# Keep old I7 920 @ 4.2 GHz or go Skylake/Haswell-E?



## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

I am in a midlife crisis. I just cant deside to keep my old I7 920 @ 4.2 GHz or go skylake/Haswell-E. I think im suffering from upgrade sickness.

I feel so sad by letting my old I7 920 go away and i would properly never get such a oc friendly cpu Again according to base clock and how high they will go even on aircooling, but it is also an old CPU i mean i have had it for like over 6 years now and she refuses to die so i can upgrade so im thinking and upgrade is maybe on its right place cause i would maybe get a desent FPS boost in CPU intensive games like GTA V.

The CPU has been oc almost 3 years now some where from 3.8 GHz in the beginning to 4.2 GHz the last year and i feel whit Water coling it would even go higher. I have seen ohter i7 920 whit Water cooling run up 4.5 GHz. And i dont have any of those problems that can come from overclock over time like CPU degradation. Well no now at least. It just keep on going... These old i7 920 have been such long life CPU´s compared to all the others i have had before mostly AMD cpu before my I7 920.

So what would you do.

Keep the old sucker till she dies (properly a year or two more, i would be very impressed if she last that long at 4.2 GHz) or upgrade?

The most intesive i do is gaming and not that much online/MP.

Not so long ago i upgrade from GTX 660 TI SLI to GTX 970 SLI and that alone gave me a desent boost i games alone.

3D Mark firestrike score of the old sucker. The gfx is clokket lower for every day gaming than in this test.

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/5018467

https://billedeupload.dk/images/gT4ou.jpg

Complete system setup

Core i7 920 @ 4.2 GHz
ThermalRight Ultra 120 eXtreme cpu cooler.
ASUS Rampage II Extreme ROG motherboard
12 GB DDR3 ram Corsair 1600 MHz (6 x 2GB)
Samsung WriteMaster SH-S223F DVD-drive
Crusial M4 64 GB SSD for OS
SAMSUNG EVO 250 GB SSD for my newest games
2 x WD Velociraptor 150 GB 10000 RPM i raid 0 for older games
WD Caviar Black 1 TB
WD AV-GP 2 TB
2 x Zotac GTX 970 in sli
Thermaltake ToughPower 1500 Watt PSU
Antec Twelve Hundred case
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit


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## Devon68 (Jul 23, 2015)

Does it do what you require it to do? If yes, I see no reason to change it.


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## the54thvoid (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> I am in a midlife crisis....



Enough said - get a tattoo, start some dangerous sport and buy a trophy wife - crisis sorted.

As for the cpu - that's a far harder story.  Upgrading is fun but if you can't afford it - stick with what you have but if you can afford it - help the economy by buying new stuff and help TPU forumers by donating the old 920.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

Devon68 said:


> Does it do what you require it to do? If yes, I see no reason to change it.



More or less it does what i need from it. It is not that it feel a need for upgrade more like i want to upgrade and in the same way save som on my electricity bill.
It is no secret that these old CPU´s eats more power than newer and more energy-friendly CPU´s. The question is whether it is worth it or not besides save some on the power bill.


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## the54thvoid (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> More or less it does what i need from it. It is not that it feel a need for upgrade more like i want to upgrade and in the same way save som on my electricity bill.
> It is no secret that these old CPU´s eats more power than newer and more energy-friendly CPU´s. The question is whether it is worth it or not besides save some on the power bill.



They're not GPU's, I doubt you'd see real term savings on a 140 watt cpu*.  You might shave off 50 watts (load power) which isn't a whole lot.

* assuming you'd overclock the new cpu so the energy saving would be comparable.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

the54thvoid said:


> Enough said - get a tattoo, start some dangerous sport and buy a trophy wife - crisis sorted.
> 
> As for the cpu - that's a far harder story.  Upgrading is fun but if you can't afford it - stick with what you have but if you can afford it - help the economy by buying new stuff and help TPU forumers by donating the old 920.



Upgrade is indeed fun and i can afford it. It is more like would it give a good enough more performance vs. the cost. New CPU would also need new motherboard and properly new memory also,
But it is not fun spending so much Money on something and then be disappointed with performance.


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## Schmuckley (Jul 23, 2015)

eh..the new thingamabobber is about to drop..Skylake is it? 1151?
cuz it absolutely needs a new socket right? 
I doubt Haswell-E would eat less power.and tbh imo..
Westmere-EP is snappier in desktop stuff AND has a good bit of grunt if you need it.
I know those newer chips bench faster and all...
but take longer to load progs than AMD Deneb,Westmere-EP,even Ivy Bridge..
I swear I observe that.
like AMD thuban..you click something..it's open.
get to that haswell-E thingy..you click..and go..did i click that? and then about 5 secs later it opens
or regular haswell for that matter.
Westmere-EP..you click it,it's open..and has about 85% of the grunt of the newest chips
/end ramble


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## xkm1948 (Jul 23, 2015)

Hey the x99 platform. With haswell-e and broadwell -e it should last you a good amount of time.


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## the54thvoid (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> Upgrade is indeed fun and i can afford it. It is more like would it give a good enough more performance vs. the cost. New CPU would also need new motherboard and properly new memory also,
> But it is not fun spending so much Money on something and then be disappointed with performance.



I know where you're coming from - I'm itching to upgrade my 3930k (OC'ed at 4.4 - 4.2, from 3.2 stock for almost 3 years).  I _*know*_ it'll not give much better perf if i go to Haswell-E but I like shiny new things


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

the54thvoid said:


> They're not GPU's, I doubt you'd see real term savings on a 140 watt cpu*.  You might shave off 50 watts (load power) which isn't a whole lot.
> 
> * assuming you'd overclock the new cpu so the energy saving would be comparable.



