Should qubit get his Sandy upgrade now or later?

[Deleted member 67555]

jmcslob, that's the dilemma. If BD wasn't the Vista of processors, I would agree, but as it is, I just don't know.

I know exactly what you mean but Ive been seeing a place here and there run sales with the 2600k and specially the 2500k.....The type of sales you usually see before a price drop...other than that all I can say is it's a gut feeling

 

[15th Warlock]

My advice is not to wait, otherwise you'll never upgrade, I got my SB at launch, and besides the P67 recall fiasco, I've been really happy with it, it OCs like a champ, and at a very low voltage to boot

big releases are just around the corner, BF3, Skyrim, MW3, and trust me, SB won't disappoint you

 

[Frick]

Upgrade, there is no point in waiting. 2600k still has a LOT of punch for the money (€250 here).

 

[happita]

There's always something just around the corner. If you want it, get it and when you get ripped just shrug it off because it was bound to happen anyways.

Why would he get ripped off? SB is the best bang for your buck right now, unless your talking about something else and me being slow and a bit lifted atm don't know if there is anything else better than 2500/2600.

I don't know. A Core 2 Q9650 is still a force to be reckon with and would be cheaper.

But that's just me.

A Q9650 is just 2x E8400 slapped together. Moving to that from a E8500 won't yield him that much of a performance bump unless it's for apps that love to use cores. Going to SB...ANY SB chip would yield him a big bump over a Q9650. Not to mention the chip is STILL expensive as hell even now. Getting a Q9650 would be a very unwise decision IMO.

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

Intel is entering the ring against bulldozer. They have a competitor that can't touch them in most areasa that "normal" users see. Their Enthusiast offering is rapidly devolving from awesome sauce to expensive ketchup.

In order to maintain sales, with the Ivy Bridge coming quickly, Intel either has to reduce prices, or shake their line-up. Given that they have an excess of chips (read the financial news for this information), they aren't going to release slightly newer chips that might damage sales of their current stock.

This means that the most likely decision will be a minor price decrease. If the 2600k was only 30 USD more expensive than BD, you'll choke off AMD. People will spend the money on a 2600k, and people with a lesser budget will be able to purchase a 2500k. Both of these situation spur sales, liquidating inventory in preparation for the Enthusiast (shaping up to be turd) offering and IB.

So yes, a pricing change is likely coming. When, and will it be substantial? I do not pretend to know, and refuse to pull numbers from my backside. What I can conjecture is that prior to December a price shift will occur. Waiting till then may hurt, but it may prevent some buyers remorse.


Edit: I second Happita. Second hand e6850s run well over 200 USD where I'm looking. For that kind or money you can get a brand spankin' new 2500k, which will beat the piss out of a e6850 every day of the week.

 

[LagunaX]

Of course upgrade now...Christmas is so far away!
You'll be happy even if you didn't save that $30...

 

[JrRacinFan]

Go ahead and get the 2600k no point in waiting but ...

Given the disaster that is Bulldozer,

Why the unneeded flame? I must know why do YOU feel it was/is a disaster?

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

Of course upgrade now...Christmas is so far away!
You'll be happy even if you didn't save that $30...

A quick point. You obviosly won't get BD. I pulled 30 USD out of personal experience. 40 UD is a tank of gas, 50 is half of a benjamin' (yeah, screwy local slang). 30 USD seems to be the sweet spot, in my experience, where people say "f*ck it, I'll upgrade" more often than not.

This is why I said 30 USD, without intending that to be a hard figure.

 

[qubit]

Thanks for all the replies everybody, you have really helped me to decide what to do - TPU at it's best.

I think I'll wait until SB-E is released on November 15, before buying anything. Even though I don't intend on buying the first revision due to those two bugs, I believe that I'll get a much better price on the pricey i7-2600K which I now have my eye on.

The 2600K is already appearing on various special offers at the moment with some fair discounting, so its price is trending downwards and the 2700K is just around the corner, which will have a higher stock clock at the very least, but might possibly also have some design improvements too (the reviews will tell us) so I believe that I could save a good £50-£80 or so on my overall purchase of CPU, mobo, RAM and cooler if I just wait a bit. Heck, it'll take me a while anyway just to choose the mobo I want.

