is it worth ti upgrade CPU on x79

[onehans1982]

hi i have sabertooth x79 with i7 3820@4.625ghz is it worth buying new cpu or should i just go for new mobo? new mobo means for me RAM , Motherboard, CPU and that won't come chap so it will take me some time to gather that kind of money. on other hand i can easly fork out 200£ + sell old cpu, but is it worth effort?

 

[voltoid27]

The only real upgrade path for your system would be to the i7-4960X; that'll get you 50% more cores and cache without sacrificing clock speed. The question is, what are you doing with your system? Does the kind of work your computer does warrant shelling out cash for 2 cores and a few minor IPC/clock improvements? Ultimately Broadwell-E isn't a huge jump over Sandy-E (although it is noticeable) so it wouldn't really be worth upgrading the whole platform either. If the i7-4960X doesn't sound appealing maybe wait for Skylake-E on its new socket and see how it performs.

 

[n0ns3ns3]

The question is why you think you need to upgrade it.

 

[onehans1982]

well i feel that my machine is pretty old now. its an all rounder PC : video converting from time to time, gaming with gtx980ti a bit of photoshop and anything that comes up. aside of locked multiplier at x43 im not sure if my processor is not bottleneck my graphic card - in 3dmark firestrike i get 16075
if i seen well i7-4960X costs 450£.

 

[n0ns3ns3]

there is a simple test. use some overlay like the one in MSI afterburner to have CPU and GPU utilization on screen while in game.
If your GPU utilization is significantly less than 100% while CPU utilization is very close to 100%, you have some slow down in game performance due to CPU.