So an upgrade is not for power alone.

Whit the new CPU i would do the same ass whit I7 920. Let it run stock at the beginning and over time and when i need it overclock it.
A the beginning at stock i7 920 had plenty of power but over time games needs more cpu powr.


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## EarthDog (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> Upgrade is indeed fun and i can afford it. It is more like would it give a good enough more performance vs. the cost. New CPU would also need new motherboard and properly new memory also,
> But it is not fun spending so much Money on something and then be disappointed with performance.


"Whit"? 

I would upgrade to Skylake when it releases. The performance difference, in benchmarks, is likely going to be on the order of 50% clock for clock. There is also SATA3, M.2, DDR4 etc. Now... is that TANGIBLE? Maybe. Depends on how you use your PC. While the 920 is plenty serviceable, I would want another CPU after 6 years.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

Schmuckley said:


> eh..the new thingamabobber is about to drop..Skylake is it? 1151?
> cuz it absolutely needs a new socket right?
> I doubt Haswell-E would eat less power.and tbh imo..
> Westmere-EP is snappier in desktop stuff AND has a good bit of grunt if you need it.
> ...



So if i am correct you say newer cpu´s take longer time to open software and not give that much more performence?


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

xkm1948 said:


> Hey the x99 platform. With haswell-e and broadwell -e it should last you a good amount of time.



It shut do if i upgrade to it and if it goes like whit my old i7 920. I shut last 4-6 years also.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

the54thvoid said:


> I know where you're coming from - I'm itching to upgrade my 3930k (OC'ed at 4.4 - 4.2, from 3.2 stock for almost 3 years).  I _*know*_ it'll not give much better perf if i go to Haswell-E but I like shiny new things



You got that right. New Things is nice, but i also hate waste of Money. Thats why i just cant make a decision. Keep or upgrade.


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## XL-R8R (Jul 23, 2015)

Power consumption was my main reason for upgrading......I have a similar setup lurking around to your current one listed as "Antique" in my signature area.

For games, the 3520/920 I had was nearly (within 10% clock-for-clock) as quick as my current CPU.... the RAM was obviously slower but not very noticeable and it ran warmer then the never tech does (duh!)


In all fairness, if you dont care about power usage, I'd hold out until the next release from Intel and grab someones cheap X79 or X99 (preferably) cast-off's when they upgrade for peen value as it'll be a true investment and a definite upgrade instead of a side-grade/something barely noticeable for the loot spent.


Hold off.


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## EarthDog (Jul 23, 2015)

XL-R8R said:


> Power consumption was my main reason for upgrading...


You F@H or something that has your PC pegged 24/7?

If not, do the math and see how many dollars you save over the course of a year (hint: low single digits if you 'game' a few hours /day). Upgrading a CPU for solely power savings is not a good reason. You will not come close to making up the tax over the life of the CPU in most cases (again unless you run 24/7 full load).


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

EarthDog said:


> "Whit"?
> 
> I would upgrade to Skylake when it releases. The performance difference, in benchmarks, is likely going to be on the order of 50% clock for clock. There is also SATA3, M.2, DDR4 etc. Now... is that ? Maybe. Depends on how you use your PC. While the 920 is plenty serviceable, I would want another CPU after 6 years.



Sorry about my riding. English is not my main language.

Well i already have sata 3 and USB 3.0. So i cant even use that as an excuse. I have these Little sucker in my motherboard: https://www.asus.com/Motherboard-Accessories/U3S6/

About DDR4 and other new Things. I dont now because besides gaming i only do normal surfing and random stuf on the old pc. No encoding and other Things like that.


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## sneekypeet (Jul 23, 2015)

Buy a new case....

All the fun of a build, but none of the cost. I really cannot see investing near or over $1000 for surfing and "random stuff".


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

So i beginnig to get an understanding that most off you would keep the old CPU. Cause power saving isent that much and the more power i get vs. Money i spend is not worth it for my use.

Am i wrong?


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## dorsetknob (Jul 23, 2015)

You got a nice  very overclockable motherboard suitable for a sidegrade/upgrade

Have you considered  going   "" 6 core Xeon  ""
They fit your motherboard     Socket1366
They are relatively cheap either throu the forums or from ebay
Very overclockable ( see the Xeon owners thread for examples )
A X5670 would suit you for upgrading 
Read the Xeon owners thread and consider that as a cheap option for you


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## jjnissanpatfan (Jul 23, 2015)

I am still waiting for my I7 to die. I bought it when it first came out. Still waiting for it to die. I have had it overclocked from day one...CO stepping also first ones. With a decent video card and SSD....i can not justify spending more money for newer CPU and board. I have helped a few friends with newer builds and they are shinny but perform close to what i have. So until this beast dies...video cards will have do. When i built this i had a 9800GTX 512mg then a 5850,6970 and now R9  2900. So i am waiting for a power surge or something...my battery died on my battery back-up and i have it plug into the wall. That has to help my chances at making this old cpu die.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

dorsetknob said:


> You got a nice  very overclockable motherboard suitable for a sidegrade/upgrade
> 
> Have you considered  going   "" 6 core Xeon  ""
> They fit your motherboard     Socket1366
> ...



I dit have it in my mind upgrade just the cpu whit a xeon or an I7 970/980. But these CPU are also old and would they give any thing in games. I mean most games if even any games out there cant handle more than 4 cpu cores so would 6 cores even give me any thing. I mean i am not end coding or other cpu heavy Things, and if i even dit i would properly use software that supports nvidia´s cuda core any way. I have two nice GTX 970 that cut do that part ans shut be far faster than any cpu can do even Intels 8 core monster I7 5960X.

But it is a nice idea. What do others think about it?


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## Pill Monster (Jul 23, 2015)

My mate has a 4Ghz 920 and 290 VaporX. He runs Assetto Corsa maxed out at about 85fps.


