Upgrade question: i7-3770, Xeon E3-1270 v2 or Xeon E3-1275 v2?

[Sonny_G_Oku]

My main gaming rig is equipped with a Dell Vostro 470 motherboard (H77 chipset, I believe) equipped with an Intel Core i5-3450, 16 GB of DDR3 RAM, and a GTX 1060 6GB. I'd like to upgrade my CPU, but I don't want to change motherboards right now...my Windows 7 key came with my Vostro and is probably bound to the motherboard. Plus, DDR4 RAM is EXPENSIVE.

I'm thinking of upgrading to an i7-3770. Mainly for the hyperthreading and faster base and turbo clocks for performance reasons. I'm also thinking of a couple of Xeon models (both Ivy Bridge quad-cores with hyperthreading): a Xeon E3-1275 v2 with the same clock speeds as an i7-3770. Also a slightly under-powered Xeon E3-1270 v2.

Should I try for one of the Xeons to possibly save some money, or should I play it safe with the i7? Any help would be appreciated.

[Snow]

Originally posted by Sonny_G_Oku:

My main gaming rig is equipped with a Dell Vostro 470 motherboard (H77 chipset, I believe) equipped with an Intel Core i5-3450, 16 GB of DDR3 RAM, and a GTX 1060 6GB. I'd like to upgrade my CPU, but I don't want to change motherboards right now...my Windows 7 key came with my Vostro and is probably bound to the motherboard. Plus, DDR4 RAM is EXPENSIVE.

I'm thinking of upgrading to an i7-3770. Mainly for the hyperthreading and faster base and turbo clocks for performance reasons. I'm also thinking of a couple of Xeon models (both Ivy Bridge quad-cores with hyperthreading): a Xeon E3-1275 v2 with the same clock speeds as an i7-3770. Also a slightly under-powered Xeon E3-1270 v2.

Should I try for one of the Xeons to possibly save some money, or should I play it safe with the i7? Any help would be appreciated.

Sure, why not Xeon? There's nothing "unsafe", those are all Intel CPUs your chipset should have no problems with. Unless Dell tried hard to modify BIOS the way it doesn't support Xeons, but that's really unlikely. Either way it's best to try ask that on a Dell forum, as someone most likely already tried that.

[Captain.Cheasant]

Did you ever find out if the Vostro 470 is compatible with the e3-1270 v2?

[Sonny_G_Oku]

Originally posted by CHAD:

Did you ever find out if the Vostro 470 is compatible with the e3-1270 v2?

Nah, I decided to go with the i7-3770. I'll let someone else find out if the Xeon works. The 3770 is pretty nice considering its age.

[hawkeye]

There isn't much performance difference.
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/socketType.html

If the mobo allows it, set the cpu speed manually in the advanced bios settings.
I have a 2600 non-k and I get another 1100 over the 8191 score in that chart above.

[Lord Flashheart]

I bought my CPU/motherbaord & some memory 7 years ago and still going fine. Then I got 8GB DDR3 1600 Mhz, a z77 extreme6 and an i7-3770k.
The H77 chipset was bad then and bad now. It was an expensive setup for the time. I bought them for longevity. Now I have 32GB memory.

The CPU is overclocked and is still works very well for gaming. I do intend to upgrade in the near future. The machine is for gaming only. Any serious work is on another machine with a linux OS.

There is not much you can do with that setup to upgrade to a decent gaming machine as I see it as you cannot overclock the CPU with the H77 motherboard.
I suggest you deal with the extra memory cost and go for something with upgrade options.
AMD is probably the better option for now.- so 16GB DDR4 (expensive), a good motherboard with excellent power delivery and a CPU that is good enough for your needs now. With AMD there are better options to upgrade the CPU later on if needed without having to get a new motherboard & memory.

[Captain.Cheasant]

For anyone curious, the e3-1280 v2 and presumably all the LGA 1155 ivy bridge xeons under it is compatible with the Dell Vostro 470 motherboard, 0YJPT1 with latest bios. I swapped out the i5 3450 with the e3-1280 v2 and it was recognized by the motherboard and booted up just fine. No issues here.