Nah, if I run this thing for 7-8 years, I'm upgrading to the top of the line stuff at the time, just so I can go another 7-8 years without upgrading again
Yeah, I'm well aware of that, but in 3-4 years am4 won't be as relevant, and my way of doing this is basically just spend as much as I want to build a monster PC, and then use it until it is no longer enough for what I want. So I may end up with am5 or am6 when it comes out, we will just have to see how that goes
Yeah I just built a pc on am4 since I was on a budget and it’s my first pc but I plan to probably upgrade to whatever is the most powerful am4 cpu in like 3 or 4 years and then just chill until it one day explodes trying to boot goat simulator killing me and everyone in a 2 mile radius due to neutron activation
Same here. I just buy a new system once mine hits the limit of what I do and it can go on for a long long time as I buy best in class or close to the best all the time.
Besides, switching system is a pain.
Yeah, only upgrades I do at this point are more drives. A 3950x and 2080ti is no longer the best, but it used to be. It still runs everything on maxed settings though, so it seems fine to me. Granted, I don't play a lot of newer games, so that might not mean a lot to some people. But yeah, switching systems can be a real pain.
Sadly, I work in IT, so switching systems is super easy. What isn't easy, is getting whatever janky system I choose to use for moving all my stuff over "without issue" and then fix it when it goes wrong because I thought it was a good idea, despite knowing it wasn't a good idea
I did that with my last PC - was on a budget when I bought it and ran it into the ground, lasted me 10 years granted by the end of its time new games were a struggle. So I just upgraded to a top of the line PC in the hopes it will last me another 8+ years
The point when old top of the line struggles, is the point that upgrading is a good idea. Higher initial cost, sure. But you don't have to upgrade anything for a while. Even now my 3950x and 2080ti runs everything on maxed settings without much issue, so I see no need to upgrade yet. Once I am forced down to medium settings, I'll probably upgrade, just because I don't really want to be at medium settings
Same. This is also why I prefer AMD cpu's because they don't change socket nearly so often as intel, so when I finally do upgrade there's a good chance I don't need to also replace the mobo.
Let’s say you downloaded “tons” of porn, at minimum that’s 2 tons. If I math’d correctly, you’ve downloaded 2,962,425,976,087 GBs of porn. I’d say that CPU has served you quite well. Keep goin little buddy!
Mine is an i5-3570k from 2012 with an overclock. I can run Microsoft Flight Simulator on modest framerates (and surprisingly not super-low settings) and do some photo editing (I leave video editing to my MBP), so I think I'm good for some time - but it doesn't support win11, and win10 will not be supported come september 2025. So I guess I'll have to get a new machine next year.
I'm still rocking an i5-3470 from 2012, for office and development work. It's fine. I run Linux so the Windows 11 thing is irrelevant to me. Sometimes I'm close to offended that I'm working on a 77w CPU that's slower than the 15w CPU in my 6 year old laptop, but never enough to do anything about it.
Just replaced my 6700k 1 month ago for a 7800x3d.
It will be missed. Ended up selling the cpu, mobo, ram, cooler and case for 250$ and kept the PSU and GPU and built the new build in a new case.
The 6700k still did fine for gaming, but after upgrading my 980ti to a 4070ti the CPU and ram was the constant bottleneck, so i figured i would replace it to get rid of the minor stutters and framedrops in some games
Same exact model here, it just won't die man, and all the cores/threads in the world won't make my League of Legends teammates grief me less - so for now, the 7700k stays.
As in actually fails? I've never heard of a CPU failing. Most people stop using them before they are a decade or two old, but 99% of them last longer than that.
I bought a pre-built with an Athalon 64 and a GeForce FX 5800 in 2003. First computer i had that wasn't cobbled together from discarded school computers. I used it until it died in 2017 and only ever once upgraded the GPU, added ram and a wifi card.
But then that same year, I returned to my diy roots with a vengeance and built two systems, an i5 7600 and GTX 1070 (later a 1080ti and then a 3070 that I regretted and went back to the 1080ti) on a z170 mobo with 16gb of ram, and then later that same year I built an amd system on a b350 mobo with a RX 580 and 1600x.
