CPU Anyone still tempted by an old Sandy/Ivy CPU today?

Hi guys

I currently got asked by my friend to build a PC for him, as he wanted to upgrade from his old Q6600 after his motherboard died. His uses are a few games that aren't too demanding (LoL, and some steam games) occasionally, and some casual photo/video editing too.

Looked at some builds and think that Skylake is still a bit too expensive IMO, looked at some Haswells as well since he has 4GB of DDR3 from the old build.

Then I came across some used 3770k/3570k/2600k/2500k with decent motherboards on eBay for around £150-£200. And that got me thinking...

This is like Skylake i3 money, and I'm sure even if the CPU was a stinker it should at least do 4GHz, which would put it pretty competitive with current parts, and for a decent amount less than new i5 + bargain basement motherboards that barely have enough USB ports to plug in your mouse and keyboard

I've also asked him if he is OK with used parts, which he said its fine if its cheaper and is faster than his old PC, but I'm not too sure. Do you guys think that this would be a good purchase?

 

I'm still running a 2500K and it hasn't skipped a beat

 

I just got back into Pc building again after a year or so away from it and like you mention, skylake was too expensive so i bought a second hand sandybridge i7 2700k for peanuts added a R9 290 ( again for virtually next to nothing) and i have a rig thats a match for these £1k rigs

 

I was out of the game for a while and still haven''t a clue with all the CPu names and chipsets, ended up with teh stuff in my sig and am happy enough

 

Define "old"? I don't think that these CPUs can really be considered old because they are very much still in use. Only enthusiasts buy the latest and greatest hardware; most people just trundle along for a few years on something that worked for them at the time of purchase. That's why Core2 rigs are still in use in many workplaces.

So to answer your question, hell yeah. Get a good bargain on ebay and it should keep your friend going for a while yet. I rarely buy new components because atm I'm on a pretty tight budget; the only strictly "new" PC I bought was back in 2007 when I made the big move from AMD to Intel, and damn that felt really good (to buy shiny new hardware, that is!).

 

Happily rocking a 3770K at the moment and see no reason for any upgrade.

 

The problem is Z series boards, rare!

I wouldn't be happy building a 1155 system for a friend if he wanted to overclock, if the board failed then it would be a major head ache finding another board.

That said H series boards are very common still, and non K series i5 chips are pretty cheap, could make a i5 system with ram on a H series board for not much over £100 id guess.

 

The reason why I ask this is I've had my E5 1650 (basically a 3930k, even with unlocked multiplier) for the past few years and single core performance seems good enough for me, but I just wasn't sure if investing in 'older' hardware is worth it at this point, even though I know my sandy CPU would easily last me a few more years.

Some of the motherboards that comes bundled with these CPU are either Z68/77 so OC is not really a problem, but to be honest, I think that even a stock 2500k/2600k or their ivy equivalents should be a decent amount faster than the Q6600 @ 3Ghz right? Even if I was going to OC it for him it's not going to be a big one, probably just going to push it as far as I can on about 1.3V, so won't be (hopefully) destroying VRMs left right and center

Even that mobo and CPU somehow self destruct in the near future, I suppose with the money saved by not buying a Z170 and 6600k I can probably just ebay another motherboard and CPU XD.

 

Sandy as an architecture is miles beyond what the Q6600 was.

 

I went from a Q6600 to a 2500K... and am still running it with an R9 290, it's still perfectly fine for 1080p gaming.

 

Worth bearing in mind that replacement Z-series boards are pretty expensive now, most seem to be more expensive at EOL than they were at release. So if you bought a working 2nd hand CPU+mobo, but the mobo failed in six months it'd be expensive to replace.

Performance-wise the 2500K is still great. As others have said, it was a large improvement on the previous generation and later iterations have not improved significantly.

 

still running the intel i5 3570k with a 4.5 oc on a corsair h100. I wont be switching anytime soon and if i do it will be for an ill priced 3770k lol.

Maybe even a 6 core if the board is with it and at a good price. Altho id love the 5820k that is a cpu and a half

 

I upgraded from a Q6600 to a 2500K, 5 years ago. It was like night and day, your friend will be pleased with this CPU.





note: If he don't own a SSD, get him one.

 

You can pick up a package for the 6700k for £549 on scan or even cheaper if you want a worse cooler. That includes what most people require.

6600k is £400 same package. Mobo CPU Cooler DDR4 memory.

To beat the newer cpus you got to be willing to overclock if building for friends i would never recommend this route. Stable PC beats Faster PC every time, Unless you want to vist him every week for any stability issues. Which come Summer most pcs suffer when heavily overclocked.

Best way to test overclock stability is not during the winter when the room is 10c, but in the summer when its 30+ that difference in ambient temp is huge and is a large factor in issues that people I know have suffered in the years gone by.

 

Im doing one for a friend next week. He got all the parts himself for under £180. Its nothing spectacular.

But ill have to overclock it to make it run nice in some games even then it wont be enough but hes happy with that. It will have a decent cooler and will be ocd as much as it can take.

He got the case for free. / sold him a evga 600b psu, and he bought a gtx 670 msi superclocked card for 45 and then the cpu mobo ram and cooler for 40, but its old like a q9450 or something, with 8gb ddr3 1333mhz, on an asus rampage with a titan fenrir cooler.

It is currently overclocked to 3.6ghz without a massive voltage push, i hope to be able to get it to 3.8ghz or 4.0 on air cooling, currently loads at 60 degrees, if i can keep it about 70 for a 4ghz oc ill be happy and so will he

All in that one is a pretty old machine be he should be able to game on high or medium high at 1080 just fine.

I for one love my i5 and wont be forking out skylake pennies for a good few years adn by then it will be 3 gens behind.

As long as this meets my needs i see no reason to spend the cash on the newer setups with are usually only incremental performance increases

 

I'd be very interested to see some game benchmarks on a setup like that.

 

me too im really looking forward to it. see how it fairs today

 

Just an update

Actually ended up buying my friend a used 3930k and a sabertooth X79 with 2x4Gb DDR3 1600 (he already has 2x2GB 1333 left from his old PC) for £290. Stuck on his old antec kuhler 620 with push pull and running a 4.2Ghz 1.22V 24/7 OC. Had a bit of a quick run and got 4.7Ghz on 1.38V, but CPU and VRM's running a bit too warm for my liking.

Only managed to run fritz chess and Pi, and got 25K on chess and 7.972s on 1M pi (4.7Ghz), and 22K and 9.062s at 4,2Ghz. Haven't had a Skylake CPU yet but I'm sure that at least puts it above stock 6600k or even 6700k right?

 

£549 for the 6700k is not in the same league as ~£200 for the 2500k/2600K, At twice as much cash I would be expecting a huge performance increase, and if he was going to buy a 6700k I would tell him to save up a bit more and get the 5820k instead at that price.

I was wondering about more with the 6600K vs the others with a slight overclock (not anything massive like above 4.6 for everyday use) so stability shouldn't be a problem right?

 

I'm running a 3220, i'd love to upgrade to a 3570.

I've genuinely never had a Quad core processor, ever. Can't afford them really.