Planning an upgrade, boxer details and current to planned new machine details added.

[MadMilitia]

My boxer details:

Play from: Healer perspective.
5 x dedicated boxer
2 melee
2 ranged
1 healer

Current performance in cata zones:
Slaves (forced 10FPS, low quality, 1920x1080)
Main (normal quality, 1920x1080)
- registers 30-40 fps, 20 fps in Ogrimmar

Isboxer: 1 region, stacked, swap.
Addons: Recount, DBM, Isboxer, Mogit

My current rig:

Processor: Q9650
MB: EVGA 780i
Ram: 8GB
HDD: WD Black 1TB
Video: 2x 295 GTX (non-sli, dedicated physx 2ndary)
OS: Windows 7 Pro
IO: G510, Evoluent left handed edition
Case: Antec 900


My planned rig:

Processor: I7 2600
MB: ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3
Ram: 16GB
Primary HDD: Crucial 256GB SSD
Secondary HDD: WD Black 1TB
Video: 2x 295 GTX (non-sli, dedicated physx 2ndary)
OS: Windows 7 Pro
IO: G510, Evoluent left handed edition
Case: Antec 900


Now the questions.

1. Will the new rig be able to handle (better than 20fps) high settings on the main and 20fps on the slaves?
2. Will I need to water cool this thing at stock speeds?
3. Will it bottleneck at the GPU (single card) ?
4. Will adding a secondary 1920x1080 display hinder performance too much? I don't want slaves on it. Just a free window.

Thanks in advance. This upgrade will cost me approximately $1,000 as of the listings.

[Kekkerer]

Is it a mistake on your part that you've listed the same GPUs in your planned rig section?

if not then here goes:
1. Ogrimmar is heavily CPU reliant meaning that at your current settings you will get better fps there but it won't increase much everywhere else.
2. i7 2600 is not a particularly hot CPU, so no watercooling would be wasted effort especially at stock speeds.
3. Well since you are upgrading the CPU and not the GPU no, there won't be a bottleneck.
4. Adding an additional display won't hurt.

[MadMilitia]

Is it a mistake on your part that you've listed the same GPUs in your planned rig section?

if not then here goes:
1. Ogrimmar is heavily CPU reliant meaning that at your current settings you will get better fps there but it won't increase much everywhere else.
2. i7 2600 is not a particularly hot CPU, so no watercooling would be wasted effort especially at stock speeds.
3. Well since you are upgrading the CPU and not the GPU no, there won't be a bottleneck.
4. Adding an additional display won't hurt.

Not a mistake. I planned on swapping out critical bottle-necked components for something that would be the cheapest alternative to a better performance.

The options I'm looking at are A) do the critical component swap or B) start building an entirely new machine to serve my 4 slaves on.


I don't much ever play from the slave windows. Not since the IWT/CTM and broadcasting. I'm very comfortable playing as heals. I just want maximum visibility (effects especially) from my main window without suffering any serious slowdown.

Option B would be more a long term project and not immediate. I could have option A assembled and ready to roll by Tuesday.

For the display I'm hesitant to do that on my current rig. I don't know of who has the I7 here on D-B so maybe if they see this thread they can offer their thoughts based on my needs.

[Ualaa]

Your planned rig will 5-box with ease:

My planned rig:

Processor: I7 2600
MB: ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3
Ram: 16GB
Primary HDD: Crucial 256GB SSD
Secondary HDD: WD Black 1TB
Video: 2x 295 GTX (non-sli, dedicated physx 2ndary)
OS: Windows 7 Pro
IO: G510, Evoluent left handed edition
Case: Antec 900

I have a similar system.

Same CPU, same motherboard (but Generation 1), same OS, same case.
I'm using 8GB of 1600mhz ram, my wow and OS are on separate SSD drives.
I have a 1GB GTX 570, for my video card.

The i5 2500K was fairly smooth until I started to stream.
The i7 2600K is totally smooth, with or without streaming.

I play with the slaves on lower settings (except view distance, which is medium).
And the main on 3/4 settings, except view distance maxed.

You can check my stream site, there are videos there.
To give you an idea of my quality/performance.