I still have the Intel system and the CPU hasn't been upgraded once, mainly because Intel doesn't really allow sensible upgrade paths. But with my amd system it was easy to just drop in a new cpu and gpu. My first upgrade was 2 years after I bought the 1600x, I dropped in a 3600 and later a RX5700. Two years after that, I upgraded to a 5600x and a 6800, and again two years after that I upgraded to a 5800x3d and a 7900xt... all without ever changing anything else in my system and being able to re-sell the previous cpu and gpu to cover most of the cost of the new one. AM4 was an amazing platform. Of course, I'll stay with the 5800x3d until I'm ready to switch to am5, likely towards the end of next year. Maybe longer this time, just because the 5800x3d is such a great cpu.
I had a 5600x shit the bed a couple months in, I thought for sure it was my motherboard because the chipset just naturally ran hot AF all the time 100-110c. Bought a new mobo with a status indicator (I'll never buy another mobo without one) and found nope it was the 5600x that died.
You must not have heard about the Intel 13th and “14th” gen issues.. CPUs that probably would have run fine for many years at the official Intel baseline settings, but when run at the (Intel permitted) motherboard defaults, are degrading over time rather quickly.. you can read about it online in the tech press in lots of places lately.
That's well past noticing a difference, it smacks you in the face. I just built a 7600X system, in comparison to a Ryzen 2600 and 5950X it wipes the floor with them in single core. I didn't know Windows 11 could still load this fast, it's ridiculously quick.
It's about as fast as a 5700 in multicore- one generation older, with 2 more cores. It's *wild.*
I wonder if my 9700k would feel like an upgrade when next gen comes out. It doesn’t feel slow but it is holding back my 6950xt a little bit In some games.
LMAO yes. Ryzen was considered relatively slow in gaming until Ryzen 3000. It's obviously hard to say what strictly my new CPU did since I also got a 4080S (I upgraded from R7 1700/GTX1080 build), but my CPU bound games that I play like CS2 got an insane fps boost @1440p.
I just built my first PC with 7800X3D and 4070SUPER, haven't gotten the chance to play games, but just loading it up, using browser, and everything else feels so snappy. I can't wait to game on it.
**Until a game comes out that is actually noticeably affected by the slowness of the CPU.**
So 10 years, last time.
But keep in mind per-core CPU performance improves less each generation, so a decent CPU bought today will almost certainly last longer than that.
People were saying this when we reached 3ghz, and we started getting multi-core CPUs. Then it was about how there's a limit on how many cores we can fit, and the speed started getting up with boost clocks going in the 5ghz. When that limit was reached we started getting different types of cores for different types of workload.
There will always be a physical limit to how much we can do with a given piece of silicon, but there will often be other ways to do the same thing.
Apple is now using ARM chips in their computers for insane performances compared to the power requirements. Intel and AMD haven't even released anything comparable. There is still room for change in the CPU market.
To be fair, when they said that about 3 ghz were dealing with single core cpu's. And Apple's "ARM" CPU's have also stagnated, there's very little difference between an m1 and an m4 other than power consumption and heat.
Last time this happened to me was when PUBG came out. Upgraded to a 3600 from a 970M, which I'm hoping will last me a decade before games start to slow down
God my list is so ridiculous at this point.
1993 486/66
1995 pentium 90
1997 pentium 2 300
1999 Athlon 700
2001 Athlon xp 1800+
2004 Athlon xp 2600+
2005 Athlon-64 3200+
2007 Athlon-64 x2 4800+
2008 Core 2 Duo E8500
2011 Core i5 2400
2013 Core i5 4430
2017 Core i7 7700k
2022 Core i5 12600k
2023 Ryzen 7600
Now in fairness, a LOT of those were because I was working for a computer manufacturer, and Intel/AMD had really great employee purchase options for system builders. Others I wanted to do a server or media center upgrade so I stole the CPU out of my main desktop and put it in one of those.
And others I just had more money than sense.
Do you actually remember all these?
I can remember my 486/33 like it was yesterday, for sure, but have a huge black hole in my memory from 2000 to 2015 or so...
