CPU/MBOARD UPGRADE

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diesel

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Hi

I want to upgrade my cpu, motherboard and ram but not 100% sure what to do , I definately want to stick with Intel and was thinking of the Intel® Core™ i7 3820 - 3.60GHz Quad Core, Socket 2011, 10MB L3, 4.8GT/s QPI, 32nm, x64 Support, Intel VT, 3 Year Warranty for R 2999.00

I am not sure what motherboard to choose , here are my two choices.

1. INTEL® "Extreme Series" "Siler" X79 - Socket LGA2011 @ QPI Up To 6.4GT/s - For Intel Core™ i7 Socket 2011 Processors Only
8x DDR3-2400 (Dual Channel), 4x SATAII, 2x SATAIII, 3x PCI Express x16, 2x PCI Express x1, 1x PCI, 14x USB 2.0 (8x Cable), 4 x USB 3.0 (2x Cable)
2x IEEE1394, SATA RAID Support, SLI & Crossfire Ready, Intel 10ch HD Audio, Dolby Home Theatre™ & Intel Audio Center,
Dual Intel® Gigabit LAN, Full ATX, * Requires VGA - No Graphics on CPU
For R 3029.00

Or

2. GIGABYTE® X79S-UP5 WIFI: Intel® C606 Express Chipset - Socket LGA2011, Supports: Core i7 LGA 2011 Processors, Xeon Processors
8x DDR3-2400+ Slots (Quad-64GB Max), 4xSATA 2, 2xSATA 3 (RAID 0,1,5,10), 8x SAS 3Gb/s connector, 1x eSATA\USB Combo connector, 1x eSATA 3 connector,
12xUSB 2.0 (6xCable), 6x USB 3.0 (2xCable), 2xIEEE1394
3x PCI Express x16 (2x16 +1x8), 2x PCI Express x1, 1x PCI Slots, 7.1 Channel HD Audio, Optical &SPDIF Ports, Dual LAN (Intel, Realtek 10/100/1000 LAN)
Ultra Durable 5 Features: IR3550 PowIRstage®ICs , 2oz Copper PCB, 60A High Capacity Ferrite Core Chokes
GIGABYTE 333 Features : USB 3.0, 3x Power, SATA 3
* Requires VGA - No Graphics on CPU, GIGABYTE Bluetooth 4.0 and WiFi Card Included
Dual BIOS™, GIGABYTE 3D Power, GIGABYTE 3D BIOS, Gigabyte Smart6, 3-Way nVidia SLI, 3-Way ATI Crossfire, ECC DDR3 Support, 4 Channel Memory Architecture,
PCI-e GEN3 Support, On/Off Charge, Dolby Home Theater, 12 Phase Power, OC DualBIOS

For R 2999.00

Another concern is wether or not its a good idea to upgrade now or wait for the new intel chips to come out?(anyone have any idea when that is?).

Your thoughts/advice would be appreciated.

Regards
 
I would go with Gigabyte. I've had some bad experiences with Intel boards. Gigabyte is always my first choice.
 
Sorry forgot to ask about the socket , im assuming the socket 2011 is better than 1155 , please explain the main differences/benefits/disadvantages and what you think about the two.

thanks
 
Dunno why you want socket LGA 2011 unless it's for a server/high end workstation. You are gonna pay through your ears for a LGA 2011 CPU and have limited choice.

If your needs are for a desktop or gaming rig then rather get a Z77 LGA 1155 setup with i7-3770K CPU, http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/523?vs=551
 
Last edited:
Socket 2011 is just for the people who has too much money or who wants the absolute best.
So unless you're going for like 2x GTX690's and a R10k CPU, I really can't recommend going the Socket 2011 route.

Rather go for a R2000 Socket 1155 motherboard (which is already quite a lot) and an i7 3770k like what ponder suggested.
 
Well the price of the I7-3820 = R2679.00 and the price of I7-3770K = R 2999.00 , The boards are about the same price but with socket 2011 you can use quad channel ram but 1155 you limited to dual (not sure wich is best). I just figured the 3820 is better because it has more cache and is priced the same as the 3770. I would not go bigger than the 3820 because the next step up you looking at R5000 for the cpu.
 
Quad channel is better, but the real world performance difference is very small.

The i7 3820 may be cheaper, but spending R3k on a motherboard is pretty extreme. You can get better performance by going for an i7 3770k (R3k) + ASRock Z77 Extreme 4 (~R1.5k).

Just have a look at the CPU performance of the i7 3820 vs i7 3770k: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/551?vs=523
The i7 3770k is better (but not by much) in every single test they performed!

