Toying with the idea of "going big".

[VirtualLarry]

I already have two ASRock Z170 Pro4S boards, which are fairly nice. I don't know if they support SLI, but I'm pretty certain that they support Crossfire, since they have two PCI-E x16 slots.

Just musing, about getting a 6700K. Of course, my boards are "SKY OC" capable (I've got two G4400 dual-cores OCed), but it's an open question if Intel is going to start shipping newer SKL CPUs with updated 0x76 microcode to prevent SKY OC. So I can't quite be certain that newer locked SKL CPUs will OC at all, even if my board is capable.

Or maybe I shouldn't "go big" this generation, if Cannonlake / Icelake is going to increase mainstream platform core counts, and I would regret holding onto a 6700K for five years, if everyone around me is running an 8-core Intel with HyperThreading. It would be like getting a Willamette P4 CPU.

Then there is the issue of the price premium on the 6700K, which seems to have stubbornly held on. (Can you get a 6700K anywhere for $350 (list) price anywhere?)

Or maybe I should just save my money, and get Zen late this year / next year. If I could get an 8C/16T Zen CPU (not even APU) for around the same price as a 4C/8T SKL CPU, and Zen has at least Sandy Bridge IPC, then I think I would rather go Zen.

Edit: Usage would be: Occasional gaming (have Skyrim, want to get SF V, and start playing online against friends with PS4 and PC), Distributed Computing (I do that more than gaming, but most projects seem to give the most points for GPUs, not CPUs. But then, some projects are primarily CPU-only (like WCG, right now).), and general forum neffing and listening to internet radio.

Current monitor(s) are 1080P, with one 1200P in the bunch. Want to also upgrade to 4K sometime, but maybe not till there are decent IPS 4K monitors at $300 or lower. Might compromise with a 2560x1440 monitor if it's IPS and on fire-sale because the price of 4K monitors came down.

Current GPUs in my two SKL rigs are 7950 3GB cards, running 800 / 1250 (stock). Also bought some GTX950 cards, which of course have HDMI2.0, and HEVC support. Still deciding if I want to swap the GPUs out yet. The GTX950 would use less power, but are also less powerful overall, except for their extra features.

Edit: I do have a Microcenter less than an hour away, and the i7-6700K is only $349.99 there, in-store, limit one per household. I could bring someone with me to get a second one.
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.aspx?sku=804856

I would appreciate any comments from people that own 6700K or Haswell-E CPUs, as well as speculations about Broadwell-E, although I wouldn't likely be able to afford an 8- or 10-core BDW-E.

 

[ShintaiDK]

6700K sells for MSRP around in Europe.

Your only objections against the 6700K seems to be "what if in the future".

You have no idea how many cores future mainstream Intel parts will have. You have no idea how Zen performance will be, what SKUs and what price it will have.

If you want performance now, then buy now.

 

[VirtualLarry]

If you want performance now, then buy now.

That's the thing, I really don't need any more performance right now. Not that I know of, anyways. "People say" that dual-cores stutter on the latest games. So I was thinking it could be useful for future gaming, and add to my DC capabilities.

I guess, maybe I'll wait.

 

[Magic Carpet]

That's the thing, I really don't need any more performance right now.

Build one for a friend, that way you get to play with a new rig, but don't have to get stuck with it long-term

"People say" that dual-cores stutter on the latest games..

That's right, but you don't play games anyway. Face it. And for the ocasional gaming, that Skylake i3 of yours should do it well enough, imo (especially, since you can OC it some = you don't have to run the latest microcode/bios).

 

[hhhd1]

skylake 6800 and 6900 hasn't been released yet, IMO, I would wait for those, they may drive the 6700/6600 price down a bit.

 

[NTMBK]

Skyrim doesn't multithread well and doesn't used advanced instruction sets like AVX... seems a bit pointless to upgrade for that, the Pentium should run it just fine.

I'd say hang fire and wait for Zen/Kabylake to come out.

 

[Yuriman]

Larry with an i7? I think that violates one of the fundamental constants of the universe.

I have a hard time believing current CPUs will become massively obsolete and massively depreciate any time soon, but if you don't need the extra performance, it's not money well spent.