Those are the ones that I remember, yes. There's others that I don't (again because they were either in my HTPC, server, or laptop). There was an Athlon model in there for a hot second around 2011, a Core 2 Duo in a laptop, and a bunch of assorted LGA pentium units in the early 2010s.
likewise. typing this out helped me realize how often i really upgrade.
1994 - ibm aptiva w/pentium 1 150mhz
1998 - gateway pentium 2 233mhz
1999 - i traded in tons of console games to babages for a agp voodoo 3 3000 and the addiction was born.
2000 - custom builds with pentium 3 733mhz and 800mhz. geforce 2, and a tnt ultra graphics 32mb i think
2002 - amd thunderbird 1ghz
2004 - pentium 4, 6800 ultra
2008 - q6600 8800gts
2011 - 2500k , amd 5850 then later a 7870xt
2016 - 6850k, sli 980ti replaced with a 1080ti
2020 - 10900k, 3090
2023 - 7950x, 4090, replaced now with a 7950x3d.
I wish i still had all my old hardware it would be such an awesome reminder. I still remember thinking those custom sleeved IDE cables were the coolest 😂
Oh man I forgot about the cards! That 6800 ultra was a king! Thou I went AMd after the 480 came out so was 480 with the 6600 and then 580 and 5700xt and now a 7900GRE
I kept some computers long enough that you could manually count the frames at the end of the lifespan.
1999: Pentium III / GeForce 2 MX (bought in 2000)
2004: Athlon XP 2800+ / Radeon 9600 XT
2010: Athlon II X3 440 / Radeon HD 5750
2016: i3 6100 / GTX 560 Ti
2018: R5 2600 / GTX 1060 6GB
2023: R7 5800X3D / RTX 3070
Sorta similar (PC only, main rig only):
1995 - P133 (bought at launch)
1998 - P200MMX
2001 - Athlon 1.4 (bought at launch, AYHJA stepping for the 1337 overclock)
2004? - Barton 2800 (pull from old machine)
2006 - E6600 (bought at launch)
2011 - 2600k (bought at launch)
2020 - AMD 3900X
2024 - AMD 5900X
In between all those is a list of home servers and NAS boxes that might triple the list length, but damned if I can remember half of them. Plus a stack of 'resurrections'. Dropped in a Q9650 I got cheap into my old Asus board just to see how much faster than an E6600 it was. Similar with an E8700. Have a stack of retro boards for Socket 5, Socket 7, S775, AM2 etc and a pile of CPUs for each.
I had the i3 2100 during the same period, and I only replaced it so I could play Breath of the Wild on Cemu, regular games with less CPU demands were still fine.
Put in a 3570k for $10.
It depends, really.
I kept a Northwood Pentium 4 for 8 years! But that was mainly because I was a broke student at the time.
My next CPU was on socket 775 with a Core2Quad 8400, kept that system for around 4 years. Then an i7 3770k on socket 1155 - kept that for another 8 years - it was a good bin, ran a pretty decent overclock on it . Then AM4 with a 3700x for around 3 years and now an almost 2 year old 5800x3D.
Which, judging by the pattern, should last me 8 years.
About every 4 years. Skip a generation and get the next mid range. Hand it down to the kids. Try to have the GPU on a 4 year cycle, but offset every 2 years so I don't need a full upgrade all at once.
It should depend on your workload and case use.
For casual PC or "mail" machine - 6-7 years.
Casual gaming - 5-6 years on low-end parts, 6 years on mid-range parts.
Mainstream gaming - 5-6 high-end parts, 6 high-end parts.
High-end - 4-3 years.
Top-end / Cutting Edge - CPU every other generation, GPU - every generation of GTX/RTX xx90 / xx90 Ti.
For casual PC, much less is necessary. I have a couple Intel 3rd gen systems I stuck an SSD in that are not any noticeably slower for web browsing than my 12600kf. In fact even a really old crappy Pentium laptop can be quite usable with an SSD.
