[SOLVED] I5 9600K vs i7 9700K. Does it make sense 2Upgrade?

[ganymede-]

Hi, these are likely straightforward questions that probably won’t be too hard to answer. Here’s the deal:

I currently have a year old ASUS MB that holds an Intel i5 9600K CPU that I have overclocked by tweaking a couple BIOS settings. I’m wondering how much faster I could make my system by upgrading my CPU?

I am thinking of buying the Intel i7 9700K CPU that I would overclock too, so it will be running close to or maybe over 5.0Ghz after adjusting to maximize speed, or that’s what I expect. I’m presently running the i5 CPU at about 4.3Ghz

The big issue I have w my current setup w the i5 CPU is that it’s too slow in copying files from my internal drives to external ones, which I do fairly often. My whole system slows down a lot when copying multiple files from one drive to another, which I find annoying. However, aside from this one issue, I’m pretty satisfied w the i5’s performance.

I would like to know if I can expect a significant increase in processing power w the new i7 CPU? The difference between the two CPUs is the i5 has 6 cores while the i7 has 8 cores. That doesn’t seem like a lot but it might be more than I realize. Also, the difference in cache seems nominal at 8MBs
vs 12MBs.

My other question is whether I should expect any difficulties w swapping out the CPUs on my computer. I am expecting that I will at the least have to adjust the overclocking options in the BIOS w the new CPU. But will I have to do any further adjustments to my system w the new CPU? Also, aside from hardware, what about my Windows 10 x64 OS? Will it simply update to the new CPU w nothing for me to do?

Again, does it make good sense for me to upgrade? This new CPU would be my main birthday gift, so I want to make sure it’s worth the upgrade bc of course there are other items I would like for my birthday.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

 

[Lutfij]

The extra cores will offset some of the burden on the CPU but I'm wondering if you have the right drivers installed on your platform and that your OS isn't corrupt since a 9th gen processor shouldn't be bogged down unless you have other processes in the background.

Make and model of your motherboard? If it's the specs listed in your sig space, please find it in your heart to list your specs in teh body of the thread. Reason being is that the sig space specs can and will change over time, making this thread and any relevant suggestions moot to the person in the same boat as you are now.

 

[ganymede-]

Hi, I have listed the speciations from my signature that are current and accurate:

ASUS ROG Strix Z390-E Gaming Motherboard, Intel i5-9600K @ 3.7Ghz Base, Corsair Hydro Series H150i Liquid CPU Cooler; Corsair 32GB (4x8GB) RGB PRO DDR4 RAM, ASUS GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4GB DDR5 Graphic Card, Corsair RMx 850x Power Supply Unit, Samsung EVO 970 M.2 SSD 500GB (C Drive), Samsung 500GB SSD, 4TB WD Blue HDD, Corsair Crystal 570X Glass Case, and 8 Corsair LL series RGB PRO fans.

Regarding what you said about my OS being corrupt, I suppose it is possible though I am careful not to click on any unrecognizable links in emails. Even with the trial software I run, it is only from legitimate companies. I often try trial software with Photoshop. Moreover, I do have Kaspersky Internet Security and another program for monitoring for viruses and the like on my system, though I recognize that these programs are not perfect.

Understandably, I would be reluctant to wipe my primary drive clean and reinstall the OS. I have so many other programs installed on my computer that it would take a considerable amount of time to reinstall everything. I mean I have eight or more plugins just with Photoshop, so it would be an arduous task; however, if I was certain that my OS was compromised than I would reinstall it. Is there a way to determine if there is a corruption of my operating system? In addition, I have my Microsoft updates automatically installed, so wouldn't that preclude having the wrong drivers installed? I do understand that there are drivers beyond the OS ones.

Also, how do I know if I have a wrong driver installed? I looked under my Device Manager and everything looked good with no yellow explanation points signalling a problem with one of my drivers. To be fair, under "Other Devices" it shows a number of question marks, but I do not know what it is referring to exactly. I do not know what an "AAP Server" or AudioWear Voice" refers to, but I do not think it's a big issue, unless you think otherwise.

