When to upgrade from i5 2500k?

AgtX · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:11

My PC isn't able to run some games at recommended settings its clear my CPU is not up to it anymore, I was going to upgrade 4-5 months ago but after researching seems it wasn't really worth it as there was nothing that was a big enough leap in performance to warrant a new motherboard, processor & memory.

Any advice on what to upgrade to now or what to wait for?

Thanks.

Asus p8p67 pro
Asus GeForce GTX 970 direct cu 2 strix
Corsair vengeance 16gb memory

andy_mk3 · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:12

You should be able to run most games perfectly fine unless you're running 4k. Your CPU is perfectly good enough for all modern games.

ferret141 · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:12

Skylake and DDR4 are the next major things to wait for. I don't know enough about what's currently out there to say if it's worth upgrading now or later.

Minstadave · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:14

Is your CPU overclocked? That will make more difference than upgrading tbh.

Your mobo should get you to 4.6-4.8ghz with decent cooling.

Andreas.96 · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:18

As others have said your CPU should be fine, especially if it's overclocked.

What resolution are you running at?

/\ndy · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:20

I have the i5 2500 (non k). Turbo boosts to 3.6ghz, plays all my games fine, excellent cpu, and even though its 4-5 years old it still keeps up, check out the benchmarks between yours and modern i5's, hardly anything between them,.

LateX'Dog · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:25

Skylake wont come with DDR4 support, so your probably better of getting a haswell chip and then upgrading the cpu/board/ram in 2016 when the die shrink on the skylake happens and DDR4 support is added.

Andreas.96 · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:27

LateX'Dog said:
Skylake wont come with DDR4 support, so your probably better of getting a haswell chip and then upgrading the cpu/board/ram in 2016 when the die shrink on the skylake happens and DDR4 support is added.

If he's only gaming I wouldn't bother doing anything until Skylake comes around because he won't see much of an increase in performance from his i5 to a current gen one.

stulid · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:32

Skylake has DDR4 support I think.

P.S overclock that CPU as mentioned, going to a 3570K or 4690K is pointless.

LateX'Dog · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:33

Andreas.96 said:
If he's only gaming I wouldn't bother doing anything until Skylake comes around because he won't see much of an increase in performance from his i5 to a current gen one.

Right and according to most sources you wont see much of a performance increase from Haswell to Skylake and for the extra cost is it worth it?

https://youtu.be/j5O8oqohgK0?t=45m22s

Linus explains it well, the change from Haswell to Skylake is minor at best and for the expense it might not be worth it. Considering there is no DDR4 support for the mainstream chip.

Andreas.96 · 11 Apr 2015 at 11:59

LateX'Dog said:
Right and according to most sources you wont see much of a performance increase from Haswell to Skylake and for the extra cost is it worth it?

https://youtu.be/j5O8oqohgK0?t=45m22s

Linus explains it well, the change from Haswell to Skylake is minor at best and for the expense it might not be worth it. Considering there is no DDR4 support for the mainstream chip.

I guess we'll just have to see when it comes out, but I think you may well be right in which case the OP can rest easy and save his monies

AgtX · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:35

Im running 1920x1080. I haven't upgraded since the 2500k came out (3-4 years ago?) & didn't really keep up with anything that came out since then, I expected the latest chips to be a big upgrade but was surprised how little the performance has come along since my late update. I guess the technology has plateaued or hit the ceiling? By the sounds of the comments theres nothing in the pipeline that will be a true sort of "next gen" upgrade?

Minstadave · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:36

No not really, just clock the nuts off it.

AgtX · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:44

its at 4.3ghz

Andreas.96 · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:46

AgtX said:
its at 4.3ghz

In which case you should be fine, and at 1080p your GPU should munch through games. So happy days

AgtX · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:52

I went on that http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri/ & it says my cpu isn't good enough for GTA V or Witcher 3 on recommended settings, it just looked like games are now leaving my cpu behind but even if I cant max out all the settings its not looking like its worth while doing anything about it atm anyway.

stulid · 11 Apr 2015 at 12:57

The games aint even out yet LOL.

Jinxter · 11 Apr 2015 at 13:06

Are you actually having performance issues with current games or you're just going on that requirements labs detection? If the latter then I would say ignore as you have ample power to run the likes of GTAV and Witcher without any worries whatsoever and probably for the forseeable future.

Rik1254 · 11 Apr 2015 at 13:21

We'll be fine with our 2500k's. The only reason you would want to upgrade is for numbers in benchmark tests, real world performance is negligible to the naked eye.

Hotwired · 11 Apr 2015 at 13:42

AgtX said:
I went on that http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri/ & it says my cpu isn't good enough for GTA V or Witcher 3 on recommended settings, it just looked like games are now leaving my cpu behind but even if I cant max out all the settings its not looking like its worth while doing anything about it atm anyway.

That site is ignorant or deliberately deceptive to push its referral links to Amazn, Razer and "driver upgrade" sites.

For example....

I'm checking my odds of running The Witcher 3... and I fail even the minimum apparently.

Minimum: Intel CPU Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz / AMD CPU Phenom II X4 940
You Have: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU 750 @ 2.67GHz

Recommended: Intel CPU Core i7 3770 3.4 GHz / AMD CPU AMD FX-8350 4 GHz
You Have: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU 750 @ 2.67GHz

Actually its a 4.0GHz i5 750 and it knows that because it says so underneath, however it will compare the stock cpu and ignore the overclock.