• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

i7 860 OR i7 920.

R.O.S.S.I

R.O.S.S.I

R.O.S.S.I

Soldato
Joined
16 Nov 2002
Posts
11,314
Location
The Moon
Right i've been tasked of building a rig up for £800 and i've come to a bit of a hurdle when choosing between an i7 860 or an i7 920.

Now the machine will be a purely music/audio editing machine using many VST's and plenty of audio rendering etc.

Now i've specced up 2 machines and the i7 920 rig comes in just about on budget at £800 (6GB RAM & X58 Mobo). However the i7 860 comes in nearly £75 cheaper at £725 (4GB RAM & P55 Mobo).

I've read the performance is negligble at best between both the 860 and the 920 and that there isnt much performance difference having 4GB of Dual Channel compared to 6gb of Triple Channel memory. Some benchies have also said the 860 is an allround better chip due to it running cooler and using less power.

Now a £75 saving is quite a lot (it's for a Charity organisation) and I'd just like some people's opinions off here as to what you think I should do, if I should stump up an extra £75 and go the 920 route with 6GB RAM, or save the £75 and have an 860 with 4GB RAM (especially if i'm not going to notice much (if any) performance increase spending the extra money.

Hope i've made sense, any help is massively appreciated.

Thanks.
 
For a stock speed system, either would make a good choice, However, there are still some socket & memory controller issues with the LGA1156 platform which can cause memory to become "system reserved".

Im guessing it probably doesnt affect the LOTES socket which makes a better contact than the foxconn socket.

Of course most LGA1156 setups will work problem free, but the risk of having problems is a lot less with the 920.

BTW, With windows 7 64bit, my system feels much better with 6GB ram than 4GB, and thats on an Q6700 system which is "only" dual channel. 64bit windows does use a bit more memory for its own housekeeping purposes than 32bit windows.
 
triple channel is overrated unless your rig is going to be doing hardcore memory intensive tasks, for most uses theres no difference.

dont rule out dual channel just because a mobo can do triple, google for benchmarks
 
arknor said:
triple channel is overrated unless your rig is going to be doing hardcore memory intensive tasks, for most uses theres no difference.

dont rule out dual channel just because a mobo can do triple, google for benchmarks
Click to expand...

Thanks, I guess most of the stuff I will be doing is CPU intensive. As memory doesnt factor in as much when audio rendering and using multiple VST's in a DAW.
 
I had the same question as you and in the end i went for the i7860 due to money really as there is nothing between them really
 
if your leaving at stock, then doesnt the 860 turbo its cores higher than the 920?
if so, then i would go for the 860

also theres the obvious dont go for the 6gb if you're gonna lump Xp or 32bit os on there, but i guess you already know that
 
thingemajib said:
if your leaving at stock, then doesnt the 860 turbo its cores higher than the 920?
if so, then i would go for the 860

also theres the obvious dont go for the 6gb if you're gonna lump Xp or 32bit os on there, but i guess you already know that
Click to expand...

WIll be having Windows 7 64 bit on. Hmmm I might have to investigate this Turbo business.
 
Just had this con with the wife..... I wish i had gone with the 920 not cos its faster or slower. its cos you can plug a new CPU in there, 1156 cant see whats going to happen there? 880 or what ever its called but at the end of the day all the new 6 core CPUs are going to be 13 boards so that should make your mind up.

Just been looking on ebay think iam going to sell this 860/mobo and ram.
 
Get the i7 920...Its on budget and will allow for upgrades to six core.

The 75 extra in the grand scheme of things will be worth it in the long run.

6GB ram and 64 bit is a nice balance.

i7 920 DO IT!
 
easyrider said:
Get the i7 920...Its on budget and will allow for upgrades to six core.

The 75 extra in the grand scheme of things will be worth it in the long run.

6GB ram and 64 bit is a nice balance.

i7 920 DO IT!
Click to expand...

Aye mate, like I said earlier, I'm speccing it up for a Youth Project i'm working with. They are overhauling their studio's as they are vastly out of date, so its a case of getting a final spec down on paper then applying for funding for it which may take a while.

I'm hopefully going to be overhauling some of their audio equipment too as they have a tonne of old, half working stuff, and would be nice to just get rid and replace with some high end, fresh, new gear.
 
CDj-Rossi said:
Aye mate, like I said earlier, I'm speccing it up for a Youth Project i'm working with. They are overhauling their studio's as they are vastly out of date, so its a case of getting a final spec down on paper then applying for funding for it which may take a while.

I'm hopefully going to be overhauling some of their audio equipment too as they have a tonne of old, half working stuff, and would be nice to just get rid and replace with some high end, fresh, new gear.
Click to expand...

Get the most money you can get and then decide.:cool:
 
I and many others may not get the best from a 920 but its Intels flagship CPU type as it stands, I am happy to be on the bottom of a ladder I can climb than one which already has clear limitation :cool:
 
easyrider said:
Get the most money you can get and then decide.:cool:
Click to expand...

Funding doesnt work like that in this case. They don't just say, "here is £2000 go and buy what you want".

We have to supply a detailed run down of what exactly is going to be bought in cases like this. So it's not a case of writing to them begging for as much money as possible.
 
I think an i7 860 would be more than enough unless you forsee them wanting to upgrade to Crossfire/SLI or a 6 core processor (in which case you're better off with the LGA1366 platform).

Given that they're a charity I think they'd appreciate the £75 saving over a few barely noticeable technological improvements.
 
mmj_uk said:
I think an i7 860 would be more than enough unless you forsee them wanting to upgrade to Crossfire/SLI or a 6 core processor (in which case you're better off with the LGA1366 platform).

Given that they're a charity I think they'd appreciate the £75 saving over a few barely noticeable technological improvements.
Click to expand...

I appreciate what you are saying, but given that this is a funding application, I don't think the £75 extra is going to make or break the deal so its a 'moot' point imo!
 
I'd recommend the 920, or go i5....

The i7 920 gives you triple channel memory (+ more memory), improved PCI Express x16 (x2 or x3) support and won't be much more expensive.
 
Unless you're wanting to leave open the 6 core CPU route the X58 is overkill for what they need, the i7 860 is clocked 133mhz faster so unless you're planning to overclock them it will be faster than an i7 920 at stock settings.

X58 = benefits multi-GPU only.
Triple channel = no significant difference.

You could probably get an i7 860 with 8GB for £800 which would be better still.

I have an i7 950/X58 so I'm not being biased.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom