Upgrading from an Intel Core i7-2600K: Testing Sandy Bridge in 2019
by Ian Cutress on May 10, 2019 10:30 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- Sandy Bridge
- Overclocking
- 7700K
- Coffee Lake
- i7-2600K
- 9700K
Test Bed and Setup
As per our processor testing policy, we take a premium category motherboard suitable for the socket, and equip the system with a suitable amount of memory running at the manufacturer's maximum supported frequency. This is also typically run at JEDEC subtimings where possible. It is noted that some users are not keen on this policy, stating that sometimes the maximum supported frequency is quite low, or faster memory is available at a similar price, or that the JEDEC speeds can be prohibitive for performance. While these comments make sense, ultimately very few users apply memory profiles (either XMP or other) as they require interaction with the BIOS, and most users will fall back on JEDEC supported speeds - this includes home users as well as industry who might want to shave off a cent or two from the cost or stay within the margins set by the manufacturer. Where possible, we will extend out testing to include faster memory modules either at the same time as the review or a later date.
| Test Setup | |||||
| Intel | i7-9700K | ASRock Z370 Pro Gaming i7 |
P3.20 | TRUE Copper | Corsair Vengeance 4x8GB DDR4-2666 |
| Intel | i7-7700K | GIGABYTE X170 Extreme-ECC |
F21e | Silverstone AR10-115XS* |
G.Skill RipjawsV 2x16GB DDR4-2400 |
| Intel | i7-2600K (OC) | ASRock Z77 OC Formula |
P2.40 | TRUE Copper | GeIL Evo Veloce 2x8GB DDR3-2400 |
| Intel | i7-2600K | ASRock Z77 OC Formula |
P2.40 | TRUE Copper | G.Skill Ares 4x4 GB DDR3-1333 |
| GPU | Sapphire RX 460 2GB (CPU Tests) MSI GTX 1080 Gaming 8G (Gaming Tests) |
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| PSU | Corsair AX860i Corsair AX1200i |
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| SSD | Crucial MX200 1TB | ||||
| OS | Windows 10 x64 RS3 1709 Spectre and Meltdown Patched |
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| *VRM Supplimented with SST-FHP141-VF 173 CFM fans | |||||
Many thanks to...
We must thank the following companies for kindly providing hardware for our multiple test beds. Some of this hardware is not in this test bed specifically, but is used in other testing.
| Hardware Providers | |||
| Sapphire RX 460 Nitro | MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X OC | Crucial MX200 + MX500 SSDs |
Corsair AX860i + AX1200i PSUs |
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| G.Skill RipjawsV, SniperX, FlareX |
Crucial Ballistix DDR4 |
Silverstone Coolers |
Silverstone Fans |
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RSAUser - Saturday, May 11, 2019 - link
10nm Intel desktop is earliest 2021 or so probably, wouldn't bother holding out for that.PeachNCream - Friday, May 10, 2019 - link
The only reason why I upgraded from a Sandy Bridge laptop to a Haswell-U laptop was because it was $30 cheaper to get a refurb PC with Windows 10 preloaded than it was to just buy a Windows 10 Pro license for my Sandy Bridge system so I could finally get off WIndows 7. Oddly enough, I spend more time on my Sandy Bridge laptop after moving it to Linux Mint than I do on the newer Windows 10 laptop. The Haswell-U is simply here for a handful of things that I can't do in Linux which are mainly a few games lacking a Linux version that are iffy or uncooperative in WINE. It really had nothing at all do do with a lack of compute power and more to do with EOL on 7. I'd argue that these days, pretty much any Sandy or newer system is adequate from a compute power perspective for most mundane chores and a number of heavy lift tasks.29a - Friday, May 10, 2019 - link
You can buy a Win Pro license for about $7, I've done it multiple times.MDD1963 - Saturday, May 11, 2019 - link
sounds real 'legit', does it not?29a - Monday, May 13, 2019 - link
They're legit, they activate. They just come from the grey market.BushLin - Saturday, May 11, 2019 - link
You can still take the free upgrade from Win 7 to Windows 10, Microsoft never stopped this from working. Do one upgrade the dirty way, get activated and future clean installs will activate too.Targon - Monday, May 13, 2019 - link
You could have thrown a Windows 10 flash drive in there and upgraded your Windows 7 to 10 for free.Irata - Friday, May 10, 2019 - link
Thanks for the article - it is really interesting.I think it shows very well why the PC market was stagnant for a long time. Depending on ones use case, the only upgrade that seems worth while is going from the top Early 2011 4C CPU to the top late 2018 8C consumer CPU.
I would love to see a similar article comparing the top of the line GPU with the 2600k in this time frame to see what performance difference a GPU upgrade made and contrast this with a CPU upgrade.
siberian3 - Friday, May 10, 2019 - link
I am running a 2600k at stock on 16 gig 1333 ram ddr3 and dont plan to upgrade until mobos with ddr5 and pci express 4 i only play 1080p anyway so thats enough for me i guess29a - Friday, May 10, 2019 - link
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I've been wanting to read something like this for a while.