[SOLVED] i7 3770 Vs Xeon E3 1270 for upgrade

Robbom

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Recently upgraded my graphics card and I'm finding my CPU is bottlenecking me in more intensive games such as monster hunter world and the Witcher 3. I'm really looking to get the best non overclockable CPU for my motherboard (within price and availability limits, the Xeon 1290 seems too expensive for what it is and I can't seem to find any 1275s) but I'm confused as to the differences between a Intel i7 3770 and a Xeon E3 1270 V2 as they seem very similar. The Xeon is considerably cheaper on the used market so I'm interested in the gap between it and an i7 and if either would be a decent enough upgrade from my 3350p and a good match for my GPU. Also, would I be able to use the stock cooler from the 3350p on these processors?
Would appreciate any advice

Current specs are:

Intel - Core i5-3350P 3.1 GHz Quad-Core Processor

MSI - B75MA-E33 Micro ATX LGA1155 Motherboard

Corsair Vengeance 16 GB (2 x 8gb) DDR3-1600 Memory

Corsair 500gb SSD

MSI GTX 1060 6GT OCV1

NZXT - Source 210 (White) ATX Mid Tower Case

Corsair 500W PSU
 
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Was looking into this question for you and I think if you can get the Xeon for a lot cheaper than the i7 I would go for the Xeon. The performance seems to be identical. You also shouldn't have any problem using it for gaming etc. So unless I'm wildly wrong, i'd go for the Xeon.

MetallicMonk

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Was looking into this question for you and I think if you can get the Xeon for a lot cheaper than the i7 I would go for the Xeon. The performance seems to be identical. You also shouldn't have any problem using it for gaming etc. So unless I'm wildly wrong, i'd go for the Xeon.
 
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Robbom

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Was looking into this question for you and I think if you can get the Xeon for a lot cheaper than the i7 I would go for the Xeon. The performance seems to be identical. You also shouldn't have any problem using it for gaming etc. So unless I'm wildly wrong, i'd go for the Xeon.

Ok great I'll go for it, it's definitely going to be the cheaper option
Do you reckon I need to get an aftermarket cooler, or can I just use my stock Intel one?

---EDIT--- Oh wow I'm being stupid, the reason the 1270 was going cheaper was because it was the sandybridge model and not the 1270v2, so will just keep looking for either a good deal1270v2 or 3770 woops!
 
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MetallicMonk

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Ok great I'll go for it, it's definitely going to be the cheaper option
Do you reckon I need to get an aftermarket cooler, or can I just use my stock Intel one?

---EDIT--- Oh wow I'm being stupid, the reason the 1270 was going cheaper was because it was the sandybridge model and not the 1270v2, so will just keep looking for either a good deal1270v2 or 3770 woops!

Haha that's a bummer. The 3770 sell for about $140 AUD in my country. You can also find them in old Dell optiplexes and Hp PC's. Sometimes you can get super cheap deals on those systems from schools etc that want to upgrade. I've seen Dell i7 systems sell for $150 AUD so keep an eye out for them!
 

Robbom

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Haha that's a bummer. The 3770 sell for about $140 AUD in my country. You can also find them in old Dell optiplexes and Hp PC's. Sometimes you can get super cheap deals on those systems from schools etc that want to upgrade. I've seen Dell i7 systems sell for $150 AUD so keep an eye out for them!
Will do thanks
I think a 1240 V2 is also not a bad option looking into it as it's essentially the 3770 with a 100mhz lower boost clock, and achieves almost the same results on benchmarking sites I've checked. Luckily I'm in no massive rush as my system is ok on the games I want to run for now and therefore I can shop around and wait for the right price
Cheers!
 

Robbom

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Managed to grab a 1240 v2 for a really good price with an added 10% off ebay code that was expiring today so thats gone pretty well
I assume my stock intel cooler can handle the processor?
 

Robbom

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Got some Arctic Mx 4 which I think should be pretty good, also going to get some rubbing alcohol to clean the top of the processor before applying the paste.
Luckily I had to reapply the paste on my processor a couple of years ago so I'm reasonably confident with it
 

Robbom

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Well new CPU and ram is in and working great!
Actually really surprised how big a difference the CPU has made, for example in monster hunter world I've gone from medium settings 45-50 FPS in the forest area (seemed to be an FPS killer before) to high settings 55-60fps.
Tempted to do a moderate overclock on my GPU to get a few more frames out of it and would be interested to know your opinion on that.
But yeah some more games to test still but so far so good
 

MetallicMonk

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Feb 16, 2019
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Well new CPU and ram is in and working great!
Actually really surprised how big a difference the CPU has made, for example in monster hunter world I've gone from medium settings 45-50 FPS in the forest area (seemed to be an FPS killer before) to high settings 55-60fps.
Tempted to do a moderate overclock on my GPU to get a few more frames out of it and would be interested to know your opinion on that.
But yeah some more games to test still but so far so good

Awesome to hear :) As long as your GPU temps are decent I'd definitely try some overclocking. I think your model of card comes factory overclocked, so should be a good to take a bit further.
 

Robbom

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Yeah it's hitting 55-60C under max load so I think I've got some decent headroom to bump the memory clock and base clock a bit. Don't want to go too mad as I hear overvolting too much over a long period can reduce the cards life, and I plan to keep this for system going for a while and would be using the overclock for gaming fairly frequently. Think I'll probably see how far I can push it for tinkerings sake, then pull it back a bit for general gaming use.