Time to upgrade i7 860

So after four years of gaming on a ati 5770 it's time to get something that can handle today's games. Here is the system I am looking at getting. Main use is gaming on 1080 and photo editing. This is also a 24/7 rig, only time it gets turned off is power outages.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2HjNq

I have a few questions though. I need this rig to last another 4 years for my next upgrade and had some worries on the cooler. I've heard about the cooler leaking and the pumps going out, you think that it will last the 4 plus years before the next upgrade?

Second is the cpu, i7 or i5? Is the $100 savings worth it to step down to the i5? I use primarily lightroom for my photos(raw ~24mb apiece) Will the extra semi cores help?

Third is the gpu, 780 should be good for the next 4 years right? I dont need to max out for all 4 years but my 5770 now just doesnt cut it for bf4. I am planning on keeping my current monitor setup until 4k comes WAY down in price, 4-5 years.

Corsair Graphite 600 and hard drives are going to transfer to the new rig, mounting to the 600 an issue with the H100i?

Thanks for your input

I'd consider just upgrading GPU.

You dont think the 860 would bottleneck the 780?

it will bottleneck the 780.. i would not use a 860 with less than 4ghz paired with a 780. in fact my sister i7 950 at 3.5ghz bottleneck in several games my GTX 780 SC i've tested many times under several scenarios. at stock 3.06ghz it bottleneck badly, in minimums and average the drop in FPS are very notorious and in certain recent games its just an awful performance specially those that love to eat CPU i've tested in crysis 2, crysis3, BF3, BF4, Far cry 3, Hitman absolution, Tomb Raider 2013, batman arkham city.. at 3.6ghz its not able to maintain 60FPS in most games with heavy drops and serious bottleneck in crysis 3, far cry 3, and BF 4, GPU was not even able to be full usage with vsync off so yes, your 860 at 3.2 will bottleneck a GTX 780 specially at 1080P where the CPU its still very important and actually even one of my cousins i5 2500K at 4.2ghz aren't able to maintain 60FPS in certain Games.

about your questions, if you are working with graphic designs then yes, the i7 Hyper Threading really worth, and help a lot in those heavy works, but if you want to save some money and you will not change your build for at least 4 years then why not look for a 3770K you can find cheaper than 4770k and also find cheaper Z77 boards, also ivy bridge overclock much better than haswell because do not have that shitty integrated voltage regulator in the CPU.. so you will be able to overclock better with better temps on a ivy bridge and you will save some money too..

about the cooler i have several builds in my house because I work at home almost 24/7 and in all my work machines and my brothers machine we use AIO WC kits being most all corsair(H100i x3, H80ix2 H110 x2, H70 x1, H60 v2 x2, and other couple of Kraken X60 x2 and swiftech H220 x2 to replace some old H50s and H100) all work flawlessly, i've only had one problem with a h100i last year with a pump the pump was working but no moving the water corsair said the blades mechanism was just loose, however it was instantly replaced by corsair, never had any problem since that with any other AIO Water cooler kit, even with the oldest H50, H70 and H100 that are working since day 1 installed, never a leakage or any other issue.. so i should not worry about that, newer corsair h100i units came already updated and even better packaged than my firsts h100i units..

on another discussion, I would change that western red drive for a blue one..

Cuzzy81 said:

You dont think the 860 would bottleneck the 780?

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On a lot of games, yes it will.

We have a lot of people here living in the past with the "Your 486 won't bottleneck your Quad SLI Titans" mindset, luckily some of us know what year it is and can tell you that a cpu upgrade should be a priority.

Ultima99 said:

We have a lot of people here living in the past with the "Your 486 won't bottleneck your Quad SLI Titans" mindset...

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Oohh man that was EPIC comment... +1

So change out the 4770 to 3770, suggestions on motherboards? Not going to raid anything to thats not a concern but would like to have decent audio built in. I havent had a dedicated audio card since my 667 coppermine

And for the hard drive, they dont make a 3tb WD blue, only up to 1tb. I already have a 1tb and 2tb drive I will move to the new rig so I need more than 1tb for new storage of pics.

Cuzzy81 said:

So change out the 4770 to 3770, suggestions on motherboards? Not going to raid anything to thats not a concern but would like to have decent audio built in. I havent had a dedicated audio card since my 667 coppermine

And for the hard drive, they dont make a 3tb WD blue, only up to 1tb. I already have a 1tb and 2tb drive I will move to the new rig so I need more than 1tb for new storage of pics.

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Ah for pics and those things yes the red will work flawlessly..

actual motherboards have good integrated audio chips.. specially the ROG Asus boards with Supreme FX IV actually if you want to spend some money in a good Mobo with great overclocking capabilities, great sound features and others then i would suggest a Asus Maximus V Formula or Asus Sabertooth Z77 they are kinda expensive but are great mobos and you do not have to spend on dedicated audio cards.. the P8Z77-V Pro its a good mobo too at a more reasonable price with nice features...

