Help! Too many options, not enough knowledge

3770k is better than the 3820.
3570k will pretty much mirror the 3770k in gaming (Obviously there's some situations where this isn't the case)

But a 3570k in some cases would be less than your current i7 in heavily threaded situations.

3770k isn't cost effective for gaming over a 3570k though.

Kitkat's parts are fine, not sure on the coolers however, I have a 7950 Crossfire myself, end performance is stupidly good.

What would be the end PC your son got if you bought Kitkats parts?

EDIT : Although, I can't treat it as upgrading your PC, CPU wise the upgrade I'd do would be a second hand gulftown at 250, which when going 100% would outrun everything bar the 39XX stuff on socket 2011, then probably with a second hand GTX580 and almost double your GPU performance.

Much higher CPU upgrade percentage wise than a 3770k/3820 ever would be when going maxed out, and a stock GTX580 SLI isn't miles away from a stock 7950 Crossfire.
When the 7950 launched it wasn't miles faster than the GTX580.

But don't take that as a suggestion, that's just purely what I'd do as a cost effective upgrade route on your own system, and is certainly not the advise that you're after as it doesn't at all suit your situation.
 
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If you want a new PC, there are a few options, yes, but all will revolve around the same system. I would go with a good 1155 over a cheap 2011.

- 3570K / 2700K / 3770K.
- decent Z77.
- 8GB.
- GTX 670 / HD7950 / HD7970.
- Bronze / Gold 550W PSU.
- £30-£40 CPU cooler.
- decent 128GB SSD.
- 1TB HDD or more.
- OS?

Then really, the rest is a matter of preference. What you can do is post a build that think is sensible, and we can provide options / tweaks. It's not gonna be noticeably any quicker than yours, not by a big margin anyways.
 
3770k is better than the 3820.
3570k will pretty much mirror the 3770k in gaming (Obviously there's some situations where this isn't the case)

But a 3570k in some cases would be less than your current i7 in heavily threaded situations.

3770k isn't cost effective for gaming over a 3570k though.

Kitkat's parts are fine, not sure on the coolers however, I have a 7950 Crossfire myself, end performance is stupidly good.

What would be the end PC your son got if you bought Kitkats parts?

He would have the i7 920 on the UD5...6GB patriot 1600 DDR3, Seagate 2TB 7200 rpm HDD, GTX580 (GTX285 if I kept the 580) HAF932 case, DVDRW.
 
He would have the i7 920 on the UD5...6GB patriot 1600 DDR3, Seagate 2TB 7200 rpm HDD, GTX580 (GTX285 if I kept the 580) HAF932 case, DVDRW.
Still a very potent gaming setup, (gpu depending of course). Recently made the move from a 4ghz i7 920 to the spec in sig. In the games i play, performance is pretty much the same.
 
I don't see how that's much better than buying a mid range i5 system with a 128GB SSD and 16GB RAM with a 7870 LE.

In gaming the i5 with the IPC advantage is going to give your i7 920 a run for its money at its current clock, the 7870 LE would best your GTX580 too.

It's not like you're giving him something inferior, the opposite actually.

Hell, you could buy that set up yourself, tweak a few things so you end up with a better case etc, maybe spend about 700, but you're saving 500 quid and getting what you want.
Possibly get the Ivybridge Xeon to make up the the minor deficit the i5 would give you in heavy threaded situations, the Intel Xeon only costs about 175 but OCUK don't stock it.
 
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I don't see how that's much better than buying a mid range i5 system with a 128GB SSD and 16GB RAM with a 7870 LE.

In gaming the i5 with the IPC advantage is going to give your i7 920 a run for its money at its current clock, the 7870 LE would best your GTX580 too.

It's not like you're giving him something inferior, the opposite actually.

But I will still want to upgrade at some point myself. It would cost more in the long run.
 
But I will still want to upgrade at some point myself. It would cost more in the long run.

But the upgrade bar the GPU's is giving you nothing, that is wasted money for the sake of calling it an upgrade (And the GPU's you can upgrade at any time, but your son's already get the superior set up than he would have had)
Socket 1155 is also dead, due to be replaced Q2 2013 with Haswell, which again won't have any mainstream hexcores.

