The Sandy, Ivy and Haswell (Hazzy?) Upgrade Thread

[almoststew1990]

Oh alright, we can include the four people who bought Broadwell CPUs too.

I think there are lots of people in my position right now - those who wisely invested in 4c8t 2600k, 3770k or 4770k's many years ago, which have seen a good long life but are now seriously considering upgrading after the cost/performance ratio is finally becoming quite attractive after the release of Zen 2 (because we definitely need another Zen 2 thread!)

I was all geared up to upgrade. I had booked a first class ticket on the hype train, got myself a window seat and a table, but I am now slightly underwhelmed compared to what the leaks had me daydreaming about. I find myself thinking "wellll I could hold on for another year or 18 months, when NVME storage is slightly cheaper, DDR5 is out and 16c is the "mainstream high end" 4770k equivilent, no chipset fan (probably)".

I have a 4770k at stock but undervolted so it is cool and silent, 12GB of DDR1600 (preferred over my 8GB of 2133MHz) 2 sata SSDs and a 1070ti. My chip overclocks to 4.3GHz. The 4770k / 1070ti pairing seems to be a good balance of CPU/GPU power and I doubt I'd want to upgrade GPU without upgrading the rest first.

But on the other hand, new shiny. A 12c CPU will probably last me another 5 years. Also no more sata cables as I'd go NVME and SATA M.2 drives! And I have already bought my new case!

Anyone else in this position and waiting impaitiently for the reviews to see whether it is worth it?

 

[almoststew1990]

seemingly daft x570 motherboard prices

Where have you seen RRPs on the motherboards?

 

[almoststew1990]

Maybe I'm jumping the gun based on rumour, but there has been suggested prices in the Zen2 thread, and I think there's a thread in the mobo section with rumoured euro pricing for MSI boards. Hopefully they are wrong.

Here - https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/msi-x570-motherboard-prices.18855876/#post-32752701

Daaaaamn, I might just get a X470 board as I'm happy with 1x GPU + PCI-E x4 NVME M.2 + SATA M.2 + PCI-E x?? Wifi adapter. Should be fine!

I had budgeted £150 for a solid X570 without flashy lights.

 

[almoststew1990]

How long do you think it will take for the 550 chipsets to appear? Will these likely support the 3900x without overclocking and 3200MHz RAM (again not overclocked) or will the VRMs not be up to it?

 

[almoststew1990]

Now we've seen the full range of launch CPUs (I assume!) I think I'll be getting a 3900x I'm slightly cautious that I got a 4770k and not long after the 4790k released running cooler and 4/500MHz faster which is quite a lot! I guess it will be a year or so until the refined Zen 2 is out... Which is a long time

 

[almoststew1990]

OP just checking in to say



I'm not sure if I will go B450 with a 3700x (or even 2700/x) and 3200MHz RAM or get a X570 with a 3900x with 3600MHz RAM for probably twice the total price. I guess I'll wait until Sunday! Alongside two M2 drives (one SATA and one NVMe) so I finally lose my drive cables (death to cables!)

 

[almoststew1990]

Has anyone seen any benchmarks comparing old "ancient" CPUs to the Zen2?

 

[almoststew1990]

Just for consideration, the 3900x tops the passmark charts https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

and has a reasonable price.

Holy balls that's a big improvement! Kept scrolling and scrolling, the bars kept getting longer and longer... Even for the 3700x

I might dig out some Cinebench R15 scores for the 4770k with fast DDR3 (can't get to my PC at the mo ) to see how it would compare.

So I'm a weirdo and I just got a 9700k with a Z390 pro (coming from Haswell).

My reasoning is all I care right now is gaming, and that's the best gaming CPU today.
By the time 8 physical cores aren't enough, we'll get noticeably better CPUs (as what Ryzen did was, as far as gaming goes, just almost catching up).

I am also not ruling out Intel and am holding short of the raving praise and hype (both of which are genuinely deserved). The 9700k is a bit more expensive but a bit quicker than the 3700x. I can order both now and not worry about BIOS updates to get my CPU to work. I don't have a chipset fan. I don't care that much about the vulnerabilities as a home user who just games. I am still probably getting a 3700x, just not ruling out Intel.

 

[almoststew1990]

I never rush these things, I was running my Q6600 for 7-8 years before replacing it. Getting 'only' 4 years out of my processor would feel like a ripoff after that.
I've upgraded my machine to 16GB and played a couple of hours of Division 2 and had no freezes at all with a steadyish 60fps ao I'm pretty happy. Here's to another 3-4 years!

*guiltily looks at my big box of new parts and bank account*

 

[almoststew1990]

I didn't know anandtwch did a comparison like that (I wonder if Tom's still has up to date charts?) I was surprised just how much faster the 3700x was than my 4770k in games at 1080p. Also pleased to see it beat the the 4770k in single threaded performance too.

 

[almoststew1990]

I've gone from a 4770k to 3700x and the difference is not that great. The most noticeable thing is load times where I've gone from a DDR3 1600 to DDR4 3600 (plus faster CPU and also nvme storage). Games feel pretty similar to before, perhaps slightly smoother (I.e. Less stutter and better minimum frame rates) but then I play at 1080p 60Hz.

At the moment I'm not sure it's been worth it.
I would say I can (possibly) upgrade to a 16/32 chip in a year but that might be pushing it on a mid range x470!

 

[almoststew1990]

My PC is fine I guess. Not had any BIOS or chipset /CPU issues but I am running the latest x470 prime Pro BIOS and drivers anyway.

I couldn't really see a huge difference from my 4770K at 1080p really. I was getting about 60fps before with high CPU usage and now I gr about 60fps with low CPU usage

But ive just upgraded to a 144Hz monitor and the 4770K might have been significantly worse than the 3700x!