"Our tests demonstrate fairly little difference between a $225 LGA 1155 Core i5-2500K and a $1000 LGA 2011 Core i7-3960X, even when three-way graphics card configurations are involved. It turns out that memory bandwidth and PCIe throughput don't hold back the performance of existing Sandy Bridge-based machines. "
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-cpu-review-overclock,3106-4.html
OK, since we see the CPU isn't the usual bottleneck on gaming, are you sure you are changing the right parts?
Bob
I am on a rather tight budget, so i am trying to make a decent PC upgrade by replacing my oldest components and combining them with the "less old" ones.
New components (not yet purchased):
CPU: INTEL Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz (strongest i5, the next one is i7 that is ~50% more expensive)
MB: Gigabyte MB - SOCKET 1150 - GA-Z87-HD3 (this one costs about 100 euro, i could go to about 180 euro if something valuable can be gained).
HDD: WD 1TB SATA III, 64MB, 3.5", 7200rpm, Caviar Black - WD1002FAEX (fastest rpm and biggest cache that i could find, rather cheap as well)
Old components (not enough money for new GPU):
Windows 7 64-bit
GPU: NVidia GTX 460
RAM: 8GB DD3 1866MHz
Powersupply: Cooler Master 550W
Personally i think the only room for meaningful improvement (within price range) would be a higher quality motherboard upgrade, but i am not sure what i would gain by doing it?
The motherboard i mentioned above already has the Z87 chipset (intel's best in the latest generation, as far as i know), and the RAM speed is within it's capabilities - also as far as i know, the i5 can be safely overclocked on it.
So what do you think of this setup?
Please feel free to offer any advice and/or suggestions as to how i can improve it
Chowhound
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GameSpot
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