"upgrade" to new i5?

[caliban7]

Hi, I currently own a pc with the following:
-i5-2400 cpu
-12gb pc3-12800 ram
-Nvidia EVGA gtx970 graphics
-EVGA 600w power supply
-NZXT phantom 410 case

I've been considering upgrading a little more and getting some extra power out of my rig. I primarily use it for gaming and some coding, and I was considering getting an i5-3570k to that I wouldn't have to swap the mobo. Will the performance increase be worth the cost? And will it affect the gaming by any significant amount?

 

[eddieb101]

In terms of real world performance you probably won't notice much of a difference between those two CPUs. I would personally wait and save some money up until you can buy a new cpu/motherboard combination.

 

[electrontau]

Probably not worthy for amount of performance increase.

 

[Brillis Wuce]

Any i5/i7 from the second generation and forward is still a great processor. I'd recommend waiting for Skylake to come out later this year, then consider an upgrade. It'll prolong the lifespan and upgradeability of your next PC.

 

[junkeymonkey]

I'd feel you would see some improvement but exactly how much ???? 5-10 % at best ??? tough call for the money

 

[arossetti]

You'll see some improvement - but if you are going through the trouble of upgrading, why wouldn't you jump to an i5 4690k? I'd recommend looking at Tom's Best Picks - CPU write ups and compare see how your prospective upgrade compares to what you are getting now. You can probably find some benchmarks as well.

One thing to consider is that if you do upgrade you'll probably need to get faster ram. DDR3-1866 is looking like the new base line standard for the new generation of Haswell CPUs.

 

[voltoid27]

Unless you live by a Microcenter, an i5-3570K is about $240. By itself, it won't have any huge performance gains over your i5-2400, as the base clock speed only goes up <10% with a ~5% increase in performance per GHz. Where the real advantage lies is in overclocking; HWBot (http://hwbot.org/hardware/processor/core_i5_3570k) reports an average overclock potential of >4.6 GHz on air cooling, so if you're into overclocking, it might be worth it for you. After overclock, you're looking at something in the ballpark of 50% more CPU power compared to your current i5-2400. Is it worth it? That's up to you; if it were me, I'd hold off for Skylake processors.

 

[junkeymonkey]

but if he goes haswell that's a new board and all I think he was looking to upgrade 1155 or wait ??? then with out amd pushing intel will skylake be really worth it over if he were to just go with a z97 and a devils canyon chip today ??

 

[IamTimTech]

If your marks on paper matter to you then go for it, if your real world performance matters then wait till skylake has shown her face.

 

[caliban7]

Yea, I was trying to keep the current motherboard and therefore not spend more money than necessary, but if the wait for skylark is worth it i have no problems waiting it out. It'll just be a bigger project down the road lol. Thanks everyone for your input!