 

[know of fence]

The i7-6700K is really the opposite of going big, as the 6th generation of 4/8 Processors it's really more like going stale. People waited and speculated to see "Toc"- gains and DDR4, but mostly Skylake is barely not slower than you know the other stuff. SL will probably lose appeal when we see true consumer price 8-core, SL will lose value if we see eDRAM return. Also in terms of value it's a tiny die that wastes 1/3 of that precious space to iGPU, especially now when dGPUs stand most to gain from a new process.

It's either one of the last generations (6th gen) of core i (4/8) or it's the first to use DDR4, both not very opportune times to invest IMO.

However the best predictions for the future aren't the ones that happen to come true, but the ones that contain the total distribution of all possible outcomes.
I'm not going to do that. Instead just consider best and worst case scenario. the best possible outcome for Skylake to retain value is, it could be the last hurrah for high clocked 4 cores and K-unlocked CPUs, sort of like Sandy Bridge.
Another great scenario for Underwhelm-lake is to still be the fastest CPU on offer, when Oculus, Polaris and Pascal become available, with just a follow up refresh down the line (like Haswell).

 

[VirtualLarry]

Larry with an i7? I think that violates one of the fundamental constants of the universe.

"Moving on up... to the Eastside!"

I have a hard time believing current CPUs will become massively obsolete and massively depreciate any time soon, but if you don't need the extra performance, it's not money well spent.

Yeah, not really sure I need / want to spend the $$$. Probably wait until Zen releases to make my decision, unless I see a good sale somewhere. (i7-6700K with FREE Z170 mobo might do it, c'mon Microcenter!)

 

[hojnikb]

Cheap 2011 xeon e5 is the way to go. You can get them as low as 70$ nowdays.

 

[tential]

That's the thing, I really don't need any more performance right now. Not that I know of, anyways. "People say" that dual-cores stutter on the latest games. So I was thinking it could be useful for future gaming, and add to my DC capabilities.

I guess, maybe I'll wait.

Then buy it when those future games come around. Why in god's name would you buy the CPU months before the games come out that you need it for? Do you need the CPU to burn in or something?

You know how CPU's work VL, you don't need this explained to you.

You have a GTX 950 VirtualLarry.

Do you seriously have trouble realizing that there are other CPUs than just the 6700k and a super cheap intel CPU? THey have i3s and i5s. PIck a CPU that matches the GPUs you buy and move on man.

You've drawn out an obvious CPU choice for years.....

 

[Essence_of_War]

Skyrim doesn't multithread well and doesn't used advanced instruction sets like AVX... seems a bit pointless to upgrade for that, the Pentium should run it just fine.

I'd say hang fire and wait for Zen/Kabylake to come out.

Yeah, Skyrim runs as well on a fast dual-core as it does on anything else. With the various texture mods, you can really stress the GPU if you have a hi-res monitor and crank everything up, but the CPU doesn't need more than a pentium or i3. Especially if it's an overclocked pentium.

Edit: Usage would be: Occasional gaming (have Skyrim, want to get SF V, and start playing online against friends with PS4 and PC), Distributed Computing (I do that more than gaming, but most projects seem to give the most points for GPUs, not CPUs. But then, some projects are primarily CPU-only (like WCG, right now).), and general forum neffing and listening to internet radio.

You're right about the DC. If you have a particular project you like that is CPU only and you really want to do well in that, a Xeon-D is probably a more efficient choice.

Current monitor(s) are 1080P, with one 1200P in the bunch. Want to also upgrade to 4K sometime, but maybe not till there are decent IPS 4K monitors at $300 or lower. Might compromise with a 2560x1440 monitor if it's IPS and on fire-sale because the price of 4K monitors came down.

The higher you push the resolution, the less important the high-end CPU becomes (unless you're dumping a ton of money on GPUs!). It's a few years old, but this article from Anandtech is a good reference point for some of the issues:

http://www.anandtech.com/print/6985/choosing-a-gaming-cpu-at-1440p-adding-in-haswell-

For example, in Metro 2033 @ 2560x1440:
single 7970: every CPU is identical until you hit the E6400.
two 7970s: small jump vishera -> bulldozer, bigger jump to i3 / pIIx4 and FM2
three 7970s: now there is a noticeable jump from intel quads to vishera.