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## OneMoar (Jul 23, 2015)

hell going to LGA 1150 would be a upgrade the difference in IPC  between Nehalem and haswell is like 20%
which is pretty significant


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

jjnissanpatfan said:


> I am still waiting for my I7 to die. I bought it when it first came out. Still waiting for it to die. I have had it overclocked from day one...CO stepping also first ones. With a decent video card and SSD....i can not justify spending more money for newer CPU and board. I have helped a few friends with newer builds and they are shinny but perform close to what i have. So until this beast dies...video cards will have do. When i built this i had a 9800GTX 512mg then a 5850,6970 and now R9  2900. So i am waiting for a power surge or something...my battery died on my battery back-up and i have it plug into the wall. That has to help my chances at making this old cpu die.



I now what you mean. These old first gen i7 will just not die. So you have a CO i7 920 oc to 3.8 GHz according to your profile lasting close to 7 years now and run oc the hole time. That is dam impresive. And CO even tend to need more voltage than a DO like mine at same clocks and by that also runnig hotter. This could mean my CPU can end up lasting for years to come cause mine have only being oc the last 3 years. The first 4 years it just run stock. Oh my. Looks like to kill these old ladies i need to overvoltage it alot.

About GFX i have also had 4 different Cards whit this one CPU. 3 x GTX 285 3 way sli, 2 x GTX 570 sli, 2 X GTX 660 TI sli and now 2 x GTX 970 sli. GFX does not last for long for sure. About two years for me and then they are to slow for me.


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

OneMoar said:


> hell going to LGA 1150 would be a upgrade the difference in IPC  between Nehalem and haswell is like 20%
> which is pretty significant



If im upgrade now im going LGA 1151/skylake since it just around the corner. Going LGA 1150 would be stupid unless i bay used part off cause.


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## OneMoar (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> If im upgrade now im going LGA 1151/skylake since it just around the corner. Going LGA 1150 would be stupid unless i bay used part off cause.


was just a example at the potential performance difference
I don't expect skylake to be a Significant upgrade from haswell/broadwell tho couple percent in IPC maby


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## peche (Jul 23, 2015)

sneekypeet said:


> Buy a new case....
> All the fun of a build, but none of the cost. I really cannot see investing near or over $1000 for surfing and "random stuff".


really best advice...
i will add a custom water loop for wasting some money ...




dorsetknob said:


> You got a nice  very overclockable motherboard suitable for a sidegrade/upgrade
> 
> Have you considered  going   "" 6 core Xeon  ""
> They fit your motherboard     Socket1366
> ...


another great response here....


indeed,
you don’t have the need of a new system, but if you have the money sell the motherboard, ram and processor and get the new baby… you must reuse your old hardware… 970SLI pretty kickass my friend…!

also the option of a cheap hexa core xeon is pretty interesting…


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

Oh alright just an exsample.

I agreed about the performence difference over the last years. It dit nok give that huge difference between gen´s. And so will skylike also be.

The real question is now will a new cpu give me a significant boost in games or shut i just keep the old cpu?


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## peche (Jul 23, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> The real question is now will a new cpu give me a significant boost in games or shut i just keep the old cpu?


again ... keep it .... 
you said you dont need it with all your previous posts lad


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## Tomgang (Jul 23, 2015)

peche said:


> again ... keep it ....
> you said you dont need it with all your previous posts lad



alright I think this decide it. Im keeping the old I7 920 for a while longer then. It looks like most of you agreed to that.
And yes GTX 970 SLI is not bad and they overclock like nothing else i have had before + they er pretty energy efficiency compared to older Card i have had. like GTX 570 had a TDP of 219 watt compared to GTX 970 TDP of just 145 for refference Card of cause. Even my GTX 660 TI had a TDP of 150 watt. Nvida dit a great job whit Maxwell GPU.

I am having the hexa core in my mind as an option. But they are also old and are there even games out there that can handle more than 4 cores. In some games more cores even have a negative effect in performence.


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## Brusfantomet (Jul 24, 2015)

As someone that had a i7 920 and got a 5820k, i can tell you that i dont realy feal a difference here. I mostly did it to get a M-2 SSD, wich is nice and all, but not that noticeable. I have the old computer as a backup, and the only place the new one does anything better is round times in civ 5.

Get a sick ass water cooling setup with one or more external radiators, smear the internals of the chassis with blocks and get a fancy PWM fan controller. when the 920 finally dies/ is noticeably slow, put that water cooling stuff in a new computer.

Also, a OCed x99 platform is not any less power hungry than a OCed x58.


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## peche (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> I am having the hexa core in my mind as an option. But they are also old and are there even games out there that can handle more than 4 cores. In some games more cores even have a negative effect in performence.


again your answers tell the truth ... no need for it ...




Brusfantomet said:


> Get a sick ass water cooling setup with one or more external radiators, smear the internals of the chassis with blocks and get a fancy PWM fan controller. when the 920 finally dies/ is noticeably slow, put that water cooling stuff in a new computer.


there you go ...


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

Brusfantomet said:


> As someone that had a i7 920 and got a 5820k, i can tell you that i dont realy feal a difference here. I mostly did it to get a M-2 SSD, wich is nice and all, but not that noticeable. I have the old computer as a backup, and the only place the new one does anything better is round times in civ 5.
> 
> Get a sick ass water cooling setup with one or more external radiators, smear the internals of the chassis with blocks and get a fancy PWM fan controller. when the 920 finally dies/ is noticeably slow, put that water cooling stuff in a new computer.
> 
> Also, a OCed x99 platform is not any less power hungry than a OCed x58.



