Mobo & CPU Upgrade Advice

[Briggsy]

Hi All,

I want to upgrade my Asus P6T deluxe and i7 920 early this year....

I really don't want to be paying +£1000 anything between £500 - £700 really. What are my best options:

Purchasing some of Tom's best 2011 picks in a couple of months to save cash or waiting to see what hits this year?

I want hi end and great OC perfomance, what do you think will be best value for my price range?

Thanks

 

[yassarikhan786]

I say you should wait for the offerings this year. Not too far off now

.

 

[Briggsy]

When do new lines come out? Every 3 months or as and when?

 

[yassarikhan786]

Not 100% sure, but I think the IvyBridge CPU's will be out first quarter 2012.

 

[Briggsy]

But I guess they will be mega expensive

And the mobo to go with them...

I though maybe I should upgrade one step behind the new releases to save money, that way I get to see and use the new technologies and save money at the same time...

Wonder how many other people do the same?

 

[yassarikhan786]

Ivy Bridge prices are rumoured to be similar to Sandy Bridge prices. Just wait and see

. But if you can't wait, by all means go for a Sandy Bridge setup. The performance difference between Sandy and Ivy will most likely not be that big.

 

[Briggsy]

Thanks mate...

 

[Azurite]

Ivy is launched 8th of April. I would get a Z77 mobo, the top IB cpu and a gpu from the new releases from Amd or Nvidia. Intels best IB cpu, the i7-3770K, will cost 332usd/212£. I dont know about the Z77 MB prizes yet, but i think a decent MB will cost around 130-240£. The amd 7970 prizing is said to be around the 475-525$/304-336£.

So there should be no problem to get a top notch system for around 700£. Im getting the 3770k/z77 myself

Id say IB is worth waiting for. You get lower TDP/less heat, probably better oc headroom, better igpu performance, faster video conerting and its also said that the Z77 top boards will have thunderbolt(code named lightpeak)witch is mutch faster then using usb 3.0 devices.

 

[yassarikhan786]

Some good points Ole, I think it would be a good idea to wait, but Sandy Bridge is still good if he can't wait till April

.

 

[Briggsy]

Thanks guys, really appriected....

 

[MaXiMiZe]

Ivy is launched 8th of April. I would get a Z77 mobo, the top IB cpu and a gpu from the new releases from Amd or Nvidia. Intels best IB cpu, the i7-3770K, will cost 332usd/212£. I dont know about the Z77 MB prizes yet, but i think a decent MB will cost around 130-240£. The amd 7970 prizing is said to be around the 475-525$/304-336£.

So there should be no problem to get a top notch system for around 700£. Im getting the 3770k/z77 myself

Id say IB is worth waiting for. You get lower TDP/less heat, probably better oc headroom, better igpu performance, faster video conerting and its also said that the Z77 top boards will have thunderbolt(code named lightpeak)witch is mutch faster then using usb 3.0 devices.

The i7 3770k will be about £240, a good mobo will be about 120-150 quid with the £150+ ones being high end/enthusiast boards, and the 7970 will be about £400 to £450. All costs are with the VAT factored in.

 

[Briggsy]

How come the Intel Core i7-3960X is retailing £700 atm and the IB will be £240, is there something I'm not getting?? lol

 

[Azurite]

The i7 3770k will be about £240, a good mobo will be about 120-150 quid with the £150+ ones being high end/enthusiast boards, and the 7970 will be about £400 to £450. All costs are with the VAT factored in.

The prizes i found on these products didnt say if VAT was included, so you might be right. It also depends on where you live. I pay alot more for hardware then they do in USA for example.

How come the Intel Core i7-3960X is retailing £700 atm and the IB will be £240, is there something I'm not getting?? lol

Well first off they are using different platforms. The 3960x is using LGA2011 and x79 chipsets. This cpu have very strong specs: 6 cores, 12 threads, 15mb cache and it also uses quad channel memory. This cpu is for the enthusiast's and people who needs the extra performance. Also, the extreme models have always been very expencive, and i dont think they are worth it. If you want a SB-E cpu you should buy a 3930k for half the prize almost.

IB is a mainstream cpu similar to the sandy bridge cpu's, and it uses the 1155 socket. Uses dual channnel memory, has less cores/threads/cache compared to the SB-E 3960x and 3930k.

 

[Briggsy]

Cool - Thanks

 

[MaXiMiZe]

Here's the article relating to the prices : http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/Intel-Ivy-Bridge-CPU-LGA1155,news-37362.html

 

[yassarikhan786]

Yep Azurite has hit the nail right on the head. The 2011 socket is not really worth the money and is really only for people with really deep pockets or people who won't be upgrading for a couple of years.

 

[Ya93sin]

All of the Z77 (Ivy Bridge) motherboards are ready, it's just that MSi/ASUS and the other big manufacturers are waiting for the Ivy Bridge CPUs themselves to be released. It's meant to be Q1 2012, probably will be as well bearing in mind we're just waiting on CPUs.

Prices wise it's going to be the same roughly as Sandy Bridge, maybe a bit more expensive as it's new, but Intel is mainly competing against itself with it's next couple of Ivy Bridge and Ivy Bridge E releases, AMD aren't really close enough. So the prices should still be affordable, and you should probably therefore wait. Nothing wrong with a Sandy Bridge chip on a Z77 mobo technically, but Ivy Bridge is 20% faster, so it makes more sense to wait a little while

 

[Briggsy]

Aye defo will be waiting

Thanks