CPU Upgrade

[SSG (Ret) Donohoe]

I am am stuck between 2 decisions and looking for help. I currently have an i5 4690k and was wondering should I upgrade to an i7 4790k or save up some more and go for a z170 board with an i7 6700k?
Has anyone here recently gone from the 4790k to the 6700k and is there much of a performance increase?

[E. Wolfe]

Save up and get the 6700k    Nothing wrong with the other CPU's however they are starting to get slightly dated


also with the 6700k you get the opportunity i believe to get ddr4

[Powell]

True on the DDR4 support with the 6700K.

I was originally doing the same debate with those 2 processors during the Cyber Monday sale. I ended up going with the 4790K for 2 reasons:

1) 6700K has better on-chip graphics than the 4790K, which means diddly to me since I'm running a dedicated GPU.

2) 6700K has support for DDR4, which hasn't quite sold me just yet because as you increase the Clock speed, you increase the Timings. There are several tests and published benchmarks on these tests out there. I dont feel that DDR4 is there yet. It's currently in it's "early adopter" stage where you pay alot and don't get alot.

The two main selling points of the chip just felt to me like hollow promises.

[SSG (Ret) Donohoe]

Thank you for the replies, I have read some posts on the internet that suggest there is a heat issue with the 4790k chip, is this a big deal and will a AIO water cooler resolve any issue there? Chief can I ask what cpu did you have before going for the 4790k?
CPL what cpu did you have before the 6700k?

[E. Ray]

There's basically no difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-4790.

There is a mild difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-6700, but certainly not worth the hundreds of dollars you'd spend on the new CPU, new motherboard, and DDR4 RAM.

Unless you absolutely need a chipset feature that you lack, like NVMe support, or an onboard M.2 slot, then there's no value in upgrading. If you want more performance, try a 10% overclock on your current CPU.

[SSG (Ret) Donohoe]

There's basically no difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-4790.

There is a mild difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-6700, but certainly not worth the hundreds of dollars you'd spend on the new CPU, new motherboard, and DDR4 RAM.

Unless you absolutely need a chipset feature that you lack, like NVMe support, or an onboard M.2 slot, then there's no value in upgrading. If you want more performance, try a 10% overclock on your current CPU.

Thanks for the reply CPL, I currently have my CPU at 4.3Mhz up from its base of 3.5Mhz, I have noticed no improvement in FPS at all when on large FTX or even in assult server. I would like to think what I have kit wise is good enough but I have been told by plenty in TS that the i7 is much better suited to Arma than the i5.

[E. Ray]

There's basically no difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-4790.

There is a mild difference between the i5-4690k and the i7-6700, but certainly not worth the hundreds of dollars you'd spend on the new CPU, new motherboard, and DDR4 RAM.

Unless you absolutely need a chipset feature that you lack, like NVMe support, or an onboard M.2 slot, then there's no value in upgrading. If you want more performance, try a 10% overclock on your current CPU.

Thanks for the reply CPL, I currently have my CPU at 4.3Mhz up from its base of 3.5Mhz, I have noticed no improvement in FPS at all when on large FTX or even in assult server. I would like to think what I have kit wise is good enough but I have been told by plenty in TS that the i7 is much better suited to Arma than the i5.

The only gaming relevant difference between a Core i5 and a Core i7 is Hyperthreading. To see any benefit from Hyperthreading, you must have a multithreaded application. ArmA 3 is not multithreaded, it is purely dependent on raw single core CPU performance; the more MHz, the better.

You will see zero benefit in ArmA 3 by getting a Core i7. The game engine is barely cognizant of two cores, and does most of its work on one; it will ignore the defining features of the Core i7.

Don't waste your money. I have a Core i5-3570K overclocked to 4.5 GHz, and I still drop to ~20 FPS in FTXes.

[Powell]

Thank you for the replies, I have read some posts on the internet that suggest there is a heat issue with the 4790k chip, is this a big deal and will a AIO water cooler resolve any issue there? Chief can I ask what cpu did you have before going for the 4790k?
CPL what cpu did you have before the 6700k?

I had the i5-2500K before upgrading to the 4790K. And the issue with the 4790K is only noticeable if you are a heavily overclocker. I have a thread about its overheating somewhere on this forum. If you don't have it overclocked to 4.5Ghz (its a 4.0Ghz out of the box) I wouldn't worry about the heating issue. If you are going to overclock it that far, then liquid cooling would be a must and monitor your temperatures. Several tools will let you watch the sensor on the core. If it is overheating with stock lid and liquid cooling, you can either delid it or change processors.

(EDIT, as there were replies while I was typing)

The only gaming relevant difference between a Core i5 and a Core i7 is Hyperthreading. To see any benefit from Hyperthreading, you must have a multithreaded application. ArmA 3 is not multithreaded, it is purely dependent on raw single core CPU performance; the more MHz, the better.

You will see zero benefit in ArmA 3 by getting a Core i7. The game engine is barely cognizant of two cores, and does most of its work on one; it will ignore the defining features of the Core i7.

Don't waste your money. I have a Core i5-3570K overclocked to 4.5 GHz, and I still drop to ~20 FPS in FTXes.

Pretty much what the CPL stated here. Arma doesn't use multiple threads per task, it just uses 1 thread per task and only has about 2 tasks (+1). Logistics and AI (+1 is Graphics which get offloaded somewhat to GPU). So you want those 2 CPU cores to have the highest clock possible. And here's the catch... the client FPS is actually bottle necked by the Server. Which is why you can be creating a Michael Bay movie in single player with Ultra settings and explosions everywhere and 2,000 (exaggeration) AI running around at 60FPS..... you get into multiplayer and your Arma sits, squats, and drops a pickle.

I upgraded because I was running an i5-2500K at stock speeds, mediocre ram that was the best my mobo could handle. And I couldnt run other games that I wanted at max settings. My pc was bottlenecking before the server most of the time in Arma.

(Second Edit, to not double post)

Also, there's that oculus thing coming out, so I couldn't do that with 2500K so that was another reason I wanted to upgrade.

[SSG (Ret) Donohoe]

Thank you all for the replies, I will put the CPU on the back burner for now and continue saving for when z170/ddr4 is more financially viable and makes more sense

[Powell]

Not a problem at all Donohoe, glad we could be of help o/