If you want to go for 64GB of RAM, then Socket 2011 is your only option ;)
 
Thanks , I have decided to go for the I7-3770k.

Now for another question, I would like to know if this will work , I want to install a 240gb solid state drive and have my OS and other important programs on, i will use a 3tb sata drive as my main storage drive, if i install a 64gb msata drive will that increase the performance from the sata or be a waste?
 
Yes that will work. msata would be a waste if you already have a ssd I reckon as it basically caches the main drive which is usually a mechanical spinner. What you could do is install windows on the msata and your apps & frequently used docs on the SSD so you essentially have 2x SSDs but I really dont see the point.
 
Hi there,
Glad you settled on the processor. For the storage are you going to put in all 3 devices?
Any particular reason you are going for the 64GB msata device? msata is designed more for laptops.

Regards

Tim
 
Tim the Techxpert said:
Hi there,
Glad you settled on the processor. For the storage are you going to put in all 3 devices?
Any particular reason you are going for the 64GB msata device? msata is designed more for laptops.
Click to expand...

Well yea the idea was to use all three, the largest msata is 64gb and costs R 900 , i thought if i use the 240gb solid state as main with OS and one or two other main programs i could use my 3tb sata drive as secondary or storage unit, then put in a msata to cache from the 3tb sata and try increase performance from that drive. ?
 
ponder said:
Dunno why you want socket LGA 2011 unless it's for a server/high end workstation. You are gonna pay through your ears for a LGA 2011 CPU and have limited choice.

If your needs are for a desktop or gaming rig then rather get a Z77 LGA 1155 setup with i7-3770K CPU, http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/523?vs=551
Click to expand...

+1 as well! the performance gain on 2011 over 1155 isnt enough for price you will pay.
 
diesel said:
Well yea the idea was to use all three, the largest msata is 64gb and costs R 900 , i thought if i use the 240gb solid state as main with OS and one or two other main programs i could use my 3tb sata drive as secondary or storage unit, then put in a msata to cache from the 3tb sata and try increase performance from that drive. ?
Click to expand...

So are you going to assign the msata as additional memory and cache that way? If so then Windows will decide what it puts there which may not be the data from the 240GB. Or have you got another way of caching the 240GB
 
I dont intend on using the msata to cache the 240gb because the 240gb is already a solid state drive and wont need it, i only want the msata to cache data fromt he 3tb sata drive to try increase that drives performance.
 
diesel said:
I dont intend on using the msata to cache the 240gb because the 240gb is already a solid state drive and wont need it, i only want the msata to cache data fromt he 3tb sata drive to try increase that drives performance.
Click to expand...

Sounds like the 3tb is gonna be used for data? Which means there would be no routine to what you open from the drive, it would be more random unless you have a few apps on there you regularly use. If it's random then caching with the msata is not going to give you much of a boost as it works on a algorithm of what's regularly used. Secondly I don;t know if it's possible to tell the msata device to cache that specific drive as the caching happens transparently in the background.
 
The 3TB drives are so fast in any case that I won't bother trying to cache its data.

If you're after speed, then simply copy your working directory onto your OCZ Vertex 4.
 
diesel said:
Now for another question, I would like to know if this will work , I want to install a 240gb solid state drive and have my OS and other important programs on, i will use a 3tb sata drive as my main storage drive, if i install a 64gb msata drive will that increase the performance from the sata or be a waste?
Click to expand...

It'll be a waste. The stuff you'll be storing won't require quick load times and I'm betting that in most cases that space will be taken up by incompressible data, like TV series and movies. A SSD cache is only useful if you've got a single mechanical drive for your OS and don't wan't to go through the hassle of re-sizing the OS to fit on a smaller drive, or if space is constrained, as is the case with laptops.

Some people use a mSATA SSD for Adobe's temporary scratchpad, but I don't think you'll be doing anything work-related like Photoshop or Lightroom, both of which benefit by having the temp folder on a SSD.

ponder said:
Secondly I don;t know if it's possible to tell the msata device to cache that specific drive as the caching happens transparently in the background.
Click to expand...

If the board is RST-compatible, using Intel's SSD Toolbox should allow one to associate a SSD with a particular drive for caching use. I'm not 100% sure if this is indeed the case, since I don't know many people who use the toolbox.
 
Hi Diesel,
Sorry I was just being a bit blonde.
What are you going to use to do the caching function? I had a look at some options for you and came up with this link .
I found the comments about using up the SSD writes as an interesting one.

Regards

Tim
 
Well i guess i wont be using the msata drive then , Thanks alot guys for taking the time to answer my questions, greatly appreciated!
 
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