Upgrading from AMD to an i5 or i7 to overclock, but clueless on motherboard options

[brad3n]

As the title says I have hardly any knowledge of motherboards or what makes them perform well.

The system I'm using now I built on a budget with an AMD FX 6300 CPU on an ASRock 960GM/U3S3 Motherboard (very much a 'budget board' from what I've been told) with Windows 7 OEM. I am now looking to upgrade my processor to either an i5 or an i7 to overclock, meaning I will need a new motherboard and one that will be able to handle this overclocking.

For cooling I currently have the Corsair H80i GT liquid cpu cooler, which right now isn't serving much purpose on a non-OC'd budget CPU, but I got it a while ago as part of this upgrade. So I'm guessing that liquid cooling will be sufficient for the processor, but now comes the problem of the motherboard. When I was initially doing research on this liquid cooler before I bought it, I read that liquid CPU cooling took away from some of the motherboard's essential cooling because there is no fan to blow down on it. I had also been asking about overclocking and was told that the area of the mobo around the cpu could get severely damaged without a sufficient motherboard setup.

• So first off, I am looking for a motherboard to use with either an i5 or an i7 that I can safely overclock with, using my h80i GT as the cpu cooling. Most importantly, I'm trying to make an upgrade that will last a while and that I can expand off of much easier. This means SLI support is a must (I'm an nvidia fanboy so CrossFire support isn't essential), as well as having preferably at least 32 GB RAM support.

• Secondly, the decision of whether to settle for the i5 6600K or pay more for the i7 6700K. I currently have about $550 for this upgrade, and taking away ~$100 for the copy of Windows, that leaves $450. So now I need to figure out my options for a motherboard with price compared to quality, meaning if I need a pretty expensive motherboard for the requirements I specified earlier, I'll have to go with that + the i5 6600K. But if I wait to save another $100, I'm wondering if I'll be able to go with the i7 6700K (~$349) and be able to afford a good motherboard that I can overclock on without worry and be ready for future upgrades (i.e. SLI support and decent max RAM). I'm basically just clueless as to what goes into making the high performance of those really expensive motherboards, and why one would even be necessary, so I'm trying to figure out the best way to distribute my budget between CPU and motherboard.

Sorry if anything was confusing or I left out any information, just let me know. Thanks for any info you might have!

 

[alexkensit]

What games will you be playing and at what res and settings? For most games, the 6600K will be overkill, especially if you OC. I recommend the Gigabyte Z170 SLI.
http://www.amazon.com/Gigabyte-LGA1151-Intel-Motherboards-GA-Z170X-Gaming/dp/B012N6E996/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1464642964&sr=1-2&keywords=gigabyte+z170

 

[brad3n]

What games will you be playing and at what res and settings? For most games, the 6600K will be overkill, especially if you OC. I recommend the Gigabyte Z170 SLI.
http://www.amazon.com/Gigabyte-LGA1151-Intel-Motherboards-GA-Z170X-Gaming/dp/B012N6E996/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1464642964&sr=1-2&keywords=gigabyte+z170

I play CS:GO which is CPU intensive from what I've read, as well as Fallout 4, Skyrim, and I do a lot with Photoshop so I like it to have very fast response. I am also interested in possibly streaming on twitch, and my current processor can't handle that, as I get huge frame drops in whatever game I'm playing when I stream. I'm definitely aware that the 6600K is already a very good processor, but I just figured why not the 6700K if I can afford it, no harm in future proofing. What would someone use a 6700K for? Is it just overkill for anything, or are there certain things that would need that kind of power to run well?

Update: To expand on this, I'd like to be playing at the highest settings possible, 1080p. Of course sometime in the future I'll be looking at 4k as well, so I don't know what that would require.

 

[alexkensit]

Most people who buy the 6700K are overclocking enthusiasts, and power users, who demand a lot from their PC like video editing, streaming, content creation, basically anyone who needs a lot of cores to work with. If you are streaming, I will recommend the i7 6700, but not the 6700K. The 6700 is a step up from the 6600K, but on the downside it does not give you OC ability. Its overkill for CS:GO all right. Heck, you can run CS:Go of a Pentium and still get 80 fps +. What GPU are you looking at getting?
Alex Kensit

 

[brad3n]

Most people who buy the 6700K are overclocking enthusiasts, and power users, who demand a lot from their PC like video editing, streaming, content creation, basically anyone who needs a lot of cores to work with. If you are streaming, I will recommend the i7 6700, but not the 6700K. The 6700 is a step up from the 6600K, but on the downside it does not give you OC ability. Its overkill for CS:GO all right. Heck, you can run CS:Go of a Pentium and still get 80 fps +. What GPU are you looking at getting?
Alex Kensit

Real time example: I just tried to open a jpg image with photoshop and it took about 10 seconds. I would've liked it to take no more than 2 seconds. Not sure what this would require.

And the GPU I have now is a GTX 970 so I'm not upgrading my GPU or anything. I've read it's supposed to do pretty well with the 6600K, and then I just wanted that SLI support on my motherboard upgrade in case I ever wanted to put a second 970 in there.

I just don't want to spend all this money and then decide I need something more powerful in a year or two, so I would like overclock ability, unless you're sure a 6700 would be better than an OC'd 6600K, and that a 6700 isn't close enough in price to a 6700K that it would make sense to just wait a little longer to raise the budget.