Disappointed With Upgrade: Core2Quad -> Core i7

trentlad · 6 Jul 2011 at 04:56

Recently I was offered a used Core i7 875K along with a stunning motherboard, so I snapped it up. My previous system was a Core2Quad Q9450 which ran rock solid.

I've been running both systems and a GTX 470 with no overclock, using them predomenantly for gaming with the latest FPS out there. They are honestly so similar in comparison I'm almost wishing I hadn't bothered.

Anyone else find the same or offer any true advantage of the Core i7 over the Core2Quad? I feel like there just aren't any apps that utilize the hyper threading of 4 cores and currently this upgrade seems a bit of a waste of money.

paradigm · 6 Jul 2011 at 07:30

Was really no point in going for a socket 1156 i7. Bare minimum would have been a highly clocked socket 1366 i7, better still a Sandy Bridge.

I moved from a 3.2GHz Q6600 with 8GB of RAM to my i7 920 (1366/x58) at 4.2GHz and that was only really worth it because it cost me under £200.

as905 · 6 Jul 2011 at 09:16

from Q6600 @3.6 to i5 2500k @ 4.5 or even @ stock speed the massive performance increase was well worth the upgrade but not only that our electric bill is down £10 per month.

mame · 6 Jul 2011 at 11:45

The only reason I went from s775 to i5 s1156 was because I wanted a quad and s775 quads were quite expensive at the time. It was 18 months ago but I think a q9550 was about £230 and my i5 750 was £140. Plus DDR2 sold for really good money at the time. I would have been happy with a £100 s775 quad though.

Persecuter · 6 Jul 2011 at 19:02

well i ordered myself a sandybridge setup as my old q6600 blew up on wednesday, comes tomorrow, not expecting too much as my old rig did everything fine without any probs. we shall see!

xxMephistOxx · 6 Jul 2011 at 19:58

Keep us posted, ill be looking for similar

AgedIdiot · 6 Jul 2011 at 20:45

Persecuter said:
well i ordered myself a sandybridge setup as my old q6600 blew up on wednesday, comes tomorrow, not expecting too much as my old rig did everything fine without any probs. we shall see!

What have you gone for ?

If you've gone for i2500k or better I believe you will notice an improvement - I did when moving from q9650 to i2500k and consider it one of my better upgrades - certainly better than some of the very expensive graphic card 'upgrades' I've paid for.

hedgey · 7 Jul 2011 at 03:02

trentlad said:
Recently I was offered a used Core i7 875K along with a stunning motherboard, so I snapped it up. My previous system was a Core2Quad Q9450 which ran rock solid.

I've been running both systems and a GTX 470 with no overclock, using them predomenantly for gaming with the latest FPS out there. They are honestly so similar in comparison I'm almost wishing I hadn't bothered.

Anyone else find the same or offer any true advantage of the Core i7 over the Core2Quad? I feel like there just aren't any apps that utilize the hyper threading of 4 cores and currently this upgrade seems a bit of a waste of money.

thats an odd signature. no way do you work for mi5

James J · 7 Jul 2011 at 04:33

I went from an i7 860 to an i5 2500k at 4.5ghz and it beats my old chip in every benchmark apart from encoding, which it comes very close to dispite having half the logical cores available due to the i7s hyperthreading. Sandybridge cpus seriously fly and are easily one of the simplest CPU's have overclocked in recent years.

trentlad · 7 Jul 2011 at 05:28

paradigm said:
Was really no point in going for a socket 1156 i7. Bare minimum would have been a highly clocked socket 1366 i7, better still a Sandy Bridge.

I moved from a 3.2GHz Q6600 with 8GB of RAM to my i7 920 (1366/x58) at 4.2GHz and that was only really worth it because it cost me under £200.

I also had a stellar deal but can someone tell me why is the 1156 socket such a bad idea?

Blue160 · 7 Jul 2011 at 06:52

1156 is a bad idea because it's dead (says the man with an i5 750

). It's hardly any cheaper than 1155, but is much slower and has no upgrade route.

