CPU upgrade help

[Natjtbxx]

Hi!
My son wants to upgrade his current gaming set up. He’s had it 2 years and 3 months ago we upgraded gpu to GeForce RTX 4060. I surprised myself by being able to fit it but now he’s asking for a new CPU because in his words it’s always maxed out. I’m assuming I’ll need a new motherboard too. I’m struggling with this one because I’m absolutely clueless!

Current processor is an i5 6500. Looks like an i7 6700 would be compatible but from what I can find out I don’t think it would offer all that much in terms of additional performance. Maybe about 40% hence needing the motherboard changed too.

So what are my options?? Max budget is up to £350 ideally. Is this realistic? Don’t need it to be top spec.

 

[Gray2233]

Hi!
My son wants to upgrade his current gaming set up. He’s had it 2 years and 3 months ago we upgraded gpu to GeForce RTX 4060. I surprised myself by being able to fit it but now he’s asking for a new CPU because in his words it’s always maxed out. I’m assuming I’ll need a new motherboard too. I’m struggling with this one because I’m absolutely clueless!

Current processor is an i5 6500. Looks like an i7 6700 would be compatible but from what I can find out I don’t think it would offer all that much in terms of additional performance. Maybe about 40% hence needing the motherboard changed too.

So what are my options?? Max budget is up to £350 ideally. Is this realistic? Don’t need it to be top spec.

What RAM do you currently have, as in what speed and how much?

Moving to a newer platform such as AM5 will require you to change it out either way, something like this would be a huge uplift and offer a lot of upgrade potential:

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x Gigabyte B650 EAGLE AX (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-GIG-03573) = £124.99
• 1 x AMD Ryzen 5 7600 Six Core 5.10GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DW-AM) = £179.99
• 1 x Corsair Vengeance EXPO/XMP 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C36 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit (SKU: MEM-CRS-00996) = £82.99

Total: £387.97 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

You might also need a new heatsink and fan depending on what you currently have and whether or not you have an AM4/AM5 mounting bracket. That said, you can get a Thermalright Assassin King 120 for around £15 which would be more than ample for the CPU.

 

[Tetras]

If you want something cheap, this would do it (or a Ryzen 5600 and equivalent motherboard), there's a CPU cooler in the box and you re-use the current DDR4 memory:

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x Intel Core i5-12400F 2.50GHz (Alder Lake) Socket LGA1700 Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-6AR-IN) = £98.99
• 1 x MSI PRO H610M-E DDR4 (LGA 1700) DDR4 mATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-MSI-03383) = £59.99

Total: £158.98 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

Gray2233's suggestion is much more performant and will have better upgrade potential, but for a 4060 the above would be sufficient and much faster than the i5-6500.

Looks like an i7 6700 would be compatible but from what I can find out I don’t think it would offer all that much in terms of additional performance. Maybe about 40% hence needing the motherboard changed too.

Some games benefit a lot from having 4 extra threads, since the i5-6500 doesn't have hyperthreading, but the benefit varies. Previously I would have just said "nope, don't bother", but the prices on these have come down and if you can get one (6700/7700/6700K/7700K) for £40 or so, that's not too bad.