Basically, at your current resolutions, having a faster CPU might be useful, if you're stepping up resolution and not also shifting to a high-end Xfire/SLI AND sticking mostly to games that have good Xfire/SLI support, the nice CPU might not help that much for gaming.

tl;dr Buy whatever makes you happy but you're not doing anything that scales well for HT that justifies the mark-up. Unlocked i5s give you a good mix of ST, cores, OC/turbo boost, and are excellent for gaming at all resolutions and cost considerably less.

 

[ElFenix]

Cheap 2011 xeon e5 is the way to go. You can get them as low as 70$ nowdays.

he already has the Z170 boards. if he already had a X79 board, then yeah, cheap 2011 would be the way to go. but he doesn't have one of those. seeing as how an X79 board costs $200 just to start (used!), he'd be in it for almost the cost of the skylake anyway. and he may be able to benefit from the architectural improvements from SB/IB-E to nullify some of the threading advantage the xeon has.

 

[RaistlinZ]

I thought the OP would be going with dual Xenon's and Qual-SLI. Maybe I read the title wrong. :hmm:

 

[Termie]

Just FYI, the OP's Z170 board does not support SLI, and it really doesn't support Crossfire that well either. It's an x16/x4 setup.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Just FYI, the OP's Z170 board does not support SLI, and it really doesn't support Crossfire that well either. It's an x16/x4 setup.

Hmpf, guess I should have looked into more expensive boards, if I really had a hankering to go multi-GPU any time this century. It's not a total loss, though. GPU compute runs just fine on an x4 slot, as evidenced by the number of bitcoin and other currency mining setups using PCI-E x1 to x16 risers.

The two Z170 boards I own, one was like $82 shipped, and the second one was less than $80. They were very inexpensive, for being a (relatively) full-featured board. (SATAe, Ultra M.2, second GPU slot)

 

[hhhd1]

right now, best bang for buck imo are the i5 6500 and the i5 6600 non-k, with BCLK OC.
even without OC the 6600 turbo up to 3.9ghz.

 

[escrow4]

You should scrap all your parts and desktops and most of the laptops and get a 6700K. You know you want to.

 

[Essence_of_War]

Just FYI, the OP's Z170 board does not support SLI, and it really doesn't support Crossfire that well either. It's an x16/x4 setup.

With that in mind, OP, don't bother with a CPU only upgrade if you're also upgrading your monitor.

 

[MrTeal]

I don't think Larry would enjoy the switch to a 6700k. You could build it, and then spend some time overclocking it, and then you'd just be done. It would just sit there, running well, excelling at most everything. For years. Years upon years.

How boring.

 

[bhtooefr]

Let's be fair, you can stick new GPUs in every few years.

(I wouldn't be surprised if that's what happens with my 6600K build - I'll just upgrade the GPU every 2-4 years, and then a decade's past and I'm still on the same build.)

 

[poofyhairguy]

You've drawn out an obvious CPU choice for years.....

It's all a ploy. He is purposefully dragging it out and messing with low-end parts to everyone's frustration so when he posts the GoFundMe for his i7 on here there is such a pent up angst over his CPU choices he scores enough to go hexacore anyway.

 

[moonbogg]

You don't have to go big. There is no such thing as going big with a modern CPU. Just buy an i7 and you are done. Going big not necessary.

 

[mv2devnull]

There is no such thing as going big with a modern CPU.

A quad Xeon E7-8890 v3 server chassis with 6TB of RAM could count as "moderately large", (except in budgetary scale).

Different scales. What to one is the most massive system ever, is to an another a thing so small that they have never even considered it.

Then again, anything that gets the job done is enough. Anything more is surplus.

 

[NTMBK]

A quad Xeon E7-8890 v3 server chassis with 6TB of RAM could count as "moderately large", (except in budgetary scale).

Nah, the CPU is still small. It's just replicated lots of times.