Well if a I7 5820K not even can give a real noticeable performence increase i would say nothing can right now. incredibly how this now 6 year old cpu just keeping hitting new cpu´s in the face in games. Sure for encoding a I7 5820K would spank an old I7 920. But for gaming first gen i7 whas a home run it looks like.

Well i am keeping that I7 920 when. New cpu looks to be whaste off Money just for gaming when.


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

i game and i went thru a lot of CPU, including a i7-920 ... well it doesn't even compare to my actual i5-4690K, sure it was a i7 nice'n all and a 1366 platform to add to the positive point, but man Nehalem is just showing how old it is now, i went to a FX-6300 and that one already got some decent better result than the 920 then i got a i5-2400 during my Z77 transition and a Xeon E3-1275v2 which was quite a good one, several low model like a Athlon 760K or a A10-7700K during a low budget phase and then finally the i5-4690K which is totally worth it's money paid for ... and top notch for gaming (could go 4790K but it would be a waste of money imho, i do no encoding or need more than 4 thread atm)

positive point ? well it might cost a bit (but still cost less than the whole 1366 at the time) and yet it still eat less power (well wast of money is on your power consumption it seems for you   ) and oc a bit better (personal experience i had a Rampage III Extreme and a HR-02 Macho at the time)

Skylake is a worthy upgrade for anything lower than a i7 Ivy (well even for that one it would be a upgrade) but not over a Haswell/Haswell refresh ... may i just ask why you think of a Haswell-E as a upgrade for a 1366 setup as even a 1150 setup would yeld a substantial amelioration over that 920 (it's not like you had a 990X  )

not a exact truth ... but
http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/463/Intel_Core_i7_i7-4790K_vs_Intel_Core_i7_i7-920.html

look at single and multi threaded perf differences for example...


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

GreiverBlade said:


> i game and i went thru a lot of CPU, including a i7-920 ... well it doesn't even compare to my actual i5-4690K, sure it was a i7 nice'n all and a 1366 platform to add to the positive point, but man Nehalem is just showing how old it is now, i went to a FX-6300 and that one already got some decent better result than the 920 then i got a i5-2400 during my Z77 transition and a Xeon E3-1275v2 which was quite a good one, several low model like a Athlon 760K or a A10-7700K during a low budget phase and then finally the i5-4690K which is totally worth it's money paid for ... and top notch for gaming (could go 4790K but it would be a waste of money imho, i do no encoding or need more than 4 thread atm)
> 
> positive point ? well it might cost a bit (but still cost less than the whole 1366 at the time) and yet it still eat less power (well wast of money is on your power consumption it seems for you   ) and oc a bit better (personal experience i had a Rampage III Extreme and a HR-02 Macho at the time)
> 
> ...



I can not use that link to much. Because that link only shows the performence of a stock i7 920 vs. stock I7 4790K and of cause a i7 4790K will going around a stock i7 920 in cirkels when it is stock.

Dit your run your I7 920 stock speed at all time og dit you overclock and if yes how much?


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> I can not use that link to much. Because that link only shows the performence of a stock i7 920 vs. stock I7 4790K and of cause a i7 4790K will going around a stock i7 920 in cirkels when it is stock.
> 
> Dit your run your I7 920 stock speed at all time og dit you overclock and if yes how much?


4.0 with the Macho my 4690K is 4.5 atm (more 4499)

maybe more relevant
http://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i7-920-vs-Intel-Core-i7-4790K/1981vs2384


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> I am having the hexa core in my mind as an option. But they are also old and are there even games out there that can handle more than 4 cores. In some games more cores even have a negative effect in performence.


Aye..? You got 8 cores already, just turn on HT..........


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

Pill Monster said:


> Aye..? You got 8 cores already, just turn on HT..........



Wrong HT is not 8 cores but 8 threads and it is not the same thing. i7 920 is a quad core cpu whit 8 threads.
And more or less all games cant use HT to any thing. Crysis 3 is the only game i now that can take avantage of HT.
HT can even just as whit more than 4 core have a negative effect in game performence.

As it is now for most games right now a hign clokket quad core is the bedst choise, but you never now in the future if more games will beginnig to use more than 4 cores.
It is not impossible since back when i got the i7 920 all cryed out it whas Waste of Money since more or less all games only used 2 cores or even only one core. Today 4 core are the standart and in 4-6 years 6 cores are properly the standart.


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> Wrong HT is not 8 cores but 8 threads and it is not the same thing. i7 920 is a quad core cpu whit 8 threads.
> And more or less all games cant use HT to any thing. Crysis 3 is the only game i now that can take avantage of HT.
> HT can even just as whit more than 4 core have a negative effect in game performence.
> 
> ...


 Thanks but I know how HT works, as far as the kernel scheduler is concerned you have 8 cores.  And what you're saying is completely untrue... 

Majority of DX11 games released in the last 3 years support simultaneous multithreading on at least 6 cores and are coded to work with HT. 
And why wouldn't they be since development is initially centered on next gen consoles powered by 8 core AMD Jaguar APU's,   

Only games I've seen showing a drop in performance with extra threads were testing 12 cores on Intels.


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## dorsetknob (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> The real question is now will a new cpu give me a significant boost in games or shut i just keep the old cpu?



