Upgrade from i3 2120 to i5 2500k?

[Stiffler05]

Hi all,

As the title says, would an upgrade from an i3 2120 to a i5 2500k be worth it? I can get a 2nd hand i5 2500k for £140. I intend to overclock it and my pc is mainly used for gaming. My system has 8gb ram and a hd7950.

Anyone done this upgrade or something similar and seen good performance gains?

Thoughts would be appreciated.

 

[Mrjobby]

A 2nd had 2500K isnt worth 140, they don't go for that even on eBay.

Performance gains vary in games depending how well the game responds to more threads.

In some games it can make a huge difference, BF3 on multiplayer is a good example of a game that would see massive gains in the quadcore.

 

[Drangueos]

The upgrade worth it... I don't know if I would pay £140.00 for a 2nd hand, maybe if it is a good chip and can make 4.5Ghz with less than 1.3v

 

[opethdisciple]

I think you will see gains, but I would not pay £140 for a second had 2500k.

Better to put that cash towards a new 3570k.

 

[trickynickyuk]

might as well put the extra £39.99 from here and get it brand new with 3 year warranty http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-360-IN

 

[Stiffler05]

Thanks for the replies.

I'm not a massive fan of eBay so it sounds like a new 3570k could be the way to go.

 

[linktoinsanity]

might as well put the extra £39.99 from here and get it brand new with 3 year warranty http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-360-IN

Or better still, go with the 3570K for the same price: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-404-IN&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=1275

 

[.:SAmSuNG:.]

I upgraded from a 2125 i3 to a 2500k and tbh didnt see any gains in tribes ascend that i play.

 

[Stiffler05]

I upgraded from a 2125 i3 to a 2500k and tbh didnt see any gains in tribes ascend that i play.

That's interesting feedback. I have a pretty similar system to you as I've got the asrock Z77e too. What experiences have you had with other games?

 

[Nuclear Fusion]

Depends on the games, on things like BF3 64 person MP, having a true quad core can make a big difference to frame rates over a dual core w/hyperthreading. On other games that use less than 4 cores, it won't make a huge difference (though you will have some advantage in lower threaded games from having a higher clockspeed on the 2500k when overclocked anyway). If you can upgrade without paying too much, I'd say go for it (though you may as well get a 3570k like you say, since you have a Z77 board).

 

[Marine-RX179]

I upgraded from a 2125 i3 to a 2500k and tbh didnt see any gains in tribes ascend that i play.

That's because your GTX260 would be the limiting factor; even when I use to play Global Agenda and with CPU bottleneck on my Q6600 overclocked to 3.6GHz, the lowest GPU usage on my 5850 was around 55-60%, so still more than a single GTX260. Without a fast enough graphic card, upgrading the CPU alone won't make much difference...people would need at least a 6850 or GTX460 1GB for 1920 res.

 

[Gibbo3771]

The real question is do you NEED to upgrade to an i5, me personally have not struggled to play any game on an i3 3220 w/ a 7850.

Only certain games are very CPU hungry but the majority benefit more from a decent GPU, which you have.

How are you finding current games?

 

[Antony101]

Don't forget to upgrade the motherboard drivers if you intend to switch to IB as some of the older boards do not already support them and you could end up stuck if you get rid of the i3 before updating.

 

[Marine-RX179]

The real question is do you NEED to upgrade to an i5, me personally have not struggled to play any game on an i3 3220 w/ a 7850.

Only certain games are very CPU hungry but the majority benefit more from a decent GPU, which you have.

How are you finding current games?

Yea it would really be depending on the type of games that OP mainly play.

Games like mmos would always stress CPU more than graphic (not saying those games are not graphic demanding, but it is more so on the CPU).

For Guild Wars 2, I found that the frame rate for my i5 2500K overclocked to 4.6GHz miles ahead of my secondary system with the IB Pentium G2120 (roughly on par with i3 2100) with 25-40fps vs 7-17fps in the huge battles with around 30-40 players vs the dragon and its minions, with neither GPU being close to 99% usage.

 

[JHSmith]

I intend to overclock it and my pc is mainly used for gaming. My system has 8gb ram and a hd7950.

.

I previously upgraded from a core-i3 to an i5-2400 and it's definitely a noticeable difference, but I agree with what a few of the other guys have said - if you can stretch to the 3570k it would definitely be the way to go. There's no real reason to go 2nd hand and the 3570 should last quite a few years as well.

 

[priam]

I upgraded from a 2125 i3 to a 2500k and tbh didnt see any gains in tribes ascend that i play.

Can you tell me SAmSuNG, or anyone who can, what was your minimum fps at Tribes Ascend with the i3-2125? I am trying to build a system in order to have always above 60fps at low settings. I use 105 or 110 FOV (field of view) and when I see a lot of things in my screen my current cpu (g840) drops the fps at 50 or 40 with my gpu working only at 70%...