Thank you for your feedback.

 

[geofelt]

I suspect your issue is more about your drives than your cpu.
Are we talking about ssd devices or HDD devices?
Whenever you copy a file from one hHDDto another separate device, it should run well.
But if you are running a second copy with different files from the same two HDD devices, you will get mechanical arm stealing. If you are talking about SSD devices, that mechanical arm stealing is negligible, but you will still be limited by device speeds.

I doubt that you would find such an upgrade worth while.
You could try an experiment to see how sensitive your workload is to multiple threads.
Take one thread away and run with 5.
You can do this in the windows msconfig boot advanced options option.
You will need to reboot for the change to take effect. Set the number of threads to less than you have.
This will tell you how sensitive your apps are to the benefits of many threads.
If you see little difference, you doe not need all the threads you have, let alone 2 more.

 

[ganymede-]

To answer your question about the types of drives that I am copying to and from, they would be both HHD and SSD, though more of them are HHD older drives that I used to have in earlier computer setups. I upgrade all my components completely every 3-4 years. My present system is 1.5 years old I would estimate. It works well as I cited in the initial post except for slowing down while moving files between drives. It performs quite well with the games I have installed such as Assassin's Creed, Wolfenstein - The New Order, or Gears 5, though admittedly I don't play these games often, like it's been more than six months since I played a game on my system.

Also, will someone tell me if swapping out CPU's with my present configuration will possibly causes any hiccups or should it be a relatively easy process?

 

[geofelt]

Upgrading to a 9700K on the same motherboard is painless. There will be no activation or other issues.
Cooling will be a bit more stressed, but your aio should handle it.

 

[ganymede-]

As per the recommendation from geofelt, I have access msconfig and turned off two of my six cores and will see what happens after I restart my computer. Thank you for this suggestion as I did not know you could do this function.

 

[ganymede-]

Ok. I went to MSCONFIG and turned OFF two cores, so that left four cores running. Restarted. Opened Photoshop which seemed to open as quickly as when ALL cores were running. I tried a number of other applications and they too loaded seemingly at the same rate as with six cores running. There was NO obvious difference that I could detect. Now, I did NOT attempt to copy/move files from one drive to another which was my initial complaint, that this process occurred too slowly for my liking. I suppose the next step would be to copy files from one drive to another with all cores running and then with only four cores running and see how long it takes for each to perform the task. Is this what I should do next? And if the time it takes to copy the files are similar then that means that upgrading to an i7 with 8 cores is probably not going to do much for speeding up things on my system? Is that right? Thanks.

 

[mdd1963]

file copying is not , or should not be , very intensive for a CPU...

I'd investigate if perhaps one of the (spinning drives?) in question is perhaps dragging down your performance with numerous reread attempts...

The gaming comparisons show that although only eight threads, the 9700k's cores are quite competent. (If your mainboard supports it, I'd consider just jumping to the 9900K, which ought to last 3-5 years, truthfully.)

 

[ganymede-]

file copying is not , or should not be , very intensive for a CPU...

I'd investigate if perhaps one of the (spinning drives?) in question is perhaps dragging down your performance with numerous reread attempts...

The gaming comparisons show that although only eight threads, the 9700k's cores are quite competent. (If your mainboard supports it, I'd consider just jumping to the 9900K, which ought to last 3-5 years, truthfully.)

Your suggestion was a good one. I checked Amazon for the i9-9900K and found it being sold for between $375-$387, which was more than I thought my sister would spend on me for my birthday. I did notice that the i9 CPU were being sold and shipped by third-party sellers, so I wondered if any of these sellers were price gouging, so I headed over to the MicroCenter site and to my amazement I found the i9-9900K for only $299 (must buy in store which is not biggie bc I have a store about 35 minutes from me). The $299 price was what was being asked for on Amazon for the i7-9700K. If I upgrade, which I think I will, then I am definitely going to ask for the i9-9900K. The reviews for this CPU are great. It is supposed to be ripping fast. I just wanted to let you know that your suggestions was helpful. Thanks.