the future it is a very cheap way of extending the life of your system. Games are becoming more demanding of CPUs and in a couple of years it may be an advantage to have 6 rather than 4 cores.

Gripen90 · 27 Nov 2012 at 23:05

Quixote said:
Its a great price for a great chip but I don't think you will see hardly any benefit. Your sig suggests you're a hardcore gamer who's on Socket 2011 for the extra PCI-Express bandwidth not for the extra CPU grunt. If you did CG, Compositing, Video editing or something like that then it would definitely be worth it.
One reason you might go for it anyway is re-sale value. I don't see these chips depreciating quickly, especially as it seems Ivy Bridge -E may stay 6 core & seems haswell stays 4 core.

Kaapstad said:
Go for it

It won't run games any better or worse than your 3820 but looking to the future it is a very cheap way of extending the life of your system. Games are becoming more demanding of CPUs and in a couple of years it may be an advantage to have 6 rather than 4 cores.

I've been looking at some benchmarks and game tests and both CPU's are pretty even. Overclocking the 3930K does look tempting, but holy g'sus the wattage surely increases a lot when it's getting OC'ed... that's not so great for the powerbill so I'm pretty sure the CPU will run stock settings if placed in the system - or maxed to 4~4.2GHz at low voltage.

I am really tempted to say yes to the 3930K eventhough it's 1 year old now.... hmm I think I'll give it a go.

Kaapstad · 28 Nov 2012 at 01:12

They are not that expensive to run I use a 3960x which is near enough the same as a 3930k and for gaming and everyday use I run it at 4.0ghz which means it probably uses less electicity than someone overclocking their quad to 4.7 or 4.8 ghz. The only time that changes is if I want to do some benchmarks and then I will wind the CPU up to 5ghz but that will only be for a few minutes.

If you do get the 3930k do a quick run on 3dmark11 and see how much the physics score has increased compared to your 3820.

I almost forgot when it comes to overclocking the 3930k is an absolute dream, if your want a quick overclock just wind the multiplier up add vcore and your done.

Gripen90 · 28 Nov 2012 at 10:56

Kaapstad said:
They are not that expensive to run I use a 3960x which is near enough the same as a 3930k and for gaming and everyday use I run it at 4.0ghz which means it probably uses less electicity than someone overclocking their quad to 4.7 or 4.8 ghz. The only time that changes is if I want to do some benchmarks and then I will wind the CPU up to 5ghz but that will only be for a few minutes.

If you do get the 3930k do a quick run on 3dmark11 and see how much the physics score has increased compared to your 3820.

I almost forgot when it comes to overclocking the 3930k is an absolute dream, if your want a quick overclock just wind the multiplier up add vcore and your done.

Yea if I do get the 3930K and think of overclocking it, I know it's super easy, and as said I would max go for 4~4.2GHz for daily 24/7 using including all the power saving features to keep the wattage use moderate.
But even at stock speeds it should be pretty competent anyway.

My Core i7 3820 at stock settings reaches around 9200~9300points in Physics score in 3Dmark11 and the 3930K at stock settings reaches around 10400points in Physics score in 3Dmark11 according to my friend

I have one question about the 3930K and it's Core Boost settings after reading multiple reviews which never really stated all the Core Boost settings.
The standard speed is 3.2GHz
Core Boost for all 6 cores is 3.5GHz
Core Boost for 4 cores is 3.6GHz
Core Boost for 1-2 cores is 3.8GHz
Is that correct ?

ubersonic · 28 Nov 2012 at 11:25

Gripen90 said:
I have one question about the 3930K and it's Core Boost settings after reading multiple reviews which never really stated all the Core Boost settings.
The standard speed is 3.2GHz
Core Boost for all 6 cores is 3.5GHz
Core Boost for 4 cores is 3.6GHz
Core Boost for 1-2 cores is 3.8GHz
Is that correct ?

Standard: 3.2 GHz
6 core boost: 3.5GHz
5 core boost: 3.5GHz
4 core boost: 3.6GHz
3 core boost: 3.7GHz
2 core boost: 3.8GHz
1 core boost: 3.8GHz

Unless you fiddle with it ofc (ASUS boards fiddle with it as standard).

Gripen90 · 28 Nov 2012 at 11:59

ubersonic said:
Standard: 3.2 GHz
6 core boost: 3.5GHz
5 core boost: 3.5GHz
4 core boost: 3.6GHz
3 core boost: 3.7GHz
2 core boost: 3.8GHz
1 core boost: 3.8GHz

Unless you fiddle with it ofc (ASUS boards fiddle with it as standard).

Aarhh thank you for clarifying

Gripen90 · 28 Nov 2012 at 23:10

Deal done ! Getting the 3930K friday, so now I know what I'll be doing this weekend ! Benchmarking wee

8 Pack · 28 Nov 2012 at 23:23

Let me know how your 3930K goes mate . I may well get another to test.