Ok   you desire (not need) New Cpu 
so Buy one 
then the motherboard
then the cooler (if yours not Suitable )
Oh Your need New Ram ( DDR4 of Course  say  16 gig )
  whats the Bill for that lot ???
right now offset the Cost you can recover from say ebay
for your 
old used CPU
old used motherboard
Old Used Ram

or you buy hex ( 6 ) core Xeon sell your old I7920 and use every thing else
How bad do you want to upgrade and how much will it cost you

or some one Slaps you round the face and you realize your dreaming


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## OneMoar (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> Wrong HT is not 8 cores but 8 threads and it is not the same thing. i7 920 is a quad core cpu whit 8 threads.
> And more or less all games cant use HT to any thing. Crysis 3 is the only game i now that can take avantage of HT.
> HT can even just as whit more than 4 core have a negative effect in game performence.
> 
> ...


hyper-threading has seen a massive improvement since LGA 1366
it is orders of magnitude more effective then it was on nehalem
then there is the Instructions per-clock improvement
bottom line is a LGA 1366 i7, even clocked to 4Ghz is still going to be a pretty significant bottleneck
it will also use nearly triple the power of a haswell/skylake chip


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

^I think the Op may be a little bored.  In the first post he said he was playing GTAV, it's no secret GTAV is optimized for Octacores,


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## brandonwh64 (Jul 24, 2015)

I ran a I7-920 at work for a long time and it never let me down (besides PSU issues) and I just retired it today since the company I work for ordered the IT department the new ASUS G10AJ gaming desktops with the I7-4790 and GTX 970.


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

GreiverBlade said:


> not a exact truth ... but
> http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/463/Intel_Core_i7_i7-4790K_vs_Intel_Core_i7_i7-920.html
> 
> look at single and multi threaded perf differences for example...


Yeah and then take a look at the clocks. The 4790 has nearly 1400mhz advantage over Nehalam.  

Nehalam can overclock 1400mhz.


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## R-T-B (Jul 24, 2015)

Nehalem will serve you fine.

Yes there have been hyperthreading improvements, instructions per clock improvements, etc.  You would get a slight performance boost from upgrading, but nothing near worth your money you'd spend.

And Nehalem hyperthreading is still well above Northwood hyperthreading... lol


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## RejZoR (Jul 24, 2015)

I'm on the same and frankly I don't see any point in going with Skylake. At least not with 6700k. If it was a hexacore with 12 threads, then I'd reconsider. But it has identical cores arrangement and that's just lame for year 2015...


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## R-T-B (Jul 24, 2015)

RejZoR said:


> I'm on the same and frankly I don't see any point in going with Skylake. At least not with 6700k. If it was a hexacore with 12 threads, then I'd reconsider. But it has identical cores arrangement and that's just lame for year 2015...



I agree, unless there are like massive IPC improvements hidden away or something, stay where you are man!


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

Pill Monster said:


> Yeah and then take a look at the clocks. The 4790 has nearly 1400mhz advantage over Nehalam.
> 
> Nehalam can overclock 1400mhz.


then take a look at my 920 clock in the post following (god, i didn't know i could OC my 920 before ... thanks  )... and then take notice that a 4790K can also be overclocked ...  so is my 4690K ... oh wait it's not a HT CPU but just a plain quadcore .... which still run in circle around my ex 920 in any games ... ok maybe not in multithread optimized games.... who are legions, right? (sadly ... 4 core is standard ... lame, eh? wait ... better IPC isn't it better than higher number of cores? i guess not.)
http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/t...-skylake-haswell-e.214561/page-2#post-3319412



R-T-B said:


> Nehalem will serve you fine.
> 
> Yes there have been hyperthreading improvements, instructions per clock improvements, etc.  You would get a slight performance boost from upgrading, but nothing near worth your money you'd spend.
> 
> And Nehalem hyperthreading is still well above Northwood hyperthreading... lol


if he want to upgrade ... well... and also if he didn't choose Skylake and Haswell-E as only option...

time to put trusty Nehalems to sleep ... it's not really what you say now ... getting a "slight" boost? then we didn't had the same 920... the IPC improvement from Haswell Devil Canyon alone is enough to justify the price difference (otherwise i would still be on my 920 too ... )


i did the jump, to a Haswell Devil Canyon setup: absolutely not regreting it, totally worth the change and price, now i can skip Skylake (which i wouldn't have if i stayed on the 920) things would have been a different story if i had a i7 990X maybe i wouldn't have (tho the price alone of the 990x ... versus a 920 versus a 4690K  )


that conclusion is true and point not only on stock but also if oc'ed .... ofc a OC'ed Nehalem has a higher boost (+30% versus +17%) over a 4770K
"The Intel Core i7-920 is five and a half years old which puts it at an enormous disadvantage to more modern processors. The 920 sports four cores and eight threads which is the same basic configuration that Intel still uses in the majority of their i7s. Comparing the 920 to the 4770K, its modern day equivalent, shows that 920 lags by 63% at stock speeds and by 44% when both processors are overclocked. Overclocking improves the 920 by 30% vs just 17% for the 4770K. Aside from approximately 50% more calculation throughput the 4770K offers lower power consumption, compatibility with Intel's latest FCLGA1150 platform, on-board graphics and newer CPU instructions. Owners of the 920 should probably consider upgrading not only to improve system response times but also to take advantage of the newer platform. "


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

GreiverBlade said:


> then take a look at my 920 clock in the post following ... and then take notice that a 4790K can also be overclocked ...  so is my 4690K ... oh wait it's not a HT CPU but just a plain quadcore .... which still run in circle around my ex 920 in any games ... ok maybe not in multithread optimized games.... who are legions, right? (sadly ... 4 core is standard ... lame, eh? wait ... better IPC isn't it better than higher number of cores? i guess not.)
> http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/t...-skylake-haswell-e.214561/page-2#post-3319412
> 
> 
> ...


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

GreiverBlade said:


> then take a look at my 920 clock in the post following ... and then take notice that a 4790K can also be overclocked ...  so is my 4690K ... oh wait it's not a HT CPU but just a plain quadcore .... which still run in circle around my ex 920 in any games ... ok maybe not in multithread optimized games.... who are legions, right? (sadly ... 4 core is standard ... lame, eh? wait ... better IPC isn't it better than higher number of cores? i guess not.)
> http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/t...-skylake-haswell-e.214561/page-2#post-3319412
> 
> 
> ...