The i7 860 is like the freaking 9700 pro of CPU's. They are still pretty much "good enough" for most everything except the fastest of the fastest videocards. I hope you keep it around in a second rig or something . Damned good CPU.

For 1080p, I would just upgrade to the 780, overclock your 860, and see if the games you play become CPU bottlenecked. The 860 is still a very strong CPU, and there's a good chance it won't create a noticeable bottleneck outside of very few games.

It may be a better idea to wait for Broadwell, the last of Intel's DDR3 systems, so you don't get hit with the DDR4 early adopter tax that you would get if you waited for Skylake.

At this point, unless you upgrade your platform directly to Haswell gear, I would just wait until later this year for Broadwell. I don't see any reasonable point to getting Ivy Bridge gear right now unless you're buying used and get a nice deal.

Upgrade your GPU now and then do your platform later this year!

Yeah, I would have to agree with Tsumi and cortexodus. I personally feel like you still have a very strong CPU for right now, If I were in your boat Cuzzy81 I would wait and upgrade when Broadwell comes out. I think you have plenty of power for a new GPU for now. I'm not sure what you are cooling it with but you could probably even get a little more out of it if you tweak it a bit or get a better cooling solution push a few more volts?

I think you should keep the cpu.

Upgrade the videocard and get a SSD. Instead of a 780 consider a 760. I've seen them at just slightly over $200 recently and it would do well at 1080 with most games with you having to turn details down just a little on the most demanding games to keep high frame rates. I've also seen that 256GB EVO you are considering for about $125. Those would give you the most noticeable boost for the least amount of money.

maybe get the H100i also as you can transfer it later. Join slickdeals and set up price alerts. I've seen the H100i for as little as $70.

I was just running an I7 860 a month ago for testing. For some reason, I had worse performance gaming with HT on. I recommend turning it off, and overclocking as high as you can. It does not help with gaming at all, and you'll be able to overclock higher without it on. Atleast 4ghz for sure, mine I was running daily at 4.4ghz (it was a good clocker though). It certainly was NOT a bottleneck in any game at 4.4ghz, with my gtx 680 anyway. Played BF4 fine.

I would NOT go with socket 1155 anymore, stick with 1150 or actually wait for the next release. The 860 will be fine if overclocked for now.
The 780 is a great choice, very strong GPU and if you are still mostly happy with a 5770 at this point the 780 will last for years for you. Can't say I agree with the above poster about a 760. It sounds like you only upgrade a video card every few years. If you get a 760 now, although it's a decently powerful GPU now, you'll be replacing it a year sooner than a 780.
Just make sure you have a PSU that can handle it

87dtna said:

It sounds like you only upgrade a video card every few years. If you get a 760 now, although it's a decently powerful GPU now, you'll be replacing it a year sooner than a 780.
Just make sure you have a PSU that can handle it

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On the other hand, if you buy a 760 now, you can bank the $300 you saved over a 780 and use it towards upgrading the whole rig once you're replacing the 760.

IMO you're always better off buying what you need now and upgrading when you need to, instead of going for something totally overkill. You are at a crossroads - your current rig can't really make the most of a 780, but you're not going to gain a whole lot of value from going to a current generation i7 - you'll be spending $500 between your CPU and mobo for something that isn't drastically faster. You're looking at like a 30-40% speed improvement, less if you decide to overclock your i7-860. It's not really a night-and-day difference.

You're going to want some serious hardware when you decide to go to a 4K monitor anyway, so if I were you, I'd OC your current CPU and buy a GTX 760 to do well with current games at 1080p (now THAT will be a night-and-day difference from your HD 5770, it's over triple the performance), wait 2-3 years for a good 4K >30Hz display to become affordable, then upgrade your whole machine once the i7-860 is fully obsolete and you want some serious grunt to drive 4K.

IMO it's never really cost effective to buy more GPU performance than you need. GPUs are increasing in performance faster than CPUs right now. Three years ago, the best you could get was an i7-2600K and a GTX 580 or HD 6970. An i7-4770K is roughly 10% faster than an i7-2600K, whereas a GTX 780 Ti is more than 60% faster than a GTX 580, and a R9 290X is roughly double the performance of a HD 6970. You can drop serious coin on a 780 Ti now, but it's not going to even be in the same ballpark as high end cards available in ~4 years when you want to upgrade your display, and in the mean time you'll have spent $$$ just to play games at 200 fps at 1080p.

Right now, your 5770 is clearly what is holding you back in games. It's several generations old, and even when it was brand new it was an inexpensive midrange GPU. Your i7-860 isn't a spring chicken, but it can handle a significantly more powerful GPU than a 5770, albeit not a current generation high-end card like a GTX 780 Ti. If you're mostly feeling a need to upgrade for games, not for CPU performance in Lightroom, I'd definitely consider a midrange GPU upgrade to something that will be fine with single screen 1080p gaming and won't be bottlenecked by your CPU.