 

[n-ster]

Will you be doing any Media encoding? Anything that is fully multi-threaded?

If so, the i7 3930K might still be worthy to look at.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-performance,3026-11.html

It may end up being more expensive than what you are looking for though... This is the CPU I'll be going for most probably. idk if I'll wait for IB or just SB-E, as I was panning on buying the parts in early January, a few days after the New Year. From what I hear though, IB is supposed to be March, so I think that I'm going X79

 

[qubit]

Will you be doing any Media encoding? Anything that is fully multi-threaded?

If so, the i7 3930K might still be worthy to look at.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-performance,3026-11.html

It may end up being more expensive than what you are looking for though... This is the CPU I'll be going for most probably. idk if I'll wait for IB or just SB-E, as I was panning on buying the parts in early January, a few days after the New Year. From what I hear though, IB is supposed to be March, so I think that I'm going X79

Nah, no media encoding. I basically use my PC for internet, gaming, running virtual machines and inflating my ego. I'm interested in the 2600K for the bigger cache more than the HT really, as this allows it to "breath" more in bottlenecked situations, helping to maintain responsiveness and generally be that bit quicker.

It hasn't missed my notice that the 2600K doesn't have the VT-d feature, while my old E8500 does, so ironically, I can run hardware features in a VM on my old system, but not the new one. I've not run a VM yet that supported it, so it might be a moot point. However, I refuse to buy a chip where this feature is supposed to work but doesn't, just because they want to get it out the door. And you're right about the price being higher. While I had that minor windfall with the car insurance, I need to use the rest of it for other things, so I can't go overboard on my PC.

In your case, I say wait until January, when the situation will be clearer. If Ivy Bridge is so close, then it very much looks like SB-E is some sort of marketing gimmick to keep the money rolling in until IB is released.

With such a nice SB system in a month's time, I could easily wait another six months to a year after IB is released before buying into it. qubit lies

 

[n-ster]

IB is not supposed to offer 6 cores, and TBH I think I prefer 50% more cores over smaller 22nm technology. Plus the wait would be too much xD I'm getting rid of my PC by Nov. I'll have school to distract me until Jan

When is C2 stepping coming out? I may wait until C2 for the VT-d, hope it comes out in mid-Jan at the latest.

 

[qubit]

IB is not supposed to offer 6 cores, and TBH I think I prefer 50% more cores over smaller 22nm technology. Plus the wait would be too much xD I'm getting rid of my PC by Nov. I'll have school to distract me until Jan

When is C2 stepping coming out? I may wait until C2 for the VT-d, hope it comes out in mid-Jan at the latest.

C2 should be around the start of the year.

btw I hope you have a backup PC as normal life without a PC nowadays is impossible. Besides, how would you perform your most important duty, posting on TPU?

 

[n-ster]

C2 should be around the start of the year.

btw I hope you have a backup PC as normal life without a PC nowadays is impossible. Besides, how would you perform your most important duty, posting on TPU?

I haven't been using my PC for MONTHS... I'm on my crappy netbook lol

I miss my PC sooo much But sadly, it is over 125 miles away, at my Montreal house, while I am in University in Ottawa

 

[IlluminAce]

You left the obvious option off the list... Get it yesterday! I mean, what are you waiting for? A SB-E chip is going to cost the same as Germany's annual GDP. SB costs in the ballpark of Greece's annual GDP, so just buy it!

Please don't tell me you're still waiting for Bulldoz.... zzz... zzzzzzzzzz....

 

[qubit]

You left the obvious option off the list... Get it yesterday! I mean, what are you waiting for? A SB-E chip is going to cost the same as Germany's annual GDP. SB costs in the ballpark of Greece's annual GDP, so just buy it!

Please don't tell me you're still waiting for faildozer

It's Bulldozer ya dummy and of course I'm waiting to buy it! We've all seen the world-beating benchies humbling, err bulldozing Intel into submission haven't we?!

Somebody slap me.

 

[IlluminAce]

If you make one more pun about bulldoz... bulldozzzz... bull... sh... doze... zzz... zzzzzzzzzzz

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

Do eeeeT!