A Locked i5 vs an overclockable i5

[supaman]

So what would be better? A locked i5 (4590) with an r9 390? or an overclockable i5 (4690k) with an r9 290? Also would the r9 390 be bottlenecked by the i5 4590? is there really a performance difference between an i5 4590 and the i5 4690k?

 

[StarChief]

There will be absolutely no bottlenecks with any of the above listed parts.

The 4690k Is slightly more powerful than the 4590, however if you don't care for overclocking there is also a 4690 non K version out there that's cheaper and offers identical performance at stock speeds.

 

[dextermat]

I would get the k version in case you want to overclock later

 

[synphul]

If looking to save money, I'd go with the 4590 and r9 290. The 390 is basically a rebadge of the 290 with 8gb vram which won't do much unless you're running a large resolution/mulit monitor display type setup. The overclocking of the 4690k may be beneficial later on if/when it starts to bottleneck cards that won't come out for another 3-4yrs or so (based on i5 2500k performance and current 'future' gen cards that didn't exist when the 2500k was current).

The difference in speed with a moderate to decent overclock of 4.4ghz to 4.6ghz on the 4690k over the 4590 locked i5 is a 900mhz to 1.1ghz improvement (if all 4 cores are loaded on the 4590 it will drop from 3.7 to 3.5ghz). 25% to 31% speed increase.

For most current games there's not much of a difference unless it's an extremely cpu bound title. Overclocking is more about down the road performance, being able to speed a cpu up once it begins to fall behind which will gradually happen as it ages and newer tech with improved efficiency and ipc performance comes about.

 

[InvalidError]

My $0.02: unless you are building a PC with the intent of overclocking it, don't bother with it - by the time the system starts feeling sluggish at its stock clock, it will take more than a 20% overclock to make it feel decent again. Better off saving the $100-200 extra in OC-oriented parts for the next (re-)build.

 

[synphul]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4590 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($189.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-H97-D3H ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($73.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $263.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-07-22 15:33 EDT-0400

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($219.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($25.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Asus Z97-E ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($101.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $347.95
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-07-22 15:35 EDT-0400

Yea, about an $80 difference. Not really a huge difference either way, amounts to about 2-3 trips to a fast food place for dinner over the next 3-4yrs. I'd suggest the 4590 and use the extra $80 toward a gpu upgrade but there really isn't one for that price. A gtx 970 would eat up that $80 from the price of an r9 290 and give maybe 4-5fps more in some games. To make the next real performance leap from a 290/970 would be the gtx 980 and that a couple hundred over a gtx 970 and about $300 more than the r9 290.