To answer the point raised in the first post, all you need from a CPU with most games is for it not to bottleneck the graphics card. A really good C2Q will achieve this so a better CPU won't get you any more FPS.

paradigm · 7 Jul 2011 at 07:57

trentlad said:
I also had a stellar deal but can someone tell me why is the 1156 socket such a bad idea?

If you are going for old tech, it might as well be the top of the top. The x58 platform is just better. Faster all round, triple channel memory rather than dual, and a proper PCIe lane arrangement (16x/16x/4x here).

Persecuter · 7 Jul 2011 at 18:30

AgedIdiot said:
What have you gone for ?

If you've gone for i2500k or better I believe you will notice an improvement - I did when moving from q9650 to i2500k and consider it one of my better upgrades - certainly better than some of the very expensive graphic card 'upgrades' I've paid for.

went for the i5 2500k. infact in on it right now, after a day building my new rig. is a little snappier, not done any benchmarking or oc'ing yet though. Im wondering whether to run stock on this one, think my q6600 died because of oc'ing it for so long

AgedIdiot · 8 Jul 2011 at 13:17

Persecuter said:
went for the i5 2500k. infact in on it right now, after a day building my new rig. is a little snappier, not done any benchmarking or oc'ing yet though. Im wondering whether to run stock on this one, think my q6600 died because of oc'ing it for so long

Motherboard?

'Snappier' is a good way of describing how 'different/better' a sandy system is to s775 - I would agree!

I ran @ stock for a few days and then used the auto overclock program/switch that comes with some Msi boards to find that it was certainly stable @ 4.2 but was not happy with the volts; so reverted to stock for a couple of months before just recently clocking it myself to 4.2 where I've left it. (am very happy with combo of speed/volts/heat at this overclock)

I can see an argument for not overclocking if you are looking to run 24/7 at a fairly high usage rate or if your looking to keep it for ever - otherwise as long as you do not go mad and make sure that the volts and heat are kept reasonable why not? - all that I've read appears to confirm that the cpu is capable of withstanding , at least, mild overclocks - personally I very much doubt that a clock from 3.3 to 4.2 with a minimal increase in volts and heat will kill the chip

; if it does I've got a problem coming my way at some indeterminate point in the future :eek:

kristmace · 8 Jul 2011 at 13:46

Toms Hardwares tables are really useful for basic comparison:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu,2971-5.html

i7 875k is only 1 tier above the Q9450, so that makes sense.

Dea924 · 8 Jul 2011 at 14:16

i upgraded to a i5 2500k from a Q9450

the difference is quite noticable, everythings faster, less crashes of programs, cooler, more efficient, for under £200 the upgrade was well well worth it

Phemo · 8 Jul 2011 at 14:23

James J said:
I went from an i7 860 to an i5 2500k at 4.5ghz and it beats my old chip in every benchmark apart from encoding, which it comes very close to dispite having half the logical cores available due to the i7s hyperthreading. Sandybridge cpus seriously fly and are easily one of the simplest CPU's have overclocked in recent years.

I wouldn't doubt benchmarks show an improvement, but realistically, how significant a benefit have you actually noticed in day to day use?

N00bbuilder79 · 8 Jul 2011 at 19:47

I have a Q9650 and will be keeping it till Sandybridge E or even Ivybridge, it copes with everything I do so no upgrading just yet.

C64 · 8 Jul 2011 at 20:13

None of these sites ever compare say a Q6600 @ 3.6 ghz or Q9550 @ 3.8-4ghz vs the newer chips whys it always stock speeds ?

kristmace · 8 Jul 2011 at 20:16

N00bbuilder79 said:
I have a Q9650 and will be keeping it till Sandybridge E or even Ivybridge, it copes with everything I do so no upgrading just yet.

+1

I got an i5 750 last year and I'd be nuts to upgrade to Sandybridge for the slight performance increase. Keep your system until you really can't live with it anymore.