Your board can take a Gulftown hexcore (Such as an i7 970/980), that's going to be a better upgrade than any socket 1155 CPU, especially as your current CPU is fine for what you do, and as stuff becomes more heavily threaded, the extra 2 cores and 4 threads on a gulftown are going to best a 3770k (Total 6 cores and 12 threads against 4 cores and 8 threads)

EDIT : I'm not trying to be awkward, so sorry if it seems I am.
 
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But the upgrade bar the GPU's is giving you nothing, that is wasted money for the sake of calling it an upgrade (And the GPU's you can upgrade at any time, but your son's already get the superior set up than he would have had)
Socket 1155 is also dead, due to be replaced Q2 2013 with Haswell, which again won't have any mainstream hexcores.

So you are saying that the i7 920 is as good as all the current CPUs out there, that haswell will be pointless as well..that USB3, SATA3, and whatever other improvements over my old x58 are also not worth it and I should buy a £600 midrange PC for my boy and £500 on GPUs for myself...so effectively spending £1100 anyway?
 
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Are you purposely misinterpreting what I'm saying?

I'm saying moving from a platform that can take a better CPU than a 3770k is wasted money, socket 1155 will not get better than the 3770k.
I'm not saying Haswell will be pointless at all, but you wouldn't be able to take Haswell if you're spending money on 1155 as Haswell is socket 1150, that's a new board and CPU, but again, the best Haswell CPU going maxed out likely won't best an i7 Gulftown, as again they're just quads with HT.
 
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Are you purposely misinterpreting what I'm saying?

No, because that is what you said, buy a midrange PC for my son, and upgrade my GPUs...and also add a s/h processor into that now as well....which is what is confusing, it will cost more, but leave me with an ageing system.

If a 6 core processor is a better choice and more cost effective in the longterm then I'll buy a new one, I don't want to buy s/h.
 
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So you are saying that the i7 920 is as good as all the current CPUs out there, that haswell will be pointless as well..that USB3, SATA3, and whatever other improvements over my old x58 are also not worth it and I should buy a £600 midrange PC for my boy and £500 on GPUs for myself...so effectively spending £1100 anyway?

I'd personally go for my build and then give your current stuff to your son and then both of you will have good rigs :D
 
I made an edit.
As for the 600 pound and 500 pound on GPU's, you've misinterpreted.

The 600 quid system will pretty much match your rig in gaming, along with an SSD and more RAM, giving your son a decent system (Better than what you were planning on giving him)

You can put down money on GPU's at ANY time as an upgrade as it's the only tangible upgrade you'll see gains out of, say an 8970 when they launch and cheaper than 500, while giving you gains over the 580 you can sell, while your son already has a better GPU.

SATA 3 and an SSD, not going to notice much difference in the real world outside of benchmarks.

You're going to struggle finding a Gulftown brand new, but I don't see why you're willing to buy a dead platform that has less CPU potential than your current set up, call me crazy.
Who cares if it's ageing if it gives the better overall CPU performance and will take the same GPU's as a 1155 set up would?

That 600 quid system also gives your son a better system than what you're trying to do, in general usability and gaming.
SSD over no SSD.
And an i5 with 7870 LE over an i7 920 and GTX580.

Think you're getting a little hung up on the word midrange, an i5 3330 may be mid range, but it's not exactly a lacklustre performer in any respect, better than any AMD CPU in gaming at stock.
7870 LE I'd consider high tier of mid range too.

EDIT : Although it's more like 700 than 600 quid if you're buying wholly brand new, excluding the spare parts.
I said 600 a little too conservatively.

To get two 7950's and an i5 system would cost a grand.
Give yourself the two 7950's and him the GTX580 with i5 system.

Then you could always go Haswell if you don't want to be stuck on an ageing platform, while selling your CPU/Mobo you'd probably be able to get a Haswell i7 and Mobo (I'd still get a gulftown if it were me, but it's not)

Then you've spent the 1.2k and you and your son have better systems for it.
 
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I would go x79 if you want future proof, I've gone from x58 to a 2600k Z68 to Z77 and now X79 and I can tell the difference.. Don't know why people try and get others to down grade from what they ask for in these threads.
 
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