 You're missing the whole point. He already owns the 920.

It doesn't matter if you can overclock the Haswell or that it performs better.  If the 920 @ 4Ghz is even close to the i7 at stock there's no point spending money to buy a 4790, because he gets near Haswell performance for FREE.


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

oh he already own a 920 ... wow thanks for making me realizing that ... (as i did not own the 920 i was running previously ... and OC'ed to 4.0 which is still under my current 4690K )
yeah ... "close to" is good enough right. (well yes it will be only 33% slower instead of 63% )

btw a 4690K is close to a 4790K (if no HT BS involved) so i wasn't implying to switch for a i7 ... even a i5 is worth the money for gaming.


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

I don't  what's up my broswer its acting funny...  I'll be right back .
Hmm very strange....



Anyway all good, glad we can agree


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

dorsetknob said:


> Ok   you desire (not need) New Cpu
> so Buy one
> then the motherboard
> then the cooler (if yours not Suitable )
> ...



i did that .... except that i stayed on DDR3 (since DDR4 is not really a huuuuuge improvement over DDR3 even with Skylake around the corner, well mainly because i did upgrade on DC launch  ) and nobody slaped me around ... since i was not dreaming ...
(i got 30% of my actuall mobo/cpu/ram off by selling the 1366 platform  )

funny i just noticed that saying "no need to upgrade" to a 920 user is like saying that to a FX-6300 user ... but unlike the 920 user the FX-6300 user will get a totally different salsa... "yes worth it!!!" "yes change that crap, it's 20% slower than XXX CPU" "AMD is not up the job you really should change" etc etc etc


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## R-T-B (Jul 24, 2015)

Brusfantomet said:


> As someone that had a i7 920 and got a 5820k, i can tell you that i dont realy feal a difference here. I mostly did it to get a M-2 SSD, wich is nice and all, but not that noticeable. I have the old computer as a backup, and the only place the new one does anything better is round times in civ 5.
> 
> Get a sick ass water cooling setup with one or more external radiators, smear the internals of the chassis with blocks and get a fancy PWM fan controller. when the 920 finally dies/ is noticeably slow, put that water cooling stuff in a new computer.
> 
> Also, a OCed x99 platform is not any less power hungry than a OCed x58.



This is all true.





GreiverBlade said:


> i did the jump, to a Haswell Devil Canyon setup: absolutely not regreting it, totally worth the change and price, now i can skip Skylake (which i wouldn't have if i stayed on the 920) things would have been a different story if i had a i7 990X maybe i wouldn't have (tho the price alone of the 990x ... versus a 920 versus a 4690K  )



I went from a i7 990x to a Haswell-E 5820k and experienced almost nothing.

Do not get me wrong, the chipset is nice, as is the lower power consumption, but for gaming?  There are far better ways to improve your fps for your dollar.


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## Tatty_One (Jul 24, 2015)

I was in a similar dilemma a few months ago, I had a 930 @ 4.4gig for years and decided to go 1150 and now have a 4670K, I see (and feel) a performance difference at the same clocks but not huge numbers, I would have stayed where I was if I could have gotten my hands on a decent and cost effective 970 hex core at the time, I looked at going down the 990x route but they were just stupid money everywhere, in the end it was much cheaper to go the 1150 Haswell route than buy one of them beasts.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jul 24, 2015)

I would stay with the 920.

If it aint broke.....dont fix it.


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

GreiverBlade said:


> i did that .... except that i stayed on DDR3 (since DDR4 is not really a huuuuuge improvement over DDR3 even with Skylake around the corner, well mainly because i did upgrade on DC launch  ) and nobody slaped me around ... since i was not dreaming ...
> (i got 30% of my actuall mobo/cpu/ram off by selling the 1366 platform  )
> 
> funny i just noticed that saying "no need to upgrade" to a 920 user is like saying that to a FX-6300 user ... but unlike the 920 user the FX-6300 user will get a totally different salsa... "yes worth it!!!" "yes change that crap, it's 20% slower than XXX CPU" "AMD is not up the job you really should change" etc etc etc


Lmao. I know what you mean.  

I have an 8320 which I got about 2.5yrs ago. At the time on Guru there were very few people with AMD rigs and even fewer with Vishera.
Man we got that much shit from Intel SB/IB fanboys over Piledriver's performance u just about needed a flakjacket.
Anytime a new game was benched the forums would get spammed with benchmark results, talk of AMD's imminent demise and ofc the TDP of an OC'd Vishera which apparently is enough to keep an Eskimo nice and toasty in his igloo over winter. or something..  I almost felt like apologising...

It's crazy how some people can that wound up and emotional over hardware they don't even own.    I often thought to myself "yes but have a 3570k, why do you care you care about my CPU?" lol

Anyway the irony of courses is since then Piledriver's general performance in games has skyrocketed, as was expected.  Or more specifically games were better optimised for the architecture.


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

So after reading all your post and thinking about it.

I deside i will keep it and then NeXT year bay a complete new machine cause most of the hardware in my pc is also old like over 6 years now like PSU and most of the harddrives in the pc and whit that it is getting pretty old. So if all goes well i would properly go whit a Broadwell-E cpu based setup. And keep this old sucker if it stil is alive by the end of 2016 as a second gamer/backup machine besides i would not get much from it any way in a sale so i keep it. Its my precious...

Thanks to you all for your responds and advise.


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## GreiverBlade (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> So after reading all your post and thinking about it.
> 
> I deside i will keep it and then NeXT year bay a complete new machine cause most of the hardware in my pc is also old like over 6 years now like PSU and most of the harddrives in the pc and whit that it is getting pretty old. So if all goes well i would properly go whit a Broadwell-E cpu based setup. And keep this old sucker if it stil is alive by the end of 2016 as a second gamer/backup machine besides i would not get much from it any way in a sale so i keep it. Its my precious...
> 
> Thanks to you all for your responds and advise.


