Opinions- upgrade current or start over?

[dishe]

I personally don't really think you need to upgrade right now. Your next step should be a jump straight to a platform with DDR4 and IMO that isn't right now. Depending on your actual case you could in fact do a platform upgrade to an i5 6600, which would be faster and give you the added features with DDR4 being cheaper than DDR3. The only problem is your biggest difference would still be getting a modern SSD.

Wow I am out of touch with processors. I kept reading that the 2600 holds up to later editions of the i7 so I sort of stopped following what else was coming out. The i5 6600 actually trumps my i7 though? That's news to me!

Actual cost of the chip is cheap too, wonder if I can find any prebuilt boxes on the cheap like that. I have been searching for strictly i7 boxes so far.

 

[PP Mguire]

The only difference between an i5 and i7 is HT. Skylake has a ton more IPC than Sandy but you'll be spending new cost since Skylake is new. We're in the process of buying Skylake boxes at work currently for refreshes and OUR cost for an HP Prodesk 800 is 400 bucks loaded with 16GB of DDR4, a GT 730, and a 250GB SSD. Also, the difference between processors may or may not be negligible from a productivity standpoint. I mean, my buddy's 5960x doesn't outdo my old 3960x in Premier sadly.

 

[dishe]

The only difference between an i5 and i7 is HT. Skylake has a ton more IPC than Sandy but you'll be spending new cost since Skylake is new. We're in the process of buying Skylake boxes at work currently for refreshes and OUR cost for an HP Prodesk 800 is 400 bucks loaded with 16GB of DDR4, a GT 730, and a 250GB SSD. Also, the difference between processors may or may not be negligible from a productivity standpoint. I mean, my buddy's 5960x doesn't outdo my old 3960x in Premier sadly.

Your cost is what now?!
I know corporate bulk buys get better deals, but OMG! Can they "overbuy" a unit or two or sell them under the table?

 

[PP Mguire]

Your cost is what now?!
I know corporate bulk buys get better deals, but OMG! Can they "overbuy" a unit or two or sell them under the table?

No, all S#s are tied to the company unfortunately.

 

[dishe]

Thanks for all your help, I'm revisiting this idea now that its been on a back burner for a few weeks.

My biggest hesitation is in knowing that the actual computational render time is most effected by the CPU, which I'm not upgrading with this plan. The SSD and RAM will help improve the overall computing experience as I understand it, but likely will have very little improvement over actual rendering times. The USB3 card will help with only very specific operations (backups mostly). The video card will boost certain operations during rendering (especially when scaling with Premiere), but at the end of the day a CPU upgrade I think would make the biggest difference in a return-on-investment for work purposes.
So while I like the idea of upgrading components and keeping this box alive for a bit longer (for mostly economical reasons), there's a voice in the back of my mind telling me to save it up for a setup with a faster CPU.

So that's got me thinking- Its been literally over a decade, perhaps even closer to two since I built my last custom PC. Back then, it was relatively easy and economical to swap CPUs and motherboards as I saw fit, keeping the box for generations of builds. But I started buying prebuilts when it no longer made economical sense to part out a fairly standard setup, and I've totally fallen off the bandwagon. Is there any reason perhaps a prebuilt box wouldn't be a smart idea to upgrade like that? In other words, is it crazy to attempt upgrading the CPU in my current Gateway box?
In order to replace the CPU to something more modern, I'm guessing a new Mobo would be in order as well- but perhaps there are some OEM specific restrictions that an aftermarket board would give me a hard time with? I'm thinking, if I know I can keep this computer current in the near future beyond this upgrade, I wouldn't feel as hesitant spending money on incremental upgrades now.

Or, at that point, would I just be throwing too much money into an upgrade that I would have been better off buying a new prebuilt in the first place?

...man, I need a corporate deal to get boxes like your company does. That would make this a heckuva lot easier.

 

[PP Mguire]

As somebody who doesn't believe in pre-builts beyond some super specific circumstances, I think buying a pre-built is a waste of money anyways.

My deal is upping the CPU to Skylake only gives you an increase in IPC. Your biggest difference would be if you had more cores, which you won't. I guess if you wanted to buy a 6700k and overclock it might make a bit more sense.

As to upgrading your current box, it looks easily doable. You'd need to check to verify but it looks like the PSU is standard ATX size and the motherboard sports a 24pin and 4pin. Last thing you'd need to check is if the front panel is using a proprietary connector or not. Not a big deal if it is though.

 

[dishe]

So, added the USB3 card, ordering SSD and and some RAM is next. Question:
If I currently have 2 sticks of Nanya brand PC3-10600 1333MHz 4GB Non-ECC DDR3 (total of 8GB), since my board maxes out at 16, should I be looking at another 8GB of similar specs? Or should I be replacing everything with a new set of 16?

 

[PP Mguire]

Just add in what you can.

 

[dishe]

Just add in what you can.

Ok- it doesn't have to match what I currently have?

If I get something like 1600mhz ram, would it just run at 1333mhz because my other ram is? If I take out my current chips and replace them all, will the whole thing run at 1600? Or is the mobo limited to 1333, so it wouldn't matter anyway?

This seems to have got a lot more complicated than it was when I was building machines myself. To be fair, bus speeds back then were only in the triple digits.

 

[PP Mguire]

It honestly doesn't matter and you don't really need to worry about RAM speed. I'd find some cheap 4GB sticks and put them in there.

In all fairness compared to before it's a lot easier now since most is automated.