When should i replace my i5 2500K

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dogbyte_13

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Dec 21, 2004
Messages
1,486
At what point should i replace my I5 2500k? should i wait till skylake? or maybe something a little high performance like a 5820? or the next release of the 2001 chipset? Thx in advance. Specs in my signature.
 
What do you do with your machine? Does your existing rig feel slow? What's the reason for the upgrade? Just to do it?
 
I game alot on it, just sometime when a large amount of stuff is on the screen it slows down a bit but only for a little bit, My target was trying to get atleast another year out of it possibly 2 and i was just wondering if it would actually last that long.
 
In my experience, when there's a huge drop in frame rates, GPU utilization is no where near max, and the CPU load is high (how high would depend on how many cores the game can utilize of course), that's usually a sign that the CPU is struggling to keep up.

Do note that if you enable vsnyc, then your GPU utilization won't be 99% most of the time as it only needs to render 60 fps, and not as fast as it can. But if you see your frame rate dropping to say 40-30fps and your GPU utilization is still not max, that's a strong indication that something is holding back the GPU.
 
Try OC your CPU some more and see if it helps. Maybe even get your ram to 1600 at least.
 
A 4690K would not be a significant upgrade from the 2500K.
 
Whenever you find in a CPU bottlenecked situation and you want more power.
 
2 years or 12,000 hours, whichever comes first.
I have 19,000 hours on my 3770k, a bit past time to upgrade, but I am poor.
 
jcagara08 said:
i5 4690K is now @ $200 bucks coming from $250, heck of a deal over at Amazon!
Click to expand...

Microcenter is a little over and hour away from me, it is 179 now, but everyone is saying no to that upgrade and i guess i'll just deal with knocking my settings down to high from ultra.
 
dogbyte_13 said:
Im on 3 years with my system.
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How many hours? as the processor ages, the transistors start failing in a cascade order.
You better upgrade soon if you are past 20K hours. 30% of the transistors may be gone by now.
 
Zepher said:
How many hours? as the processor ages, the transistors start failing in a cascade order.
You better upgrade soon if you are past 20K hours. 30% of the transistors may be gone by now.
Click to expand...

Blatant baseless misinformation. 20K hours is a little over 2 years of on-time, btw.
 
In the same boat you are. Usage-wise I dont see a need to upgrade, but it sure has been awhile.

Going to wait and see if there are any good black friday deals (4790k for $200-250?), but probably wont upgrade for another 1+ year otherwise.
 
You know when it's time to get a new car. Your odometer is far into six digits, perhaps the engine is burning lots of oil, or the transmission is growling. Fixing all that might well cost quite a bit more than your ancient vehicle is worth.

But what about your microprocessor? Unlike automobiles, microprocessors don't have convenient little gauges that reflect how much wear and tear they've endured. And wear they do—though you'll probably never notice it. The degradation of their transistors over time leads slowly but surely to decreased switching speeds, and it can even result in outright circuit failures.
Click to expand...
they do degrade over time.
 
Zepher said:
2 years or 12,000 hours, whichever comes first.
I have 19,000 hours on my 3770k, a bit past time to upgrade, but I am poor.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure if this is a really great troll post?

The 2500k in my office workhorse that does hard drive images all day has been on 24/7 since early 2011, and probably 12/5 at 50-100% load. It spent the first 2 years at 4.6ghz. It benchmarks the same as new in any application I test.

OP the 2500k runs any game ported from the new consoles. We will probably be limited by the new consoles for at least another 5 years, meaning the 2500k might be relevant 10 years after release...sounds ridiculous, but is shaping up that way.
 
I wasn't being serious, lol
I still have a Q9550 that works great, I may start gaming with it if I move it to the garage since my laptop can only play certain games and I am in the garage most of the day due to my hip, can't go up and down stairs very easily and my main rig is upstairs. the Q9550 only gets used about an hour a night, I use it to play a movie when I go to bed.
 
Zepher said:
they do degrade over time.
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Still not seeing a number or proof in any of your posts. Without any sort of proof, you pulled that number out of your ass.

Truth is, yes. Processors do degrade over time, just not at the over exaggerated rate you are stating. The only way that a 2 year or 20,000 hour limit might be even remotely true is if you are overclocking and overvolting the processor. A processor's MTBF is at a minimum as long as its warranty period unless its overclocked.

Many here will attest to using a processor for much longer periods than your 2 year suggestion as well as overclocked.
 