Gripen90 · 29 Nov 2012 at 07:54

8 Pack said:
Let me know how your 3930K goes mate . I may well get another to test.

I will make some quick comparison results between the Core i7 3820 and 3930K when in hand

Gripen90 · 3 Dec 2012 at 13:10

I got the Core i7 3930K installed saturday with no issues I thougt. The PC booted fine and everything seems great - untill i ran 3Dmark11. Suddenly the PC rebooted out of nowhere and had never done that before.
After the reboot I tried to check all powercables and SLi bridge and all was fine and secure.
I ran Unigine Heaven DX 11 benchmark with MSI Afterburner open to check temps. They were all ok, but suddenly the GPU usage would go down from 95% to 30% and everything went sluggish before the PC crashed.

I took out the top GTX 670 and ran SLi with the remaining 2 cards and every benchmark ran fine.

Then I tought I could be a bad connection, so I put the former top card in the middle and ran 3-way SLi again. Then I ran an OCCT CPU stress test for 10min just to be sure it wasn't the CPU getting hot and it wasn't.
Initially everything ran fine when benchmarking, but then suddenly GPU usage plummeted from 97% to 30% and crash again !.
Took out the middle card again, and then tested SLi in 3Dmark11 and Heaven DX11. No issues.

So swapping the core i7 3820 out for a 3930K has cost me the RMA of a GTX 670 for some unknown reason.

I should have left that PC with the Core i7 3820 alone

smilertoo · 3 Dec 2012 at 22:41

did you test again after putting the old 3820 back? 6 core just might not like so many gpus.

8 Pack · 3 Dec 2012 at 22:48

smilertoo said:
did you test again after putting the old 3820 back? 6 core just might not like so many gpus.

The cores make no difference to this. Its another area of the die that controls PCI EX lanes. In that sense the 3820 and 3930 are the same.

Was the 3930 at stock when you tested initially for stability??

GoogalyMoogaly · 3 Dec 2012 at 22:53

Sorry if you've already said this, but did you try removing a different card to see if it's Tri-SLI that's the issue or 1 specific card?

Gripen90 · 4 Dec 2012 at 07:19

smilertoo said:
did you test again after putting the old 3820 back? 6 core just might not like so many gpus.

No I haven't tried putting the 3820 back in.

8 Pack said:
The cores make no difference to this. Its another area of the die that controls PCI EX lanes. In that sense the 3820 and 3930 are the same.

Was the 3930 at stock when you tested initially for stability??

The 3930K runs stock speed and I ran 1hour of OCCT CPU stress test and no issues. The hottest it got was 57 degrees celcius on the hottest core at 3.5GHz (core boost enabled). I don't think that's too hot ? (using the Arctic Cooling Freezer i30 in a super ventilated CM 690 case).

GoogalyMoogaly said:
Sorry if you've already said this, but did you try removing a different card to see if it's Tri-SLI that's the issue or 1 specific card?

I tried doing that. I took out the top card and ran SLi with the middle card put to the top and everything seemed fine.
Then I put the for top card back in the middle slot an ran Tri-SLi, and then again it crashed.
Took out that card again and everything ran fine. I thought that this card was the culpit so I RMAed it yesterday.

But ironically... after RMA'ing the card I went home wanted to exclude the CPU as an issue and ran OCCT stress test for 1hour again and 0 problems.
Then I ran Unigine Heaven DX11 benchmark and no issues. Then I wanted to run 3Dmark11...and chrash again ! spontaneous restart !
I tried checking the Windows Program log for faults and now I found that "nvlddmkm.sys" was causing the system restart.

I'm wondering if the CPU swap from 4 core to 6 core has made some messing up adressing IRQs to the different cards in the nVidia driver ?

So I might have RMA'ed a perfectly working card

, but how should I have known ?. I based my conclusion on the fact that one of my previous 3x GTX 580 in 3way SLi behaved exactly in the same manner and I got that card RMA'ed and got a new card and 0 problems.

Gripen90 · 4 Dec 2012 at 12:43

Heard back from the shop. They accepted the GFX RMA and are sending out a new Club 3D GTX 670 today.

Then I'll have to go software-error-searching instead I guess. It's wierd how this just happened out of the "blue". (no I haven't got any BSODs).

I've searched the net about the nvlddmkm.sys error - and the "possibilities" are endless to what can cause it ... *sigh*, seems like gaming is postponed indefinitely

stuie · 5 Dec 2012 at 09:46

Its not a cpu issue i have exactly the same random issue with 670 cards on a 3770k, some days its fine other days it does the same thing a couple of times then its fine. I did do a full driver sweeper and reinstall of the latest drivers which seems to have helped a bit but not fully fixed it.

Im planning a re-install over xmas as it seemed to start around the same time a had a dodgy stick of memory so it might be windows related if it fixes it ill report back, in the mean time ive found increasing the power % in msi afterburner has helped a bit as well