Upgrade Advice - Asus X99-A with i7-5820K

[artaxerxes]

Hey all,

I have a venerable Asus X99-A LGA2011-v3 with 32GB of ram.
It's been my workhorse for a few years and I wanted to know what the best chip would be to wang in? Or am I flogging a dead horse?

Is it a Intel Core i7-6850k - which looks to be 10% faster?

 

[snarloas1982]

It depends on what you want from your machine. I went from a 6700k to a 12900k. If i wasn't gaming i could have went on further. Windows 11 etc might be an issue for you on that old kit.

 

[nomadd]

Is it a Intel Core i7-6850k - which looks to be 10% faster?

Why even bother. The real-world difference will be insignificant. Simply hold on to what you have and upgrade at a later date to a much more modern platform.

My second PC has an overclocked 3770k. She'll run for a few more years yet.

 

[stooeh]

Hey all,

I have a venerable Asus X99-A LGA2011-v3 with 32GB of ram.
It's been my workhorse for a few years and I wanted to know what the best chip would be to wang in? Or am I flogging a dead horse?

Is it a Intel Core i7-6850k - which looks to be 10% faster?

Do you have it overclocked, if not there's a decent boost to be had there? Still got my old 5820K, performs admirably for its age but struggles a bit now with single thread perf. I couldn't see any worthwhile upgrades when I last checked the bay. A couple of those overclockable Xeons (not many for X99) could be worth a look if they come down in price a bit.

 

[Aretak]

You can get a 5960X with a two year warranty for £72 from the high street pawn shop chain. Gives you a couple of extra cores for not much money, especially if you sell the 5820K, and once overclocked they're still very good performers (about on par with a Ryzen 3700X). Broadwell-E is really only worth considering if you're not overclocking, as any gains from the improved IPC are pretty much snuffed out by the fact that they clock lower on average.

 

[JohnStewart]

For £90 I picked up a 6900k about 6 months ago from eBay to replace my 5820k. It’s made a noticeable improvement to general operation/smoothness and a big improvement in multi core tasks light Lightroom imports and exports. A very good upgrade for me in terms of value for money.

 

[~>Dg<~]

if you gunna upgrade better off just doing the lot and going to newest 12 series intel. 12700k or above. x99 platform has done well. 5820k overlocked is still decent.

 

[artaxerxes]

Thanks all - as I feared there is no cheap magic bullet.

I use it for numerical analysis (MATLAB, NumPy) and some gaming....but that has tailed off since BF1 and Battlefront II.. currently playing B4B and Baldur's Gate III - it's perfectly acceptable on 1080.

No overclock as yet - might get the same 10% from there. SO I'll give that a bash... make the K mean something

 

[Holst1981]

Thanks all - as I feared there is no cheap magic bullet.

I use it for numerical analysis (MATLAB, NumPy) and some gaming....but that has tailed off since BF1 and Battlefront II.. currently playing B4B and Baldur's Gate III - it's perfectly acceptable on 1080.

No overclock as yet - might get the same 10% from there. SO I'll give that a bash... make the K mean something

I would definitely recommend overclocking.

You should get more than 10% boost from even a mild overclock.

My 5820k wasn't a great sample and clocked from 3.3 up to 4.2, you may get 4.5 if your chip is good.

My x99 board died and I replaced it with a 3600. That was a nice upgrade but nothing dramatic.
I've recently changed the CPU for a 5950x and thats another level of performance but it's also expensive.

 

[artaxerxes]

Software overclock with the ASUS AI Suite gave 40x100 on stock cooler albeit in a massively ventilated old school Lian Li V1000... which is good enough for 0 effort. Any good guides for a manual overclock on the X99-A? I haven't properly overclocked since the Q6600 era!

 

[~>Dg<~]

it will probably do 4.2 - 4.4 most do. better samples will do 4.5 - 4.7 if you got a nice chip.

that board you can just up the multi and see if it crashes. asus boards can over volt though on auto. which you have to be careful especially if at the higher end.

 

[Tute]

I toyed with this back when I had my 5820k. In the end I just decided to go for a full overhaul rather than try for something like a 6950X, especially as they eventually stopped depreciating and started gaining a little due to scarcity. If your 5820k performs fine then just stick with it until it doesn't.