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Upgrade to Core i7 6950X ?

Gripen90

Gripen90

Gripen90

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20 Nov 2009
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Haarby, DENMARK
I have a Core i7 6900K and I'm using my PC for primarily productivity purposes and gaming is second. I have since Broadwell-E's release 2 years ago been very keen to get a 6950X but it was out of my price range so I kept going with my 5820K for about 2 years untill I got a good deal on a 6900K exactly 1 year ago today and I jumped to that CPU.
Now exactly a year later I've come across a deal on a 6950X and albeit it's a bit more expensive than what I gave for my 6900K last year, I am still very tempted when I compare to the 6950X price other places.

I have spent many hours reading reviews and watching reviews, but they don't really give a an answer to my question if it is worth it upgrading from 8 core to 10 cores for productivity purposes ?. My "issue" with review is that they are only a "snapshot" of what the product is like to work with and the numbers.

I'd like to hear from people who have done the upgrades themselves and if it had value for them in their work and doing - I'd like to know about long term value (more than a week).
I would like some first hand experience from some one who might have done the same upgrade ?
Cheers :)
 
koooowweeee said:
The real question is does the program your using use more cores? Could you not squeeze a bit more MHz out of the 6900k ?
Click to expand...

I do some photo editing, video editing/recording and program compiling. I try to set one task going in the background and work on another simultaneously.

I have OC'ed my 6900K to 4.2GHz which fairly matches a 6950X at stock in multi core appilcations, however it would naturally also OC the 6950X.
My 6900K is unfortunately not so happy with my 2666MHz memory with cold pc boots (2 out of 10 cold boots give me overclock error message even if I have stripped it from all OC), so I am running them at 2400MHz.

I know the X99 platform is singing its swan song, and I had been looking at a Threadripper 1st gen setup, but then new motherboard, faster ram and a new cooler would suddenly add to cost - so the sole cpu upgrade with the 6950X looked attractive. Especially if it would give me another year on the X99 platform before changing to Ryzen 2 or a newer Threadripper model.
 
If you can get one at a good price go for it. I've just gone from a 5930k to a 5960x to make my rig last longer. I'm only gaming with mine tho.
 
Gripen90 said:
I do some photo editing, video editing/recording and program compiling. I try to set one task going in the background and work on another simultaneously.

I have OC'ed my 6900K to 4.2GHz which fairly matches a 6950X at stock in multi core appilcations, however it would naturally also OC the 6950X.
My 6900K is unfortunately not so happy with my 2666MHz memory with cold pc boots (2 out of 10 cold boots give me overclock error message even if I have stripped it from all OC), so I am running them at 2400MHz.

I know the X99 platform is singing its swan song, and I had been looking at a Threadripper 1st gen setup, but then new motherboard, faster ram and a new cooler would suddenly add to cost - so the sole cpu upgrade with the 6950X looked attractive. Especially if it would give me another year on the X99 platform before changing to Ryzen 2 or a newer Threadripper model.
Click to expand...

Even today I find the 6950X pricing bit stupid. £600+ for that CPU is ridiculous, considering someone could buy a 1920X 12 core CPU for half the money.
And I do have a X99 board upstairs with a 6800K that cannot shift, gathering dust since September 2017, having it working only 5months from new. :/
 
Panos said:
Even today I find the 6950X pricing bit stupid. £600+ for that CPU is ridiculous, considering someone could buy a 1920X 12 core CPU for half the money.
And I do have a X99 board upstairs with a 6800K that cannot shift, gathering dust since September 2017, having it working only 5months from new. :/
Click to expand...

I can get the 6950x for around £510.
I did think of Threadripper as mentioned but then I'd need to invest even more in new ram, motherboard and cpu cooler.
 
Well the only thing that you're doing where it could give you a max of a ~20% increase is Video editing and specifically the video encoding side. For everything else like photo editing and games there will be zero improvement and that is assuming you can overclock it to 4.2Ghz/4.3Ghz.

You've got to decide if that £510 minus what ever you can get for your 6900K is worth it for that.
 
Gripen90 said:
I can get the 6950x for around £510.
I did think of Threadripper as mentioned but then I'd need to invest even more in new ram, motherboard and cpu cooler.
Click to expand...

I am using Kingston Savage Fury 32GB kit 2666MHz CL13 ram, but have to run them at 2400MHz else I get overclocking failed errors in 2 out of 10 cold boots - also if I don't overclock at all on the cpu.
The memory worked fine at 2666MHz and XMP setting on my old 5820k.

MartinPrince said:
Well the only thing that you're doing where it could give you a max of a ~20% increase is Video editing and specifically the video encoding side. For everything else like photo editing and games there will be zero improvement and that is assuming you can overclock it to 4.2Ghz/4.3Ghz.

You've got to decide if that £510 minus what ever you can get for your 6900K is worth it for that.
Click to expand...

Yeah it mostly will be with video editing / encoding that the difference will felt. I probably will have to investigate further how much faster the 6950X will be over the 6900K also when both are overclocked.

At the moment I am running my 6900K at 4.2GHz.

Good point about the resale value of the 6900K also. Not many are on X99 platforms anymore so it probably a hard sell.
My wife has a 5960X and I'm not sure if I should replace it with the 6900K.
 
I'd look at just selling the X99 platform as a whole rig, and put the extra £500+ towards a replacement Threadripper system with at least 12 cores, which will give you 50% more cores, and a upgrade path for the future, with 7nm TR chips being socket compatible you could end up dropping in a 24c/48t CPU in the same platform, and thus overtime the total cost would be much lower, and time saved much greater. :)

Example cost (GBP) of a TR system with 360mm AIO, no case.