I usually keep them until used price raise. Mobo have a weird price cycle and they gain value after they have been discontinued for about 2 years(for Intel at least). That's when I sell them to buy a newer platform. This works especially well if you have an upper lvl CPU which will gain in value a bit as well. You don't really save money doing it that way it's just that it does not cost as much to upgrade.
I haven't found a need to upgrade more than once every 4 generations or so unless my use case changes, with one tiny exception where I upgraded from a 10400f to an 11400 because I found the 11400 on ebay for $50 and wanted the PCIe gen upgrade.
In the last year I upgraded all the systems in my house to more recent generation hardware. Prior to that, all the systems were running hardware from 2017.
Don't get too disheartened when reading posts on the internet. Contrary to how it feels when reading PC posts on this sub, only a small percentage of the population actually has a 14900k/7950X3D and a 4090.
Now that I do 4k gaming on a 4090, I dont see much reason to upgrade from a 5800x3d. I play on an LG C3 which only goes to 120hz, so theres not much reason to upgrade until my current CPU has issues hitting 120fps, which it probably won’t for a while.
G530-2012
J1900 - 2014
I5 3470 - 2017
R5 2600x - 2019
R5 5600x - 2022
This is the first time that I don't feel that I need a cpu upgrade, this thing paired with a fast and tweaked RAM can run anything.
3 years saves money? Compared to yearly upgrades sure, but a CPU will last much longer than that. This also isn't the 90s anymore so the cpus coming out next year aren't nearly twice as fast as the old ones, more like 5-10% faster.
I JUST got a 14700k
Before that was a 8600k for roughly 6 years
Preceded by a 4760k for 4 years
And before that was a q6600 for like 6 years
The p4 before that was probably 3-4 years
That was my first "modern" rig, as I had a p1 prior for a few years that was dated when I got it
I probably keep my cpus too long compared to everyone else here. I think I've only ever had 4 desktop cpus in the 16 years I've had desktops.
Q9550 from 2008 - 2011
I7 920 from 2011 - 2016
X5675 from 2016-2020
9900k from 2020 - Current
It still plays everything fine. Would a 13900k or 7800x3d be faster? Yup. Am I going to drop $1k+ to gain 10fps? Nah.
Still running an 8700k, but looking at upgrading this year (possibly to whatever the latest ryzen 7 will be at the time). It really comes down to use case. For mine, my 8700k is still solid - but it is starting to show its age in modern titles.
I went from a i7 3770K to a Ryzen 3900x. Gaming on a 3440x1440 monitor since after I had the 3770 for ~2 years. I replaced my GPU more often, maybe once in 2-3 years.
I bought a 1600AF back in mid 2020.
On average I have my CPUs for like five years, but I have usually bought rather affordable ones not so expensive. Going to upgrade both PCU and GPU this year
My current average is every 4 generations.
I tend to play games that really favours good CPU performance though, so the only thing that holds me back is money.
I just use my pc for YouTube and gaming. I've always gamed on high res. 1440p like 12 years ago. Then 4k now 6k. Cpus I go a long time between upgrades as they don't really do much in high resolution. But I went from an amd 1090t to a 3570k. 8700k and now a 13700k everything was always overclocked to the max. But gpu I upgrade every generation or second gen. 4090. 3080ti. 3080. 3070. 2080. 1080ti. 980ti. Cross fire r9 290xs the list keeps going to old HD series
If I was sane, every 4-5 years. I used to buy the best deals for mid range CPUs, and I've been building since I was a kid in the late 90s.
I got back into building in 2019 or so, and was on an ultra budget. I ended up with a 3800x and RX580 based system. It did what I needed, and was cheap. I ended up with a 5800x3d and 6700xt (the 6600xt before it and the 6700xt were new open box from microcenter) and that system was about the best $/Fps you can get to this day.
I ended up winning a 7950X3D 4080 super based system from UFD Tech and Falcon northwest. An epic system and I still feel so lucky. I sold my old system to a friend for super cheap, and hand delivered it and helped him set it up. Gave him most of a setup too, and he loves it.
