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i5 7600k or i7 7700k - is the extra worth it.

elboffor
Consultant
So im building myself a new pc, but hnsure about which chip to get. I can get the i5 7600k for £225 or the i7 7700k for £325.
Is the difference in price worth it for the improvement in vr?
More to the point, aside from the mild increase in clock speed which can most likely be matched via overclocking is there any benefit to having multi-threading?
On my current i7 950 ive always had it switched off and its been pretty flawless. But i think its time to upgrade. That said i have this chip overclocked at a rock solid 4.2 (its 3.07 as standard). According to oculus home it doesnt meet the minimum spec however and vr experience could be affected (utter horseshite).

So cmon guys what say you all?
£225 for an i5 or an extra 50% for the multi-threading. Bear in mind thos us purely a gaming rig, i do occasionally make images and videos but thats very much a second to vr gaming.
@cybereality im very much interested on your opinion on this. If anyone knows the technical difference as far as vr or future vr is concerned its you. So I'm counting your vote as 3 votes 😉
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54 REPLIES 54

cybereality
Grand Champion
I'm not sure, let me check in the morning.
AMD Ryzen 7 1800X | MSI X370 Titanium | G.Skill 16GB DDR4 3200 | EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 | Corsair Hydro H110i Gigabyte RX Vega 64 x2 | Samsung 960 Evo M.2 500GB | Seagate FireCuda SSHD 2TB | Phanteks ENTHOO EVOLV

leo1954au
Adventurer
I always prefer to do a search of the net for videos or reviews when selecting what hardware I'm after instead of asking on forums because every one had a different opinion  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJXb2xyurFs

Ernimus_Prime
Heroic Explorer
Performance per dollar and with an overclock on the i5 7600k.  It's still a good cpu to get for gaming for the money. 
ASUS TUF GAMING X570-PLUS (WI-FI), Ryzen 7 3700x, 16 gigs ram DDR-4 3600 MHZ. SSD XPG 8200 pro 1 TB. WD Black 4 TB. Windows 10 PRO 64-bit. MSI VENTUS 3 RTX 3080 OC, Primary: MSI MAG274QRF-QD 2nd monitor: Acer Predator XG270HU 1440p@144 hz, Phanteks Enthoo Pro case. Corsair rm750x PSU. Rift S.

xWandererx
Heroic Explorer
@cybereality what time does your morning start ? seeing as your post was timed at 3.40AM:)

cybereality
Grand Champion
I usually get in the office around 10AM Pacific Time, but I'm always checking the forum on nights and weekends. The server must be in a different timezone because I sure as heck wasn't up at 4 o'clock in the morning. Used to pull those late nights when I was younger, I'm too old for that now.
AMD Ryzen 7 1800X | MSI X370 Titanium | G.Skill 16GB DDR4 3200 | EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 | Corsair Hydro H110i Gigabyte RX Vega 64 x2 | Samsung 960 Evo M.2 500GB | Seagate FireCuda SSHD 2TB | Phanteks ENTHOO EVOLV

eightbitjuan
Protege
TL;DR: If you are only planning to game on it, the 7600K would be your choice. Put the money you save from purchasing the i5 towards a better GPU. 

In the latest AAA "2D" games, a 7600K will rarely be a bottleneck, especially when playing in higher resolutions. In a VR workload, you are more likely to be bottlenecked by your graphics card with the 7600K. 

I'm running the 7700K right now, but I use my PC for more than just gaming. The difference would not be substantial in gaming environment, unless the workloads are well optimized for more threads. There are some games that will take advantage of the i7, but many won't (as well as they could).

On the other end, the extra performance of the 7700K will let it remain more relevant as time goes by. If you have other uses for the PC that would benefit from more threads, then the extra money for the 7700K would be worth it.  It can be hard to say what's "worth it," as it really depends on your budget and how long you typically wait between platform upgrades.


CPU: i7 7700K, GPU: EVGA SC GTX 1070, Mobo: MSI Z270M Mortar, USB: Mobo + Inatec 4 Port Expansion Card, VR: CV1 + Touch + 2 Extra Sensors | Steam Origin Uplay Twitter: eightbitJuan

PhilSurtees
Protege
I went form the i5 to a i7 and the pc is noticeably faster, but aside from that I'm not sure it makes a real difference to gaming. I will say that going to an i7, 8gb ram, and gtx 1080 got rid of the annoying 'your pc does not meet minimum' message, which is a big plus, I hated that.

RedRizla
Honored Visionary
I think an upgrade from a i7 950 to one of those will bring massive improvements. I've got a Skylake 6700K and saw enough improvements. Just watch this YouTube video to get an idea what a CPU can do even when they are all Overclocked the same.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sx1kLGVAF0

elboffor
Consultant
Manu thanks for your replies everyone 🙂
(except cyber who tried to derail my thread with his off topic spam, I'd never do that).

The price point and current gen argument is definitely one worth making. But cost is really a concern, value is more of it. This is what i was strugling with and is the reason i held on to my current cpu as long as I have.

After seing as the first video posted shows the difference in performance of both chips equally clocked and using the same gfx card (a gtx 980 ti which is slower than my 1070 ftw) i think that coupled with the argument of longevity has made my mind up.

I'm still open to input on the mobo though.
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Anonymous
Not applicable
I was forced into an upgrade a few weeks ago, ended up getting the i5-7600K and GTX1070, replacing the i5-4690k & GTX 980Ti OC. Would really have liked the i7-7700K and 1080... The difference allowed my to keep my order for the Nintendo Switch.

I was quite surprised when I saw the Digital Foundry review between the 7600k and 7700k. Normally HT doesn't do much in games, but there were a number of titles that gaining substantial FPS with the 7700k over the 7600k with the same 4.8GHz overclock.