I need some quick advice regarding CPU's.
 

I recently ordered this:

http://www.dabs.com/products/asus-am...5.html?q=1090t

However, after doing a lot of reading on the subject, I'm starting to feel like i might of made a mistake. I have now realised that for about the same amount, I could have bought an i5 2500k, Mobo and RAM.

I am on a deadline - only a day or two to return if I want to. Would it be wise to return the bundle and opt for the 2500k build instead? I am on a budget, hence the reason I went for the 1090t bundle, which appeared attractive at first. I started having doubts after reading this review here:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpu...lack-edition/4

What do you all think? Should I click the magic blue Returns button, and go for the 2500k? Or have i made the right choice?

At present the i5-2500k is getting great reviews, partly because it is so overclockable and readily so, for me that would be a great factor in choice so I would definitely choose this over the AMD bundle, see here:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpu...ore-i5-2500k/1

Depends - that's a pretty good price you got there for the components.

Yes - a 2500K based P67 board and 4GB ram outperforms it in tests, but will probably be a little more expensive - maybe another 50 pounds. Depends how much of a budget you are on.

Seen some people using the Phenom and reporting good results so...?

No question at all, go for the 2500k, so easy to OC it to 4.5ghz on air.

works for me........

All graphics settings high, grass, roads and forest on.

http://i828.photobucket.com/albums/z...4-12_00003.jpg

Glad it works for you Lensman, and thank you all for the advice.

Along with the advice here, and on another forum that I posted on, as well as reviews/benchmarks and general feedback that i've seen, I have decided to return the package and build an Intel i5 2500k based system.

Now to find a good L1155 mobo for around £70.

Check out Scan:

http://www.scan.co.uk/shop/computer-...1155-intel-p67

Make sure you get a P67 chipset.

Seen one here for 87 pounds, so close....:)

Yes, I saw the i5 2500k on scan for £160, and that's when I decided to return the bundle. For about £20 more than I paid, I could build an i5 25k/mobo/ram bundle.

This looks good:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/msi-p...-sata-raid-atx

Here is a a relatively new long review of 5 P67 motherboards.

http://www.techspot.com/review/380-i...board-roundup/

That's a pretty good rundown thanks troll.

I'm concerned though. Just remembered that I opened the sealed (sticker over lid edge) CPU box to check contents when it arrived. That means that the seal on the box is broken. Will they still accept the return? I've emailed them, but obviously they've all gone home now. What do you guys think?

I have seen many online retailers selling open box items.I assume that they are opened returned items.Which leads me to believe that they take back opened boxes.

However I am not familiar with your particular retailer and I would wait for a reply before proceeding.I would be tempted to bite the bullet and actually call them.

Well that sounds promising. I tried calling, but they're offices had closed half an hour before. Suppose i'll know by morning.

I don't have any problems with my AMD Cpu. In fact, I'm very happy with it.
Had no problems with it until now and I oc'ed it on day 1. Running stable since then at 3.8 GHz.

Nice to see a 6 cores working well with COD. My platform is based on AMD, do you think that the game use all your 6 cores or a Phenom II x4 could do the job as well?

doubt it very much

Go for the i5 2500k if you can get it if (and only if) you are going to overclock it. The setup in my sig is working really well for CoD and there is little difference in gaming performance between the i5 and i7.

Go for the i5, AMD cpu is not worth it until bulldozer.

S!

Been using AMD quite a while, had Intel's i7 before and can say that my gaming experience has not changed to worse or better. I get very good performance in any game I play with my current rig, so saying AMD is not worth it is a bit annoying.

Will go for the Bulldozer when it comes out as Intel simply is too expensive here. I want to buy top of the line, not a stripped version thus Intel is out of question with the price tags above 1000€ compared to AMD considerably less yet offering great performance in games and applications I use.

Intel is good, no doubt. Been using it too a lot in past, up to the i7 + X58 chipset. Now time for AMD for a while :)

A lot of people on here are using the BE 965's and getting great results, so four cores are just as good my bet (in fact, a lot of people say the extra two cores are irrelevant in gaming right now).

Good to hear from you AMD boys. I won't feel as bad if they refuse my return now.

Can anyone advise me of the difference between the H67 and P67 ii55 motherboards? Did the H67 boards have the disintegrating Sata port issue?

All the first run 1155 boards had the Sata issue.The new boards out should have the new chips.Most manufacturers will say B3 on the box or literature.That is the new revision.

As far as I know the only difference between the h67 and the p67 is that the h67 has an integrated video port.No onboard video on the p67.


Note:
If you are looking at an 1155 board I assume you were able to return your other parts.

I run RoF , CoD black ops , Crysis all maxed settings and have excellent FPS , CoD runs quite well on medium to high settings and I'm sure my video card and the lack of optimisation of the game is the only reason I can't max it too.
I think a whole lot of us have extreme overkill on our processors these days and
CoD has barely used the cores we have.
So you should be fine either way ;)

sg

Ok mate thanks for clarification! Yes, items have been returned, they were ok with the box being opened, just waiting for refund of cash. Browsing for parts in the meantime - really would like a 1155 motherboard with 4 memory slots, 2 pcie x16 slots, and vitally a firewire port at the rear IO. Firewire is hard to find these days. Happily, the 2500k is pretty cheap, a real bargain, as is Ram ( Corsair £32 at oc.co.uk right now).

Seems about right, we all want more than we need! :)

you need a p67 board if your going to over clock.

which you will, since its childs play to do it with a i5 2500k.

im running mine at 4.5 ghz with the stock cooler. of course my case is loaded with huge fans, so for now im getting by with stock cooling. when the hot weather hits, i may have to get a better cooler or tone down my OC.

really? mine hit 97 degrees with the stock cooler @ 4.32 ghz.
that was auto overclock.
turbo is now disabled until better cooler arrives heh :)

the hottest mines got so far is 68 degrees C im using the auto OC also.

97 C is way to hot imo.

Make sure you read the fine print on the PCI-E x16 slots.Most boards allow you to put a card in any of the x16 slots and get the full bandwidth.However when you go Crossfire or SLI it is usually x8 in both slots.There are some very expensive motherboards that will do x16 and x8 with 2 cards.

Most Asus p67 boards have a rear IEEE 1394 port(Firewire).

H67 allow use of the 2500~2600 CPU integrated graphics, P67 does not.

B3-revision boards have fixed SATA chips.