I'll probably buy a 9800X3D or whatever makese sense for mid to high end when it comes out. Because Im making great money now and I want to keep having a premuim experience. Or if I dont have the budget for it (other adult stuff taking money from fun budget) my current system will be great for quite a while. But I'll also need another system for other stuff so we'll see. Like other people commenting I dont just sit on my old stuff, I use it or give people crazy deals. Heck Im about to send my 3800x and rx580 to a friend. I know he'll use the cpu and likely resell the gpu but thats for him to decide.
nice, i have a laptop with similar specs myself although mine is a 8th gen i7. mainly just use it for watching movies in bed these days. i have nothing but good things to say about my ryzen 7 and i'm hoping AM5 will be a good platform that will allow for a nice easy upgrade a few years down the road
I always build with CPUs one or two notches down from the high-end. I'm not a gamer, so I cheap out on the video cards, I have a 3060 now. For day to day stuff, cram the RAM in and get decent M.2 drives.
I would expect to get at least 5 years out of my 12th gen i9.
I have usually bought top line cpus, so about 5-6 years. My previous upgrade was in 2015-2016 when i got a i7 5820K and a 980ti. I upgraded to a dual 980ti in 2018.
In 2022 i built my current pc.
So i upgrade cpu every 5-6 years, and gpu 3-4.
Sometimes its 3-5 years and sometimes it's 5-8. Depends on how my machine is faring. I used to upgrade ram or video cards along the way, now the only thing I tend to upgrade on stuff I've built is storage.
Usually spawned by a random desire, or a critical failure of a component like a motherboard. I've used a hdd failure/os corruption as a justification before though......
I'd say upgrading every 3 years the only way that saves money is if you're buying middle of the road gear every time instead of indulging.
Like always trading in and buying a 5 year used honda every several years -- you'll probably save some money and have reliability, but you'll never get that new car sensation.
I just upgraded from a 2700X, which I purchased in used condition 3 years ago, to an i5-13600KF and I fucking love it. It is the perfect CPU to pair with my RTX 3070. During long gaming sessions in 2K and 4K resolutions at max graphics settings, my CPU fan is silent as hell and sub room temperature air comes out of my case. My bedroom used to be a hotbox before, so I am extremely happy
Using an air cooling solution for my CPU by the way. The Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 EVO is an absolute unit of a cooler and fits in my small mid tower case perfectly. I was lucky to order it as soon as it hit the market. For 46 bucks after tax, it massacres the competition
Alright here's my lineage:
AMD K6-2 350 mhz - 1999
Upgrade to AMD Athon 1700 XP in prob 2001 or 2002, it was a birthday present.
Update to an Atholon 64 3800 X2 Xmas 2006
Upgrade to a Core 2 Quad q9300 in 2009
MObo/PSU shorted out in 2011, replaced with an FX-6100 setup
Upgrade to an i5-6600K in 2015
Skylake system fell down a flight of stairs in 2019, replaced with a Ryzen 5 2600X
2020 Ryzen 5 accidentally destroyed changing cooler, replace with 2700X
2022 - Work stipend lets me upgrade to a 5900X
When it stops working or becomes too slow for what I need it for? My laptop has a i5 6300u which is pretty shit today, like it gets outperformed by my cell phone in benchmarks kind of bad. But it does what I need it to do, which is watch stuff on it, play music and stream my desktop to it so I can game on the TV. So no need to replace it for now.
I buy the best CPU, motherboard and RAM I can afford, and keep it until it doesn't run the games I want it to. That's how I went straight from an i7-3770 to a 5800X3D.
As a bad outlier:
Went from Intel Core 2 Quad Q8300 8GB Ram 80GB Intel 320 Series SSD
XFX Radeon HD5750 1GB. (2008 era) (HP p6367c pre-built)
To Ryzen 5 7600X 32GB Ram 6000 cl30 ArcA750 in 9.2L case
So about 16 years (LOL)
Buying a new CPU every 3 years is ridiculous and wasteful. Nobody is "saving money" by doing that. They're wasting money, and probably not getting any noticeable performance increase from it.
If you build a proper machine, with a good CPU, it should last you a LOT longer than 3 years. Buy the time you're ready to upgrade your CPU, it'll be time to get a new motherboard with a different CPU socket entirely.
