i7 7700k $280 at Microcenter (in store only)

They also apply a $30 instant discount/rebate if you bundle the processor with a compatible motherboard.

For example, this ASRock board comes out to a total of $50 off after the $30 instant bundle discount and $20 MIR.
 
Can't help but think you'd be much better for the long hall with this Ryzen 1700 for $280.

Better performance overall, double the cores for the future, and longer platform support on the new AM4 (new CPU options through 2020). Really the only case I'd pick up a 7700k over a Ryzen chip is for 1080p gaming. And even then, how long will you be gaming at 1080p? ---because as soon as you jump to 1440p or 4K, or multi monitor, the difference is moot.


Ryzen 1700 for $279

https://hardforum.com/threads/and-w...8-free-shipping-ebay.1938565/#post-1043091740
 
Archaea said:
Can't help but think you'd be much better for the long hall with this Ryzen 1700 for $280.

Better performance overall, double the cores for the future, and longer platform support on the new AM4 (new CPU options through 2020). Really the only case I'd pick up a 7700k over a Ryzen chip is for 1080p gaming. And even then, how long will you be gaming at 1080p? ---because as soon as you jump to 1440p or 4K, or multi monitor, the difference is moot.


Ryzen 1700 for $279

https://hardforum.com/threads/and-w...8-free-shipping-ebay.1938565/#post-1043091740
Click to expand...

I think an awful lot of gamers would disagree. When I game it's on 1440p and I want 144fps+ - like many who have grown to love competitive multiplayer. Honestly if you look at the most popular monitors these days - I think most gamers demand high fps on 1440p or 1080p - Ryzen doesn't accommodate today's gamer very well. Heck - I think 120+hz monitors are selling much better with gamers than 4k monitors are. PUBG is one of the hottest games right now and getting 144fps with a 1080ti and Ryzen isn't going to be consistent at all. I wanted very badly to leave Intel behind, but AMD has to get create a better gaming experience first.

Have to say I'm one of the few who doesn't get that excited about MC deals either. After living in KC and dealing with the 8.5% sales tax of the overland park location - it wipes out a significant portion of most any deal they offer.
 
Dam the nearest MC from me is 4 hours :(. I paid $329 for my current one, but I did hit the lottery with it. 5.0Ghz with 1.29v and NOT Delidded :smuggrin:
 
The semi-recent overheating scandal has made me weary of these things.

My 2500k has been chugging along @ 4.8GHz just fine, anyways.
 
I'm glad some of you don't like Micro Center. It leaves more deals for me, but then again that place is killing my bank account. If I had a significant other, she would have divorced or killed me by now. Here's what I've spent there in just the past few months:

At least 3 open box RX 470/570/580 cards for around $160 each which I flipped on ebay for $340 to $380 each
Open box Crosshair VI Hero AM4 for $99, and they let me have the bundle discount with a Ryzen 5 1600. Total with tax was ~ $280. The board itself, new, is ~ $244.
Open box Lenovo i3-6100U laptop for ~ $183 + tax. Total was less then $200.
Open box refurbished GTX 980 reference card for ~ $175, total was under $200.
Open box X370-Pro for ~ $37 + tax, total was around $41. I may sell this or the Crosshair, but I haven't decided yet.

Open box is the key, and always see if you can get some bundle deal if possible too.
Twice recently I passed on open box 7700K cpus for $239. It was hard to pass up, but I like AMD. Yes I'm probably nuts there, I know.
 
I've had bad luck with open box at micro center the two times I've tried it. Two different motherboards. Both had issues.

I later confirmed with the customer service (at the time) that they didn't actually verify working status for customer returns, they just sold them as open box. I haven't bought something open box since. This was a few years back. I'd assume if a customer returns something, chances are it's for something wrong with it a good portion of the time? If they do verify the returns that's one thing. (Overland Park KS microcenter) (circa 2005)

I don't have time and energy for that kind of nonsense.
 
Good to know, thx Archaea. I was considering open-box on a GTX 1080 Ti, but I think I'll skip it now.
 
kekewons said:
Good to know, thx Archaea. I was considering open-box on a GTX 1080 Ti, but I think I'll skip it now.
Click to expand...
Probably worth asking at your local store. My experience is old. And store policies may vary location to location. But as recently as 2012 or so I was told it was the same for the KS microcenter by an employee there. I haven't asked since.
 
I've gotten two open box video cards from Microcenter and both were perfectly fine. One of them was even a superb over clocker. Also had no issue with a couple of open box CPU's. The only bad open box experience I ever had was a motherboard. One could probably safely assume that purchasing an open box motherboard is probably asking for trouble. I'd say the open box experience probably leans more towards which particular hardware you're going to be buying. Also, you can return a defective open box item just as easily as a new item, it only cost your time to try.
 
