CPU help

[DannyTCC]

Currently running with the following :

I5 750 ( at stock )
NH-D14 which I purchased a few months back - my stock cooler broke, i was going to overclock but didn't get around to it
7870
8gig ddr3

let me know if you want any further info, I know my mobo is the wrong socket for the new chips and my PSU should be good. if you want their details I can dig them up.


Basically my CPU is bottlenecking my gaming and i'm looking to upgrade it. I'm not to sure where the i5 750 stands against the current CPU's, though it was a god damned good chip in its prime. Playing games such as arma 3, planetside 2 my FPS is terrible and im 99% confident my CPU is holding the system back.

Will I see much difference between OCing the i5 750 or is it time to upgrade. My budget is max £400 for Mobo + CPU, though I expect it to be less than this. Ultimately I'm looking for value for money, I think my i5 750 and mobo came to around £220? I bought it just after it came out, prices seem to have gone a little crazy.

If something promising is coming out over the next year I can just OC my i5 and hold on if its worth it.

 

[DannyTCC]

Your problem here is your default clock speed. Out of the box 90% of Intels are pretty lame when it comes to clocks.

I used to have a locked Sandy Xeon and it was positively crap out of the box and I couldn't shove it.

Personally I feel that your current CPU, at 3.8ghz or more, is a perfect match for that GPU you have. Buying something more modern would only net you a few % before the GPU craps out.

The art is overclocking man. Even a FX 6300 can make a mean gaming CPU when you overclock it. But again, out of the box it's pretty lame. Same goes for the FX 8 series CPUs.

Personally if you are going to make a change I would go FX 6300 with a good board (Asus M5A97) slap on the NHD14* and clock it to around 4.5ghz.

*Noctua are so good it takes the wee tbh. Just fire them an email, show them proof of purchase or some photos if you don't have one (they want to make sure you're not on the take) and they'll send you an AMD mount.

Thanks for the advice, just checked and its currently running at 2.67. A quick search shows the i5 750 is pretty happy to go to 4.0 and in some cases beyond so I'm going to try that and see if I can get some more time out of it. I'd rarther go with an intel in all honesty ( this i5 seems to have lasted forever, 3 years+? at stock ). I'd consider an AMD if it was a clear winner though. My understanding is that AMD fell behind over the last 5 years or so

If anyone else has any input with regards to an upgrade I'd appreciate it.

 

[DannyTCC]

Currently just looking to figure out how to actually overclock it my motherboard is pretty ****** though, p55-us3l

Ive never OC'd before but im guessing I have plenty room for it. Idling atm at 27 degrees.

 

[DannyTCC]

I literally don't know the best way to go about OCing, just downloaded easytune but on the forums here its says thats bad. im guessing its a trip into the bios, throw these values in ( I pulled from another thread ) and see if its still alive afterwards

Set bclk to 200 and multiplier to 38x, add some vcore (around 1.3v) and you have 3.8Ghz

 

[DannyTCC]

yep. that makes sense. it seems my CPU is locked at 21x and my ram at 10x

so if I go 200bclk then drop my CPU to 19

CPU : 200x19 = 3,800
RAM : 200x8 = 1600

upped my vcore to 1.25 from 1.19x

infact I've just done this and its booted fine, going to test it now. Thanks for the pointer in the right direction

 

[DannyTCC]

Been running prime 95 for 10mins now and temps havent gone over 65, I'm guessing thats good?

Let me know if i've missed anything or havent ran it long enough.

 

[DannyTCC]

Done a bit reading today at work seems the i5 750 is happy to go to 1.4vcore and some people take it beyond. Many people took it to 4.4+ back in its day so I'm going to have a shot taking it up to 4.2 and see how it handles when I get home from work tonight.

I was expecting to replace it so might aswell see what it can do instead.

Are you certain my 7870 is holding the system back? I upgraded from a 5770 to a 7870 about 2 years ago and didnt really see -any- benefit.

What do you feel is holding me back here? I know I wont get max FPS on all games but I'd like to see a stable 50fps on low settings.

Thanks for all your help so far I really appreciate it.

Here are my full specs :

1 x Intel Core i5 750 2.66GHz Socket LGA1156 8MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor

1 x Gigabyte GA-P55-US3L H55 Socket 1156 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard

1 x XFX HD 5770 XXX 875Mhz 1GB GDDR5 Dual DVI HDMI Display Port Out PCI-E Graphics Card With Alien Vs Predator Game

1 x OCZ 60GB Agility 3 SSD - 2.5" SATA-III - Read 525MB/s Write 475MB/s 80,000 IOPS

1 x 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600MHz HyperX Genesis XMP Memory Kit CL9 1.65V

upgrade :
1 x MSI HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5 TWIN FROZR DVI Dual Mini DisplayPort HDMI PCI-E Graphics Card

Edit : I run at 1080p

 

[DannyTCC]

your 7870 isn't holding your system back

you need to oc the cpu from stock,could switch out to an i7 860 purely for hyperthreading (4 cores/8 threads) which would only help in multithreaded games

@1080p that gpu is fine provided you oc the cpu

I pushed my CPU to 3.8 from 2,7 and the ram from 1333 to 1600 (damn didnt realise it was underclocked in my system) and had a quick go at arma3 for 5 mins. It seemed a little better but not quite there yet. maybe its because my SSD is literally full ( no joke, like 10mb left ) or some driver issues. I'll try clearing my drivers and reinstalling. Maybe its time for a full format after 4 years .

 

[DannyTCC]

you saw no difference going from a 5770 to a 7870?
I went from a 5750 to a 7850 and the difference was huge! My i5 750 is normally at 3.4GHz so hardly heavily clocked (will go higher obviously but I'm using below stock volts for day-to-day work).

If you're newish to clocking your 750 then this might help: http://www.techreaction.net/2010/09/07/3-step-overclocking-guide-lynnfield/
Though, sounds like you're having no trouble so far

Edit: 4GHz is achievable, if you get much beyond that you're lucky, the 760 tended to go a bit faster than the 750 but even it seldom gets much past 4.2GHz on air. I'd certainly not expect 4.4GHz on an average 750 chip.

I'll see how it goes at 4ghz first ofcourse but my temps and everything are good at 3.8 and I didnt mess with the vcore just straight up to 1.25 and see if its stable there. Might not need any or very little additional vcore to push to 4ghz.

I didn't mess with any other options eg. vdimm ram timings ram voltage etc as I'm unsure of their exact purpose and did not want to **** around. Only turned off all the power saving, hyperboost etc

What I have noticed is that after the overclock dxdiag and cpuz are still showing my CPU as intel i5 750 lynnfield @2.67ghz but lower down it shows it running at 3,800mhz - is that normal?

 

[DannyTCC]

I've managed to get it to 4,000, tried 4,200 but couldnt get it stable without taking the vcore almost to the reccomended max.

Thanks for all your help guys, really appreciate it. Its been so long since I OC'd I wouldn't have gotten through it without you.