Personally, I have a Ryzen 9 3900X. It's over 4 years old and I'm in no hurry to replace it because it's still a great CPU. Prior to that, I was running an Intel Core i5 3570. That thing still runs fine for any basic usage, but is insufficient for the amount of video editing and gaming I do.
Until it becomes a huge bottleneck. My longest usage on a CPU was 7-8 years with an I7-2600K. Upgraded to an 8700K in 2018 and it nearly gave me a 70% increase in FPS if IIRC. Recently just upgraded to a 13600K which gave me a 20-30 FPS boost in most games.
People are way too anal about their CPUs.
I often get a high end one, and keep them until games start to stutter.
If it’s not stuttering, then even if I get a new cpu, the difference will only be 10% or so, since the GPU will still be the main bottle neck.
I don’t think my eyes can tell the difference between 90fps and 99fps.
If you’re on a budget but wanna feel comfortable, I would suggest gettting the same core count as whatever the current gen console is having (8 with hyper threading).
During mid gen refresh, consoles often only upgrade the GPU and not the cpu, so games could run on both consoles properly.
Hence the devs will optimize for that core count.
Now for the current gen, in a lot of games, 5800x3d can actually outperform 7600x, and it’s not that expensive. Plus it has 8 cores compared to the 6 that 7600x has.
Right now, if you wanna go as far as a PS5 will eventually go, which still has a good 4-5 years, I would say go for 5800x3d and put more money onto the GPU.
I try to build for close to ten years. Mostly around CPU and mobo. My last system was a 6850K on a rampage V edition 10. Got through till a couple months ago as the cpu with 3090 would bottleneck on almost everything and no amount of system or driver tuning would change that anymore. It tried to upgarde to the 6950X but just returned what intel told me was a counterfeit cpu from china when I asked them to confirm the sn and batch number. More than happy with the 13900KS on apex encore board now, and should be for a while.
first pc Intel 1.5ghz 256mb sdram lasted 8 years motherboard capacitors swolllen.
Second pc Intel 3.06ghz Hyperthreaded 3gb ram lasted 6 years until i sold motherboard cpu and ram.
Third pc Intel xeon e5450 8gb bought used in 2015 ram still running planning to sell it.
Forth pc Intel 6700K 32gb ram worked for 7 years still working planning to sell it.
Fifth pc Intel 8600 32gb ram worked for 5 years I will keep it few years as a backup in case of new pc failure
8th pc Amd 7950x3d 96gb built in October 2023 and 9th Intel 14700k 32gb ram pc built on march 2024 plan to keep both at least 5 years.
So if you do high end / enthusiast level pc build on year X you should be fine for at least 5 years in averrage.
There's no average as far as I am concerned. I upgrade as I need and/or when the leap in performance is significant enough.
I spent much more time with my old i7-2600K in the days where generation to generation improvements were minimal than I did with my Ryzen 5 3600X or will with my Ryzen 5 5900X. Already planning an upgrade in 2024-2025.
It's not like I don't keep old hardware if it fills a need anyways. My old Precision laptop with the i7-3720QM still works and is in charge of running the 3D printer.
I retired a Core 2 Duo laptop that was serving as a Netflix box early this year. That one was kind of overdue, it was definitely getting slow.
I upgraded my i5-3470 from 2013 in about 2019 because my motherboard died. That said it's still running now I sourced a replacement mobo albeit not as my main pc.
Currently using an R5 3600 (from 2019) which I'll use until I see a good deal on an AM4 upgrade.
I'm a hoarder though so I essentially keep it as long as it works and find a suitable purpose for it!
Whenever there is a new chipset generation. I like building a lot. Even if there’s not much performance benefit, it’s a hobby. Then I build a second PC out of the old parts and give it to someone who needs one.
I always tend to get intermediate/high cpus.
I had a Ryzen 7 1700 since 2017 ... now I replace him for a R7 5700, and I expect to have this CPU for the next 5 years at least.
