Is it worth upgrading now, or waiting for Haswell?

steelhead31

steelhead31

steelhead31

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21 Jun 2011
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Sheffield(ish)
Hi,

Have a chunk of disposable cash, that needs to be disposed of... currently I have the following components, that I would be looking to upgrade.. would be looking at an Intel i7 Ivybridge ( SKT1155 ), a suitable board ( need at least 4x Sata 6GB/s ), 16Gb Ram, and probably a GTX680. The PC is used mainly for gaming, though it does also serve as a workhorse, which can include everything from video editing, photoshop, and some serious compilation stuff ( Oracle Forms 11GR2, Powerbuilder etc ). I run a single display @1920x1080.

Current spec :

CPU : Intel Core i7 950 @ 3.07
Board: ASUS P6X58D-E Rev 1.
Ram: 12Gb ( 3x4Gb )
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580

The question is, would upgrading to the Ivybridge be worth it, the PC currently doesnt particularly struggle, except on the very latest titles with everything cranked to the maximum.. ( looking at you Crysis 3 ).

Thanks for any opinions shared...

Scott
 
Depends on your budget mainly, I think if you're going to spend 1k+ on a rig you'd be better of waiting on Haswell (june)

You could upgrade the ram, get GTX680 etc now and just wait on Haswell for the CPU + mobo.

As you're saying it doesn't struggle at all, definitely wait for haswell.
 
Your current PC should last you a while yet, I would recommend holding out for Haswell in June.

I would overclock the CPU & g/card a bit more to keep you going, that should see you for a while. You could invest in a SSD for the OS and or games however.
 
How much cash are we talking?

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3930K 3.20GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £479.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UP4 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £209.99
1 x Alpenföhn K2 Mount Doom CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £59.99
2 x Patriot Intel Extreme Masters 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (PVI38G213C1K) £49.99 (£99.98)
Total : £861.35 (includes shipping : £9.50).



Upgrade the GPU later in the year. BF4 will be bundled with AMD GPUs in october. At 100 posts you get free P&P btw ;)
 
Thanks for the suggestions so far, I have around £1200 to spend, but Im quite happy to hang on, was just wondering if upgrading now, would make a huge difference in performance. So far Im leaning towards waiting the couple of months, and upgrading these components then, Im already running an SSD for Windows / my mostly played stuff.. pretty much the rest of my components are pretty good, and bundled inside a Bitfenix Colossus.
 
I'd personally hang on to it and wait on haswell, as you said your system isn't causing you issues with gaming at max settings atm so may as well :)
 
Hang on to haswell although you could overclock, get more ram and a new g-card so then when haswell comes you only need a new motherboard and cpu no need for the rest
 
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steelhead31 said:
Thanks for the suggestions so far, I have around £1200 to spend, but Im quite happy to hang on, was just wondering if upgrading now, would make a huge difference in performance. So far Im leaning towards waiting the couple of months, and upgrading these components then, Im already running an SSD for Windows / my mostly played stuff.. pretty much the rest of my components are pretty good, and bundled inside a Bitfenix Colossus.
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Having read your "brief" I would certainly put you in the "Power user" category ;)

Haswell will be a new socket but it's just a slight improvement over Ivy really. Better IGP, lower power consumption and a bit more ooompf. You'll still only have the choice of quad core CPUs though.

I spec'd the 2011 socket with a Hexcore i7 with some decent speed RAM in Quad channel. It's not a dead socket as there is still Ivy-E CPUs to be seen for it yet. I think you can survive on your GPU a while longer and BF4s release I think would be the most senisible time to upgrade from the 580 which is still a decent GPU.
 
honosuseri said:
Having read your "brief" I would certainly put you in the "Power user" category ;)

Haswell will be a new socket but it's just a slight improvement over Ivy really. Better IGP, lower power consumption and a bit more ooompf. You'll still only have the choice of quad core CPUs though.

I spec'd the 2011 socket with a Hexcore i7 with some decent speed RAM in Quad channel. It's not a dead socket as there is still Ivy-E CPUs to be seen for it yet. I think you can survive on your GPU a while longer and BF4s release I think would be the most senisible time to upgrade from the 580 which is still a decent GPU.
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honosueri makes a good point the hexcore would probably be more of an upgrade than the haswell coming out or the current ivybridge series
 
Haswell wont be that much of an upgrade either, as the biggest increase is just with the IGP, your current system will likely last another 12+ months, until the ps4 is established, then get a whole new rig. Unless you go sli or titan, or maybe get a 3930k for better video editing etc now and gaming boost in the future, i really dont think anything else you get including haswell will increase performance that much
 
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I hadn't considered the hexcore route, I'll have a more detailed look into the oracle stuff I use, and see if that is capable of using the extra cores in windows, its been a real pain to get working at all...
 
steelhead31 said:
I hadn't considered the hexcore route, I'll have a more detailed look into the oracle stuff I use, and see if that is capable of using the extra cores in windows, its been a real pain to get working at all...
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as has already been pointed out the hexcore would give you more of a benefit ingame than the quad core haswell
 
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