i5 and i7? really worth the cost?
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Bad Karma -> General Technology
#1: i5 and i7? really worth the cost? Author: PIE168, Location: Illinois PostPosted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:22 pm
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ive been looking through new egg for some computer parts and i saw that they had a intel quad core i5 and i7
i5 is about $200 and the i7 is about $290-300
its been on my mind that is it really worth paying about a hundred dollers more for the i7 or should i just take the i5?
advice would really help. thanks Smile
#2: Re: i5 and i7? really worth the cost? Author: MeatMang-BK-, Location: Newmarket, Ontario, Canada PostPosted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:13 pm
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Maybe these links will help.  There seems to be no easy answer although it seems that the i5 is your best bang for the buck if mounted on a proper motherboard with the proper chipset.

http://www.brighthub.com/computing/hardware/articles/48391.aspx

http://www.pcworld.com/article/171556/intels_new_core_i7_and_core_i5_processors_explained.html
 
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/259526-28-feeling-ripped
#3: Re: i5 and i7? really worth the cost? Author: WannaB, Location: North Carolina PostPosted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 9:11 pm
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basically it comes down to 2 things

If you answer yes to either of the following then you will want the i7

1. Do you plan to SLI vid cards? ( run dual video cards )
2. Do you do advanced things like HD video editing and 3D works? ( i7 has hyper threading while the i5 doesn't )

If you have said no to either of the above then the i5 is the route you should take; Save the money to put into a better graphics card. Although buying a video card now could have draw backs in the fact in march Nvidia is releasing there new card. ( HUGE price drops )
#4: Re: i5 and i7? really worth the cost? Author: R_OReilly, Location: Massachusetts, USA PostPosted: Wed Feb 24, 2010 1:09 am
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I've read the same comparisons.  I've been watching sales at Micro Center and if you're patient you can get some real steals.  This week they're offering the i7-920 for $199 and the i7-860 for $229.  Street price for the i5-750 is around $199.

The i7-9xx series have hyperthreading and use the LGA1366 socket and chipsets.  It's got full width PCI-E x16 lanes so it's best if you really want to go all out with SLI.  The motherboards are also expensive.

The i5-750 is the only quad-core i5 at the moment.  It does not have hyperthreading and uses the LGA1156 socket and chipsets.  If you do SLI you'll only have 2 PCI-E 8x lanes.  The motherboards are much less expensive than the LGA1366 boards.

If you can find one at a good price, the i7-860 sits somewhere in the middle.  It has hyperthreading and also uses the LGA1156 socket and chipset.  Again there's the limitation on SLI and the less expensive mobos.  It's also a 95W power part versus the i7-9xx at 130W.

I spend a lot of time reading up at www.tomshardware.com when planning a build.  There's also anandtech.com.  Most places I've seen recommend the i5-750 as the biggest bang for the buck.  Realize that when you get up over $200 for a CPU it's very small gains for very big bucks.  I haven't seen many sales on the i5-750, mostly sales on i7-920/860.  Guess the market has found it's price point.

As many have said, get a good CPU but don't put all your money there.  You'll often do better to skip the fastest CPU and put a little more in a better vid card and extra memory.  And never skimp on the power supply.  I've seen more builds destroyed by cheap power.
#5: Re: i5 and i7? really worth the cost? Author: WannaB, Location: North Carolina PostPosted: Wed Feb 24, 2010 5:14 pm
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Also to add to this;

Never buy a crappy hard drive; you can have the best system in the world but if you hard drive is slow it becomes you bottleneck ^_^
Bad Karma -> General Technology


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