Pentium? Core i5? Core i7? Making sense of Intel’s convoluted CPU lineup

[FlyingPenguin]

Darn good article on the differences in the Intel line of processors. Useful info if you're planning on buying/building a new rig.

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/02/ ... pu-lineup/

[Err]

I've been wanting to upgrade my I5 2500K but can't pull the trigger. I was looking at either a X99 Chipset build with a I7 5820K (6 core HT), an I7 4970K Devils Canyon, and even the I7 6700K Skylake. I'm not that interested in the Z170 boards even though they have USB C. Outside of a few flash drives and my cell phone, I don't have any many 3.0 devices. I'm guessing it will be several years before we see an uptake of USB C. However, I would like an M.2 SSD as my main drive. I really like the I7 4970K because of the sheer brute stock speed of 4.0 and I'm sure that it can overclock well. The Z97 boards still run DDR3 so I would need to buy new RAM but they don't support M.2 drives. The I7 5820K is interesting with 6 cores and the X99 boards supporting quad channel DDR-4 plus M.2 SSDs. The clock speed is a bit underwhelming at 3.3 but it should overclock well since it's a Haswell. I encode videos from time to time and having essentially 12 cores would work nice in Hardbrake and Sony Movie Studio.

For gaming there's minuscule gains and I'd be better off selling by 780 and getting a 980ti. I really have an itch to upgrade. My MSI P7-GD65 board is supposed to support an Ivy Bridge I7 3770K but those go for as much as a 5820K or 4970K.

Intel is supposed to be releasing Broadwell based 2013-v2 (X99 board) chips soon. By the time I make a decision, Kabylake will probably be out.

[Losbot]

My main rig's i7-2700K has been serving me well for 4 years now. Spent the cash on it back then and as expected, it's still running today's apps w/o hesitation. I've only upgrade the video in the last year, to a 970.
When I build a new gaming rig end of this year, this CPU/MB/RAM will become a nice box for running multiple VMs.

[FlyingPenguin]

1st Gen (5 year old) Core i7 860 here on my workstation (gaming PC is running a 2 year old Core i5). Still does the job for what I use the workstation for.