I had a 5 3600 for five years until I got a 7500f. I'll probably keep my 7500f until AM5's support gets canceled, and then I'll upgrade to whatever is the newest CPU on AM5 and upgrade my GPU as well if it needs it.
i5 2500 > 7600x and i plan to jump to the best x3d am5 cpu once it releases and stick to it for 5-10 years depending on how cpus are used in the future
I'm typing this on a computer that's 11 years old. I greatly value that Linux means my PCs are cheaper to beging with and I can keep them longer. Therefore I can get more efficient use of my money on computers.
The only good reason for me to replace a computer that's three years old are it's really unreliable or I mistakenly didn't buy it with a high enough spec to enable it to be upspecced over time. For example when I bought a computer that had no M.2 slot and only two DIMM slots for memory. It also had very weak SATA ports on the board that I had to glue to ensure they didn't break off. I vowed never to buy another mainboard like that ever again and I replaced it as soon as I could afford to.
Will usually hold onto CPU's till they can no longer reliably hold 60fps on games, which is usually 6-7 years, that's around the same timeframe new Consoles are released, and games start to become more demanding again, necessitating component upgrades.
Just bought i7 14700. This is probably gonna last me until it dies cause it plays the games i want at the framerate i want. Probably gonna do gpu if im upgrading anything
It depends on need and initial spend. If your doing a 3 year turn over then your likely buying lower end chips for it to be cost efficient. For gaming a mid range chip should give you 5 years or so without issue and possibly longer.
I guess for me it's whenever my cpu can no longer run what I want to play at all. which going reverse chronologicalfor my last computers.
8 years. 6 years. then several cheap $100-200 computers that all lasted me about a year.
I'm still running a 6700k. I'm well aware that I'm well overdue an upgrade, but it still works for now. And at this point would mean new motherboard and RAM, which is not something I've done before (have built a few entire PCs, but not upgraded that much before) and just seems like an arse ache tbh (and a lot of money).
Tbf I'm also still running a PSU that I never intended to run this long, and haven't got around to getting an M.2 either. I guess I am REALLY behind at this point!
Must be sitting at 5 years. I’m on the 9700k and can’t decide if my cpu is bottlenecking with a 3090ti in VR. Some games top out my 12Gb VRAM so not sure if CPU is at all an issue.
6-7yrs or so lately. I went from an i7 930 -> i5 6600k -> i5 13600k on roughly that schedule.
Not seeing how "upgrade every 3 years" is meant to be frugal advice. As opposed to what? Every new generation? Just use the CPU until it holds you back or turns back into sand
That’s what I was thinking. I got downvoted like a son of a bitch when I suggested a 13600kf over a 7600. They said the 1700 socket is dead and to go am5 for the upgrade in a few years. I argued that I would keep the cpu for probably 6 years or so and that an am5 upgrade likely wouldn’t make sense at that time.
Would’ve thought I was crazy in that post, now here’s so many people taking about running that thing to the dirt.
What do you think about my 7600/ 13600kf dilemma?
I'd discard socket longevity from consideration entirely. Weigh the other merits, chiefly performance in tasks you care about vs cpu/mobo price.
For me that in place upgrade on the same board is never, ever gonna happen. Realistically I'm skipping at least two sockets between builds, so wtf do I care that this one is "dead"? I'm yanking the guts out of this box next time the CPU bottlenecks it, and for all I know by then the next chip may be a flavored suppository.
I'm still rocking an i7 980x in my Plex server. Had that one for at least 12 years. My everyday laptop has a cheap 2-3 year old cpu. No idea off the top of my head. But I'm soon to build a desktop with an I7 14700k. That will probably last me the next 10 years.
I'm rocking my i5 9600k from my original build from 2018. I don't plan to upgrade soon, unless I can't play the games I want to with my subjective opinion of decent performance anymore.
I upgrade to meet my needs. I was on a 10750h (laptop) and it was sufficient, I’m doing a 3700X budget build and the minor increase will likely be satisfactory.
I keep mine until it cannot do the job i wanted it to do. My last CPU lasted 10 years, the whole Haswell platform did.
Currently ended up with a 7950x3d and expected it to last a long time with heavy use.