Skylake-E,  Broadwell-E just took an arrow in the knee (well "just" is not the right word, since it has been confirmed a while ago) and will likely not see the day, only mobile CPU, like my i5-5200U and 2 desktop are Broadwell as it seems Haswell arch didn't like the 14nm die shrink (broadwell is haswell shrink with a beffier IGP)


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## Moofachuka (Jul 24, 2015)

I was thinking the same as OP if I should upgrade to Skylake as well.  But I have a i7 980 and it's still rocking all my games with my dual 7970.  I probably end up upgrade to single 980 ti instead though...  I prefer AMD, but they're not doing well financially...  Just what if they go out of business or get bought or something...


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## peche (Jul 24, 2015)

I'm pretty amazed that this 3 page thread stills on fire… even when OP already decided to keep the current Setup,

don’t know why some people still on the idea to upgrade processor, why? there will not be any ultra notable boost on games, OP said that he mostly will be on gaming with that rig…

also, according to system specs of the OP, he may replace just the cooler for that rig,  ram memory is pretty fine, no problem with the currently owned 12 GB is actually half of the maximum allowed speed for that processor according to ark intel:

http://ark.intel.com/es/products/37...rocessor-8M-Cache-2_66-GHz-4_80-GTs-Intel-QPI


those intel older i7 models are powerful enough now days, so don’t worry here in the job I have 2 i7's if you want a opinion, i7 870 stock and also the other i7 3770, both of them are used for work 24/7, my job main rig is the old 870 why? I do have the 3770 in the office too?

there is no notable difference on several things between those processor, that’s why I don’t ever bother making the changes, old 870 still brave enough, and lets me do my all day job,

I'm completely aware that i7 870 is marginally newer than the 920 but is just aan opinion for those that said that the old processor needs a rest,

@Tomgang  I truly recommend you the following,

1-If you are 101% sure to keep the current hardware ask a admin for closing the thread, this is gonna be endless, 
2- if you are going to get new processor take on consideration Devil's Cannyon, pretty interesting family / models, nothing to envy to Skylake, also if you are going to make a new rig take an i5 on consideration, just for gaming i5's are the deal!


cheer everyone in this thread! thanks for the good time reading all the different opinions!


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## RealNeil (Jul 24, 2015)

I have a 4690K and a 4790K. Both are great systems and they game all of my games at speed.
If the OP were to do the upgrade, he would never look back.

I can see getting emotionally attached to a good motherboard and CPU combo.
I was an AMD guy for years, and then I won a Lynnfield i7-870 system in a contest. 
It was smokin' fast in its day and I loved it.

But along came the groundbreaking i7-2600K, and its performance was outstanding across the board. 
I never could bring myself to get rid of the i7-870. It sits on a shelf here at the house with Linux on it. It still runs great.

Now that I have the i5-4690K and the i7-4790K systems up and running, I should retire this i7-2600K that I'm typing on right now. But it works so well!    LOL!

I guess that what I'm saying is that it's normal to get attached to your old PC. Most of us picked the parts for them, built them, and tweaked them for  years. It's easy to love the fruits of your labor and many of us do just that.
Just don't hobble yourself for the love of old technology and miss out on the new stuff. It is good technology and worth owning now. 

Your old PC will still do the job, but the i7-4790K is a beast compared to it.
You say that you can afford to buy it, and I think that you should because you'll be treating yourself to something good. You'll like it too.

Just my two cents,.....


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## ZenZimZaliben (Jul 24, 2015)

RealNeil said:


> I have a 4690K and a 4790K. Both are great systems and they game all of my games at speed.
> If the OP were to do the upgrade, he would never look back.
> 
> I can see getting emotionally attached to a good motherboard and CPU combo.
> ...



Emotionally attached and it still performs very well. Like I check my benchmarks in Heaven, 3dmark, Super Pi,  and I am easily ranking towards the top compared to submissions on  this site and faster than 96% of the computers out there according to 3dmark. i7 9xx series is a beast and the triple channel memory gives it an edge over the dual channel i7 and i5's. It is hard to justify the cost for 10-20% increase in FPS.

Keep the i7 920, get a newer GPU and run the i7 920 until games start to be limited by your cpu power/bandwidth. At 4.2ghz on the i7 920 you really aren't going to get much more out of it without some extreme cooling. But a new video card would have a much bigger impact than a new cpu/mobo.


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## peche (Jul 24, 2015)

ZenZimZaliben said:


> Emotionally attached and it still performs very well. Like I check my benchmarks in Heaven, 3dmark, Super Pi, and I am easily ranking towards the top compared to submissions on this site and faster than 96% of the computers out there according to 3dmark. i7 9xx series is a beast and the triple channel memory gives it an edge over the dual channel i7 and i5's. It is hard to justify the cost for 10-20% increase in FPS.


finally !



ZenZimZaliben said:


> get a newer GPU


OP has a GTX 970 2 way sli ... look at his system specs....


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## ZenZimZaliben (Jul 24, 2015)

peche said:


> finally !
> 
> 
> OP has a GTX 970 2 way sli ... look at his system specs....



Ahhh so he does. Well then maybe overclock the 970's but really that system should be able to handle almost any game at 1440 or less.


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

Guys i all ready deside the i7 920´s fate, so why continue the discussing?