Archaea said:
Can't help but think you'd be much better for the long hall with this Ryzen 1700 for $280.

Better performance overall, double the cores for the future, and longer platform support on the new AM4 (new CPU options through 2020). Really the only case I'd pick up a 7700k over a Ryzen chip is for 1080p gaming. And even then, how long will you be gaming at 1080p? ---because as soon as you jump to 1440p or 4K, or multi monitor, the difference is moot.
Click to expand...

Depends on your current system and what you're doing. I'm currently running an [email protected] in an ITX system. Ryzen isn't "better performance overall" if you're not doing video compression or modeling (there is performance regression switching from even a lowly i5 to Ryzen in <= 4 thread-aware software so I'd likely have similar performance at best and overall worse performance on Ryzen); I'd be better off grabbing a 7700k in order to not have to buy a new motherboard if it turned out that I did have a need for more cores. Even if I wanted to "upgrade" to Ryzen there are only a couple ITX motherboards right now (ASRock and Biostar, ugh) anyway.

I think it's facetious to believe that having the extra cores/threads is going to be required in the near future; by that logic the i7-870 in my backup system or someone's FX/Bulldozer system should be getting magical performance boosts and that's not happening. By the time that there's a real advantage for 8+ cores/threads in gaming/non-content creation applications the current Ryzen and i7 will be considered slow anyway.

So if I was building a whole new PC for myself I'd likely go with a 1700 just to have another AMD system (I haven't had once since my Thunderbird and before that an AMD Athlon 64 750 with Goldfinger to get to 900Mhz) but in my situation a 7700k would actually be cheaper and faster.
 
pgaster said:
I'm glad some of you don't like Micro Center. It leaves more deals for me, but then again that place is killing my bank account. If I had a significant other, she would have divorced or killed me by now.
Click to expand...

Maybe I'm just unlucky but I've never seen a good open box deal at my local MC (Cincinnati). They're always just $5-$10 off of the price of new.
 
Good deal on a new I7.

But lately i've been staying a generation or two behind :), but Ryzen's prices would make me think twice.

kekewons said:
Good to know, thx Archaea. I was considering open-box on a GTX 1080 Ti, but I think I'll skip it now.
Click to expand...
Open box motherboards are a slightly higher risk than their other stuff, though i'd still take a chance on it due to their return policy.

I'd chance their open box videocards with no problem. Heck i once gave the next person an open box deal, i had to return a perfect working videocard because it had the wrong type of DVI port.
 
I agree with everyone saying you need to watch out with open box boards, and especially Intel since the pins are in the socket. I've pretty much given up on getting good deals on open box intel boards because I've seen several with bent pins on the shelf for sale. No, I don't think they check them very well either. If it's intel and open box and you are considering it, open up the box and check the socket. If the box is sealed up again so you can't check, I'd probably pass.

The AM4 Crosshair VI Hero I got had an issue I didn't notice right away: the RGB lighting was not working. Turns out this was a common problem for these boards.
Luckily, just a few days or maybe a week ago Elmor from Asus who posts a lot at the Overclock.net forums posted a software fix. It's not quite so easy in that you need the command line to run it, but it worked and now the lights are back on. I don't even really care about this sort of thing, but of course it hurts resale value when things don't work so I'm happy they figured out a fix.
 
SPARTAN VI said:
They also apply a $30 instant discount/rebate if you bundle the processor with a compatible motherboard.

For example, this ASRock board comes out to a total of $50 off after the $30 instant bundle discount and $20 MIR.
Click to expand...
Yeah, but only 6th gen CPUs are applicable to the discount, so it's basically just their way of unloading 6th gen CPUs. I need a 7th gen, for reasons.
 
NoForgiveness said:
Yeah, but only 6th gen CPUs are applicable to the discount, so it's basically just their way of unloading 6th gen CPUs. I need a 7th gen, for reasons.
Click to expand...

Not from what I'm seeing. Applies to 7th gen too.

Screenshot 2017-07-07 at 6.50.58 PM.png
 
Every now and then I find really good open box deals. Like a 980 Poseidon for $179, and most recently a Powerspec Ultra 3D printer for $349.

That being said I've seen several open box mobos with bent pins being sold as open box as well.
 
Not all motherboards and CPUs qualify for the discount. It says clearly in the listings. I got an i5-7700K and Asus Z170 motherboard for $220 AR last week.
 
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