Best budget Intel CPU for the GTX 970

[Matt7262]

As the title says, I'm looking for a new CPU to fit my new graphics card. I currently have the Xeon E3 1220v2. It is not a good performer, and bottlenecks most games. The 970 is simply too good for the Xeon.

I am on a budget though (>$300), so what would be the best Intel CPU to fit the GTX 970? Any socket will do, I am probably going to replace my motherboard too.

Thanks

 

[Darkbreeze]

Does that budget INCLUDE a motherboard, or do you have additional budget room for that plus memory, which will likely be needed unless you want a last gen system. Are you planning or wanting to be able to overclock or no?

 

[Matt7262]

No it doesn't include the motherboard and RAM sorry. I should have been more specific. And yes I am planning to overclock.

 

[SkyEvil]

i5 6600k fits your budget and it's a great CPU for gaming with overclocking capabilities: http://pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80662i56600k
If you would like to keep using your ddr3 ram go for i5 4690k, it's just slightly less powerful (5-10%) than i5 6600k and you can also overclock it: http://pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80646i54690k

 

[Darkbreeze]

Honestly, the non-K i7-6700 is probably your best bet right now, at just over 300 dollars, and then wait a week or two for the ASRock H170 Performance/Hyper to hit shelves, that enables you to be able to do major BCLK overclocking on that CPU even though it's not a K sku chip.

It will be a very good board and much less expensive than comparable Z170 board models that still won't allow you to overclock on non-K chips.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/asrock-non-z170-bclk-overclocking-motherboards,31362.html

 

[SirDoctorK]

As the title says, I'm looking for a new CPU to fit my new graphics card. I currently have the Xeon E3 1220v2. It is not a good performer, and bottlenecks most games. The 970 is simply too good for the Xeon.

I am on a budget though (>$300), so what would be the best Intel CPU to fit the GTX 970? Any socket will do, I am probably going to replace my motherboard too.

Thanks

I'm assuming you intended that your budget is less than $300. With that budget, since that's just for the processor, the i5-6600K would be a great option (perhaps without the K if you have no intent to overclock). As others have said, you may be able to squeeze an i7-6700 non-K out of that budget, but for most games, it won't make a meaningful difference.

Keep in mind that that would require DDR4 RAM, so if you'd rather use DDR3, the previous-gen offerings are still great options. I reckon the i7-4790 would be the highest you can go with that budget, but again, the difference between an i5 and i7 for gaming isn't going to be huge, so probably a previous-gen i5. If, however, you want to dabble with video editing, graphic design, or other demanding workloads, an i7 may be a good investment.

 

[Ecky]

You might just consider finding a used i7 3770, 3770K, or 8-thread 1155 Xeon as a drop-in upgrade for what you have. If buying new, my vote for an upgrade would be for an i7-6700, but you have the equivalent of an Ivy Bridge i5 already - I'm surprised it's holding you back.

What games are you playing that it's causing you problems in?

 

[Matt7262]

You might just consider finding a used i7 3770, 3770K, or 8-thread 1155 Xeon as a drop-in upgrade for what you have. If buying new, my vote for an upgrade would be for an i7-6700, but you have the equivalent of an Ivy Bridge i5 already - I'm surprised it's holding you back.

What games are you playing that it's causing you problems in?

Just Cause 3. It's a very demanding game. I get about 1fps with the Xeon E3 1220v2, and thats 1fps just on the title screen...

I even get some minor stuttering with Team Fortress 2.

I was looking on CPUBoss, and it says the Xeon E3 1220v2 is much worse than an Ivy Bridge i5.

 

[Matt7262]

I'm assuming you intended that your budget is less than $300. With that budget, since that's just for the processor, the i5-6600K would be a great option (perhaps without the K if you have no intent to overclock). As others have said, you may be able to squeeze an i7-6700 non-K out of that budget, but for most games, it won't make a meaningful difference.

Keep in mind that that would require DDR4 RAM, so if you'd rather use DDR3, the previous-gen offerings are still great options. I reckon the i7-4790 would be the highest you can go with that budget, but again, the difference between an i5 and i7 for gaming isn't going to be huge, so probably a previous-gen i5. If, however, you want to dabble with video editing, graphic design, or other demanding workloads, an i7 may be a good investment.

Thanks for the input everyone. One thing, I meant $300 AUD, not USD sorry. A bit sleepy at the time of posting this..

i5 6600k fits your budget and it's a great CPU for gaming with overclocking capabilities: http://pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80662i56600k
If you would like to keep using your ddr3 ram go for i5 4690k, it's just slightly less powerful (5-10%) than i5 6600k and you can also overclock it: http://pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80646i54690k

For the i5 6600k, I would get it, but a lot of people say that i5's aren't good for much other than gaming. I'm going to be using my PC as a 3D rendering machine, too.

Honestly, the non-K i7-6700 is probably your best bet right now, at just over 300 dollars, and then wait a week or two for the ASRock H170 Performance/Hyper to hit shelves, that enables you to be able to do major BCLK overclocking on that CPU even though it's not a K sku chip.

It will be a very good board and much less expensive than comparable Z170 board models that still won't allow you to overclock on non-K chips.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/asrock-non-z170-bclk-overclocking-motherboards,31362.html

The i7 6700 seems too expensive for me. I am in Australia and the price for one of them here is around $460

The i7 4790 is a bit too expensive for me, too.

I was thinking maybe I should just get the Core i7 4770k. Seems like a high performer that allows overclocking, is around $360 AUD ($269 usd) on Ebay, is able to use DDR3 Ram and is great for rendering and gaming. What do you think?

 

[Ecky]

The Xeon E3 1220v2 is an Ivy Bridge i5, it's just branded as a Xeon.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117288

It has 4 cores and no hyperthreading, and turbos up to 3.5ghz.

Moving to a Haswell CPU will get you about 5-10% more performance, plus whatever you get from hyperthreading if you go with an i7 instead of an i5.

 

[Darkbreeze]

This is where many people get confused. There is no "mystery" processor from the land of "xeon". A Xeon is just a processor, and in most cases, is exactly like it's i5 or i7 counterpart, but in some cases may lack the integrated graphics and I think in all cases includes support for ECC memory. For the E3 Xeons I believe that to be true in every case. The E5 Xeons might have a few other differences including support for some instruction sets not supported on the consumer chips and the Skylake E3 Xeons, which are Skylake-H chips, they are not supported on the standard B150, H110 and Z170 chipset motherboards, and must be used on the C232 and C236 chipset boards.

The Intel E3 Xeon 1241v3, for example, is for all intents and purposes, EXACTLY the same as the Haswell refresh i7-4790 NON-K CPU, except that it does not have integrated graphics like that i7 and it DOES support both non-ECC and ECC memory. Other than that, it's the same. Same performance, same support, runs on the same chipsets, uses the same chipset drivers, etc.

Xeons are not overclockable, EXCEPT the new Skylake-H Xeons are supposedly now overclockable using the BCLK settings on the couple of new ASRock boards I linked to earlier.



As to your country of origin, it might have helped to know that from the start, since PC hardware is like twice as expensive there and much of what can be obtained in the states or UK, isn't even available in your market.

For you, in your market, if you want to be able to overclock, and don't want to go with an older generation chip that isn't going to make much sense, this is about the least expensive option you have that makes any sense at all to spend money on and is of fair quality.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($357.00 @ PCCaseGear)
CPU Cooler: CRYORIG H5 Universal 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($69.00 @ PCCaseGear)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z170-HD3 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($184.00 @ CPL Online)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($61.60 @ Newegg Australia)
Total: $671.60
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-03-17 03:56 AEDT+1100