Input on upgrading a friend's rig

[Joriem]

Hi all,

 

So my buddy is currently running an FX-8350(lol) paired with a 1060 6GB. I picked up a used i5-4670k for around $150(MSI Z87 mobo/16GB RAM/600w PSU incl.). My question is, how much better would this i5 be over the FX. I know FX series processors are pretty much dead, and they weren't all that great to start off with, but would I be better off giving him my old i7-6700k, or would the i5 do a great job, since it's still a very well off CPU(or, as much as I can tell). He doesn't do much other than play games(Total War is always hard because the FX just can't hack the loading times down), which is why I am not outright using the 6700k for his upgrade, because he doesn't do any sort of video production or photo editing to justify the hyper-threading/newer architecture/etc. I want him to have a comfortable, but much improved gaming experience over his old stuff. Does the FX bottleneck the 1060? Would the i5 bottleneck it, since the i5 and FX are close in age(albeit the i5 a year newer). Would he be better off with DDR4 support that would come with the i7?

 

Thanks for all your input, have a great day!

 

 

- Jor

[Lurick]

The 4670K is about a 40% improvement (give or take) over the FX-8350 due to better IPC that delivers more performance with less cores. I would say that the i5 definitely would allow the 1060 6GB to take full advantage of games and not really hold it back and for the price it would be a great upgrade. Sure you could get more out of say a 8600K or something but if your friend is playing at 1080p or even 1440p 60FPS then I wouldn't worry about it as they won't see much of an improvement.

[dizmo]

The i7 would be better, but platform costs would be substantially higher, and I don't think it'd be worth it over the kit you've already picked up.

Is he using a 1080p60 monitor? If so, definitely use the i5.

[Joriem]

Lurick and dizmo, thank you for your input. Yes, he is using a single 1080p 60hz monitor. I just want to make sure he has a better gaming experience than what he does now, because he's been hurting for a new CPU for a long while.