Upgrading streaming PC

[Loony BoB]

My girlfriend is having a bit of issues with her PC while streaming lately (her full time job as a streaming artist) so thought I'd get an upgraded CPU as everyone in the streaming world has pointed it out as the bottleneck due to the need for more cores/threads when streaming. Just wondering if you guys can suggest a good replacement CPU. No overclocking will be going on with this PC. Can you guys suggest a CPU to match her board?

Her specs at present...
Intel Core i5-6600K 3.9GHz (Skylake) Socket LGA1151 Processor
Gigabyte GA-H170M-D3H Intel H170 (Socket 1151) DDR4 Micro ATX Motherboard
Team Group Elite 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 PC4-19200C16 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black
Zotac GeForce GTX 1060 Mini 6144MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
EVGA Supernova GS 550W '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply
Raijintek Aidos Direct Contact CPU Cooler
256GB SSD, 1TB+2TB HDD


Any help is much appreciated. Would prefer to not switch to AMD as I'd like to keep the board which has done us fine. Happy to pay a bit more for better quality, would an i7 8700k fit this board okay if I can actually find one? I notice on some site I was checking that it said it would only work with a Z370 chipset or something like that, not sure if that's accurate?

 

[humbug]

The best she can do for that board is this https://www.overclockers.co.uk/inte...ocket-lga1151-processor-retail-cp-62f-in.html

Its not a whole lot better, basically the same CPU but higher clocked and with Hyperthreading, she will also need a good aftermarket cooler to keep it cool, honestly its not a good streaming CPU, better than the 6600K but not really good enough.

In reality she should change the platform to give her self better options, like 'yes' an AM4 (Ryzen platform) 1700, or CoffeeLake 8600K.

Edit: 8### series Intel CPU's don't fit in that board.

 

[jigger]

The board is limited to 4 cores. The best drop in upgrades would be the 6700K and 7700K but I'm not sure they would offer a fix and the prices seem to be holding around AM4 8 core 16 thread chips.

 

[AndreiD]

For streaming I'd really recommend one the of the Ryzen 7s, I have an R7 1700 and it doesn't have a problem with OBS x264 encoder with the "Fast" preset at 900p60fps with 6000Kbps (1080p60fps should be fine if all she's doing is art, might be issue for some CPU intensive games like Battlefield 1/Ass. Creed Origins).
Since you already have the DDR4, it wouldn't be that expensive of an upgrade. No overclocking means you can make do with a 1700X and a basic B350 motherboard.

But alternatively if you don't want to spend money I'd suggest trying the NVENC encoder in OBS since it uses the GPU and performance should be very good (but quality won't be exactly as good as X264 at the same bitrate/settings).

 

[imginy]

I would put a 7700k or 6700k in there.

 

[AiiR]

7700k is the best cpu you can put in there, but all you'd be gaining is a few extra 100 mhz and 4 logical cores.. not really worth the cost imo as it won't be a night/day improvement.

I would sell the cpu and mobo together and use that towards a Ryzen 1700 and board. You'd easily get £200 for the chip and board which means your switch to Ryzen is going to cost ~£150 and a few hours of installation.

 

[Loony BoB]

Ah, bugger, was hoping extra threads might help. So... in that case, what's a good board for the spec in the first post that can fit into a Zalman T3 Micro-ATX Case?