When to upgrade

[Wheelzup]

I'm trying to decide when would be the best time to upgrade my system. Currently I'm using an old AMD FX chip and have been struggling with making the change over to an Intel board since it doesn't look like AMD has much of anything new in the pipeline as far as chipsets or support for the new USB 3.1 and DDR 4 memory. Everything seems to be their video cards which is not a bad thing. I'm working with Photoshop and doing a lot of custom video but both seem to be getting slower. I went from Windows XP to Windows 8.1 and that seemed to help but it's still very slow. I'm just trying to decide which chipset from Intel I should build around, the x97 or x99 and hope that one or the other will get me through another 3 or 4 years before upgrading again except for a video card or two or running an SLI or crossfire type setup. Any input sure would be appreciated.


One more thing my budget is up to $2500 or slightly more and my current SSD drive is plenty fast though it is not that large just 120GB Samsung 840.

[profJim]

Re: When to upgrade

For optimal performance I would use a high end 256GB - 512GB ssd for the O/S boot drive and possibly use a second 512GB SSD as a scratch disk for work files.

The question that I would research is how much better is an X99 system versus a lower cost Z97 system.

A web search using: photoshop memory recommendation will provide useful links from Adobe and other Photoshop websites and/or forums.

For starters, check out Photoshop Help / Optimize performance | Photoshop: https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb...Max_out_on_RAM

Here's a list of Newegg DD4 memory kits from 16GB - 64GB:
Computer Hardware, Memory, Desktop Memory, 64GB (8 x 8GB), 16GB (4 x 4GB), 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM, 32GB (4 x 8GB) - Newegg.com

I'm about to start using Lightroom 4.4 on my P45 system with a Q9550 overclocked to 4.0GHz with 8GB of memory.

Let us know what you find out.

[Wheelzup]

Re: When to upgrade

I've decided on going with an X99 motherboard and an i7 5820k, If my research is right and I want to run crossfire with the new R9 390 OR 390X will they fall off to run at 8 or will they run 16?

[profJim]

Re: When to upgrade

For each X99 motherboard model that you are considering, you will need to check the specifications on the web page and/or in the user manual to see what restrictions there are when you use a cpu with 28 lanes instead of the higher end cpu's that have 40 lanes.

The following is from the web page for an X99 motherboard:

• - 3 x PCI Express 3.0 x16 Slots (PCIE1 @ x16 mode; PCIE3 @ x16 mode; PCIE5 @ x8 mode)****
• - 15μ Gold Contact in VGA PCIe Slot (PCIE1 and PCIE3)

*If you install CPU with 28 lanes, PCIE1/PCIE3/PCIE5 will run at x16/x8/x4. <----

**If M.2 PCI Express module is installed, PCIE5 slot will be disabled.

***If you install CPU with 28 lanes, 3-Way SLI™ is not supported.

****To support 3-Way SLI™, please install the CPU with 40 lanes.

You will need to carefully check each motherboard model that you are considering because manufacturers and their models will have some differences. The i7 5820k with 28 available lanes will probably not be able to run with x16/x16 pci-e 3.0 video card bandwidth.

You might find benchmark or gaming information that shows that an x16/x8 pci-e 3.0 video card setup is virtually identical to an x16/x16 crossfireX setup.

All motherboards have gotcha's, even the high end motherboards.