Zepher said:
How many hours? as the processor ages, the transistors start failing in a cascade order.
You better upgrade soon if you are past 20K hours. 30% of the transistors may be gone by now.
Click to expand...

Bull Shit.
I rarely swear but this deserves it.
You have no idea what you are on about.

Back up what you have said with proof.
 
Nenu said:
Bull Shit.
I rarely swear but this deserves it.
You have no idea what you are on about.

Back up what you have said with proof.
Click to expand...

I read it on the internet somewhere so it has to be true, right?
 
i'm in the same boat. reluctant to upgrade thought because i would have to upgrade my sandy bridge mobo too. too expensive. i'm waiting fir the next 2500k. bang for the buck type deal.

Zepher said:
How many hours? as the processor ages, the transistors start failing in a cascade order.
You better upgrade soon if you are past 20K hours. 30% of the transistors may be gone by now.
Click to expand...

you can't be serious
 
Zepher said:
2 years or 12,000 hours, whichever comes first.
I have 19,000 hours on my 3770k, a bit past time to upgrade, but I am poor.
Click to expand...

BULLSHIT.

I still have my Pentium Pro 200 (Compaq) sitting on a shelf that I purchased in 1996. I just had it out last week playing X-Wing on it for three hours, and not a peep from the CPU. It is like the energizer bunny....it keeps going and going and going. That machine has WAY OVER 20,000 hours on it.
 
OP,
Overclock that 2500k as some of the others have mentioned and ride it out. A 2500k @ 4.4 ghz+ is still quite beastly.

Going to an expensive Broadwell setup currently with a likely quicker and more economical Skylake setup just around the corner for 2015 makes no sense when you have a 2500k that is still overpowered for most likely anything you use it for, especially if you OC it.
 
Zepher said:
How many hours? as the processor ages, the transistors start failing in a cascade order.
You better upgrade soon if you are past 20K hours. 30% of the transistors may be gone by now.
Click to expand...

Uh, what???
 
It's not a horrible computer i just get the itch when i see new hardware come out and then go to anadtech bench and see those numbers and want moar power! The funny part is my wife says to me so how much will it cost because she doesn't like to deny me from my hobby :)
 
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dogbyte_13 said:
Microcenter is a little over and hour away from me, it is 179 now, but everyone is saying no to that upgrade and i guess i'll just deal with knocking my settings down to high from ultra.
Click to expand...

Is it even possible for an OC'd i5-2500K to be the bottleneck? I would imagine that it would go toe-to-toe with a stock 4690K, since there haven't been huge leaps in performance for a few generations now.
 
I'm waiting for until I can get an mATX board with: USB 3.1, PCI Express 4.0, m.2 SATA, DDR4, HDMI 2.0 and DP 1.3 and preferably an i5 6 core K series. Much of this will come with Skylake. The 6 core is probably wishful thinking.
Does anyone know when we can expect usb 3.1 support?
 
MrCaffeineX said:
Is it even possible for an OC'd i5-2500K to be the bottleneck? I would imagine that it would go toe-to-toe with a stock 4690K, since there haven't been huge leaps in performance for a few generations now.
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Not a chance at HD resolutions and up. 2500k is still a little beast.
 
atp1916 said:
Not a chance at HD resolutions and up. 2500k is still a little beast.
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That's what I figured. I was actually thinking about buying back my 2600K from a friend of mine during my recent rebuilding fiasco. Not that the i3 has let me down anywhere, but two more cores and four more threads...Is tech addiction a thing? :D
 
MrCaffeineX said:
That's what I figured. I was actually thinking about buying back my 2600K from a friend of mine during my recent rebuilding fiasco. Not that the i3 has let me down anywhere, but two more cores and four more threads...Is tech addiction a thing? :D
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You run only an i3? Gross.
 
3 years as of this Christmas for my 2500k @ 4.7ghz 1.4v. Not a peep :D. Though its only on for a max of 12 hours per day. OP I would overclock it, our processors are still a heck of a CPU, even today.
 
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My 2500K has been at 4.5GHz+ @ 1.42V, 24/7 for 4 years in January (give or take the odd day down).
On a custom water loop.
Max temp is a bit north of 60C, much nearer 50C while gaming.

It did do 2.7GHz (oops, I mean 4.7Ghz) until I accidentally fed it nearly 1.5V while stress testing, max temp was mid 70s C.
You can harm them, but you have to really try.
 
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8gb of slow ram isn't helping. Go 16gb, and go faster. 2500k is fine for gaming.
 
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