Im keeping the old I7 920 and then getting a complete new system NeXT year. I am deffently not gonna getting new GPU´s now, that would be so stupid. To get the same performence from one Card i would stil need a GTX 980 TI or something like that Card. And getting much power powerful GPU setup i dont need and i think the cpu also would beginning to be a bottleneck when. I dont think the cpu would have the power to feed lets say 2 GTX 980 TI in sli. So NeXT GPU update Means for me a new CPU and thats final.


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## Pill Monster (Jul 24, 2015)

RealNeil said:


> I have a 4690K and a 4790K. Both are great systems and they game all of my games at speed.
> If the OP were to do the upgrade, he would never look back.
> 
> I can see getting emotionally attached to a good motherboard and CPU combo.
> ...



About 10yrs ago I had an XP 2800+ Barton installed on an  nForce2 ABIT AN7.
In 2004 nForce2 was king, and the undisputed kings of nForce2 were the ABIT AN7, and DFI Lanparty.
However the AN7 had one very unique feature which made it stand out from the Laparty, it had a Soundstorm audio chip with built in 5.1 Dolby Digital Live hardware encoding 
Might not sound  much but remember this is back in 2004   At the time it was unheard of.  In fact the Soundstorm was so expensive to make Nvidia discontinued it with nForce3.



Anyway point is I still have it today,  I just couldn't part with it and  now it sits in my office.  So yep I know  where you're coming from.


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

ZenZimZaliben said:


> Ahhh so he does. Well then maybe overclock the 970's but really that system should be able to handle almost any game at 1440 or less.



Well my two GTX 970 is overclokket to what i can get stable out of them al ready and bios is modet for at better power target from 106 % to 119 %.  Cpu is also oc so far i can whit that cooling i have now. 4.2 GHz on air cooling is not bad for this CPU.
Take a look in the first post i made there is a screenshot of my system from a 3dmark firestrike i made last month after some fine tuning to get the last bit of power out of the my system.


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## RealNeil (Jul 24, 2015)

Enjoy what you have until you're ready to upgrade. I was just responding to your original post and the desire to upgrade that you indicated.

Two 970s in SLI is indeed a potent formula for gaming these days.


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## ZenZimZaliben (Jul 24, 2015)

RealNeil said:


> Enjoy what you have until you're ready to upgrade. I was just responding to your original post and the desire to upgrade that you indicated.
> 
> Two 970s in SLI is indeed a potent formula for gaming these days.



Yeah so unless you are gaming at 4k there is very little reason to upgrade further. I am in the same boat as you. I have been on socket 1366 for over 5 years I believe....which is crazy.


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## R-T-B (Jul 24, 2015)

Pill Monster said:


> It's crazy how some people can that wound up and emotional over hardware they don't even own.    I often thought to myself "yes but have a 3570k, why do you care you care about my CPU?" lol



Hah, respect for that comment, even if we are going at it in the XP thread... 

It's so true...  hardware is hardware.  If you like what you got you don't need to upgrade, unless you got the upgrade bug in which case our advice is a self-fullfilling prophecy...



Tomgang said:


> Guys i all ready deside the i7 920´s fate, so why continue the discussing?
> 
> Im keeping the old I7 920 and then getting a complete new system NeXT year. I am deffently not gonna getting new GPU´s now, that would be so stupid. To get the same performence from one Card i would stil need a GTX 980 TI or something like that Card. And getting much power powerful GPU setup i dont need and i think the cpu also would beginning to be a bottleneck when. I dont think the cpu would have the power to feed lets say 2 GTX 980 TI in sli. So NeXT GPU update Means for me a new CPU and thats final.



You lit the fire...  don't blame us that it can never be truly extinguished.


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

ZenZimZaliben said:


> Yeah so unless you are gaming at 4k there is very little reason to upgrade further. I am in the same boat as you. I have been on socket 1366 for over 5 years I believe....which is crazy.



i think you responde to the wrong person

But year GTX 970 sli rocks for sure. I got my CPU on may 2009 i remember it.
Intel released the I7 920 back in november 2008 but i dit nok bay one right after release cause i waited for the better DO Stepping to be released and boy am i glad i dit that. Whit a CO 4.2 GHz on air would properly nok have been possible whit out it melting away.


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## ZenZimZaliben (Jul 24, 2015)

Tomgang said:


> Well my two GTX 970 is overclokket to what i can get stable out of them al ready and bios is modet for at better power target from 106 % to 119 %.  Cpu is also oc so far i can whit that cooling i have now. 4.2 GHz on air cooling is not bad for this CPU.
> Take a look in the first post i made there is a screenshot of my system from a 3dmark firestrike i made last month after some fine tuning to get the last bit of power out of the my system.



Look at your 3dmark Firestrike compared other systems. An i7 5820k with 2 gtx970s scores around 20k...You scored 17k. Not a huge difference and in real world this will at a maximum be like 10% - 20% more FPS. http://www.3dmark.com/fs/3654149 - Notice the biggest difference is between your Physics scores, which is based on the CPU so that is the biggest improvement you would see.


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## Tomgang (Jul 24, 2015)

ZenZimZaliben said:


> Look at your 3dmark Firestrike compared other systems. An i7 5820k with 2 gtx780s scores around 20k...You scored 17k. Not a huge difference and in real world this will at a maximum be like 10% - 20% more FPS. http://www.3dmark.com/fs/3654149 - Notice the biggest difference is between your Physics scores, which is based on the CPU so that is the biggest improvement you would see.



hmm not 17K but close to 16K yes. I can se your point and that system is also overclock so if that system run stock my score would be even closer to it. Taking another system whit a I7 4790K and whit two GTX 980 sli but cpu and GPU runs stock my system is even closer two. http://www.3dmark.com/fs/4937464

And by that should we put this post to sleep. I have made up my mind and this can keep on going else but se no point in that.


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## Tatty_One (Jul 24, 2015)

I think this one is all wrapped up now ..... thanks!


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