CPU: AMD - Threadripper 1920X 3.5GHz 12-Core Processor
CPU Cooler: Enermax - LIQTECH TR4 II 360 102.2 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler
Motherboard: ASRock - X399 Taichi ATX TR4 Motherboard
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws 4 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory

Total: £1078.68

The cooler is about £180 btw, so maybe overkill.
 
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I will sell the X99 system but right now I just don't think is the right time with new Intel cpu's incoming and Ryzen 2 in Q1 2019. So a whole platform upgrade won't be happening before late 2019.
 
Gripen90 said:
I will sell the X99 system but right now I just don't think is the right time with new Intel cpu's incoming and Ryzen 2 in Q1 2019. So a whole platform upgrade won't be happening before late 2019.
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Ryzen 2 is not coming in Q1 '19, more like 2H '19 for consumer chips, heck TR2 only came out 6 weeks ago.

So saying that, do you feel that spending £500+ on 2 cores over the course of 12 months would be justifiable if your absolute maximum increase in any app would be 25% over the 8 core using the same speeds? Which you'd then be looking to sell for a significant loss, in order to upgrade the whole system.

A TR 1920X will run at 4GHz for the most part with a decent cooler, and have 12-cores which is 50% more than you have now and could represent around a 40% uplift in certain applications. Then there is no reason to swap anything other than your CPU, which is what you are planning to do now, but really, really bad value in comparison. As I already said if you get a decent board a 7nm TR CPU with 24c/48t should be no problem at all to drop in, and reap the benefits in 12-24 months time.

Yes I repeated myself, since there seems very little point in carrying out the upgrade you are proposing unless you just cannot be bothered to upgrade the PC, and don't actually care about the cost as long as it is faster.
 
Journey said:
Ryzen 2 is not coming in Q1 '19, more like 2H '19 for consumer chips, heck TR2 only came out 6 weeks ago.

So saying that, do you feel that spending £500+ on 2 cores over the course of 12 months would be justifiable if your absolute maximum increase in any app would be 25% over the 8 core using the same speeds? Which you'd then be looking to sell for a significant loss, in order to upgrade the whole system.

A TR 1920X will run at 4GHz for the most part with a decent cooler, and have 12-cores which is 50% more than you have now and could represent around a 40% uplift in certain applications. Then there is no reason to swap anything other than your CPU, which is what you are planning to do now, but really, really bad value in comparison. As I already said if you get a decent board a 7nm TR CPU with 24c/48t should be no problem at all to drop in, and reap the benefits in 12-24 months time.

Yes I repeated myself, since there seems very little point in carrying out the upgrade you are proposing unless you just cannot be bothered to upgrade the PC, and don't actually care about the cost as long as it is faster.
Click to expand...

I see your point and I will defintely reconsider. Maybe I should postpone it all and just wait for my RTX 2080Ti to land before doing anything else in regards to the CPU upgrade.
 
Journey said:
Ryzen 2 is not coming in Q1 '19, more like 2H '19 for consumer chips, heck TR2 only came out 6 weeks ago.

So saying that, do you feel that spending £500+ on 2 cores over the course of 12 months would be justifiable if your absolute maximum increase in any app would be 25% over the 8 core using the same speeds? Which you'd then be looking to sell for a significant loss, in order to upgrade the whole system.

A TR 1920X will run at 4GHz for the most part with a decent cooler, and have 12-cores which is 50% more than you have now and could represent around a 40% uplift in certain applications. Then there is no reason to swap anything other than your CPU, which is what you are planning to do now, but really, really bad value in comparison. As I already said if you get a decent board a 7nm TR CPU with 24c/48t should be no problem at all to drop in, and reap the benefits in 12-24 months time.

Yes I repeated myself, since there seems very little point in carrying out the upgrade you are proposing unless you just cannot be bothered to upgrade the PC, and don't actually care about the cost as long as it is faster.
Click to expand...

Personally i expect next gen ryzen to launch at a similar time as the 1800x and 2700x's arrived at. Time will tell however
 
Paying 500+ for a 6950x now is insane, that is unless that extra 20% productivity is going to net you the difference between what you sell your 6900k for in a short space of time.

Also the 6950x needs to be watercooled to get any reasonable overclocks, those extra 2 cores increase heat and power consumption a lot at anything over 1.3v so you'd have to be VERY lucky with the quality of that chip.

I was lucky and picked one up about 6 months ago for 400 that will do 4.4ghz at 1.28v , at 4.5 and 1.3+v the temps go insane.
 
Why not get something like a INTEL XEON E5-2680v4 ES QHVB 2.2GHz 14Core/28Thread

Can be had for much cheaper and better for video stuff if that's your thing.

Slaps straight into your x99 system!
 
darket said:
Paying 500+ for a 6950x now is insane, that is unless that extra 20% productivity is going to net you the difference between what you sell your 6900k for in a short space of time.

Also the 6950x needs to be watercooled to get any reasonable overclocks, those extra 2 cores increase heat and power consumption a lot at anything over 1.3v so you'd have to be VERY lucky with the quality of that chip.

I was lucky and picked one up about 6 months ago for 400 that will do 4.4ghz at 1.28v , at 4.5 and 1.3+v the temps go insane.
Click to expand...

That was also a great price you got that 6950X for ! :cool:
If I went ahead for a 6950X my goal for OC would be the same OC as with my 6900K which currently runs 4.2GHz on air with a Phanteks PH-TC14PE cooler :)
I will probably try to get a resale estimate on my 6900K before doing anything else.

Combat Fighter said:
Why not get something like a INTEL XEON E5-2680v4 ES QHVB 2.2GHz 14Core/28Thread

Can be had for much cheaper and better for video stuff if that's your thing.

Slaps straight into your x99 system!
Click to expand...

I think the lower single core performance would bottleneck my graphics cards a bit when gaming and not doing heavy work.:)
 
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