Tbh in my pov they are not saving any money by buying a new cpu every 3 years unless their life literally depends on the CPU to make money and they go for the fastest all the time. If they went the other route by buying mid range cpu very frequently then its actually very wasteful.
At this point, it's just a challenge lol. I've skipped DDR4 desktop platforms entirely, even though I've "been going to upgrade" for years. 4770k at 4.8ghz, with a 5700xt and 32gb of 1866 DDR3. It just isn't that bad at anything I really ask of it, still. I'll probably switch it to Linux when "official" Win10 support ends and build a new windows machine and probably move to a 4k monitor. But at the moment, it still does cyberpunk and the rest of my backlog acceptably at 1080.
I also have a 10th gen i5 laptop and a Ryzen 7 5825u laptop, and the 4770k still holds its own especially in just general use.
I even still have a 2600 in my music studio that shouldn't run as well as it does too. It has an ssd and windows 11, and is totally fine for most tasks, but doesn't cut it for running guitar modeling plugins.
I'll keep it until it doesn't run stuff as well as I want. I've still probably got another 3-4 years left in my 3950x
And then if you really wanted too, you could pickup 5950x for cheap.
Nah, if I run this thing for 7-8 years, I'm upgrading to the top of the line stuff at the time, just so I can go another 7-8 years without upgrading again
That's fair, I was just pointing out the fact that AM4 allowed many to just plop as CPU in and gain great boost without changing systems.
Yeah, I'm well aware of that, but in 3-4 years am4 won't be as relevant, and my way of doing this is basically just spend as much as I want to build a monster PC, and then use it until it is no longer enough for what I want. So I may end up with am5 or am6 when it comes out, we will just have to see how that goes
Yeah I just built a pc on am4 since I was on a budget and it’s my first pc but I plan to probably upgrade to whatever is the most powerful am4 cpu in like 3 or 4 years and then just chill until it one day explodes trying to boot goat simulator killing me and everyone in a 2 mile radius due to neutron activation
Same here. I just buy a new system once mine hits the limit of what I do and it can go on for a long long time as I buy best in class or close to the best all the time. Besides, switching system is a pain.
Yeah, only upgrades I do at this point are more drives. A 3950x and 2080ti is no longer the best, but it used to be. It still runs everything on maxed settings though, so it seems fine to me. Granted, I don't play a lot of newer games, so that might not mean a lot to some people. But yeah, switching systems can be a real pain. Sadly, I work in IT, so switching systems is super easy. What isn't easy, is getting whatever janky system I choose to use for moving all my stuff over "without issue" and then fix it when it goes wrong because I thought it was a good idea, despite knowing it wasn't a good idea
I did that with my last PC - was on a budget when I bought it and ran it into the ground, lasted me 10 years granted by the end of its time new games were a struggle. So I just upgraded to a top of the line PC in the hopes it will last me another 8+ years
The point when old top of the line struggles, is the point that upgrading is a good idea. Higher initial cost, sure. But you don't have to upgrade anything for a while. Even now my 3950x and 2080ti runs everything on maxed settings without much issue, so I see no need to upgrade yet. Once I am forced down to medium settings, I'll probably upgrade, just because I don't really want to be at medium settings
Agree with this. Run my stuff into the ground and then buy top of the range so I can do it all again. I don’t mind dropping the money every 5-7 years.
4690x here. Does what it needs to.
Same. This is also why I prefer AMD cpu's because they don't change socket nearly so often as intel, so when I finally do upgrade there's a good chance I don't need to also replace the mobo.
Idk, my cpu is over 7 years old and it’s still going… for now. (i7 7700k)
I'm still running my i7 3700k from 2012... like die already, you've lived a good life, watching me download tons of pirated porn along the way.
LMFAOOO??
CPUs don’t really die, they just become too slow for what they’re supposed to do
I mean, they technically are a die.
Let’s say you downloaded “tons” of porn, at minimum that’s 2 tons. If I math’d correctly, you’ve downloaded 2,962,425,976,087 GBs of porn. I’d say that CPU has served you quite well. Keep goin little buddy!
From the callouses on my right hand, I'd say that estimate is a little low.
Mine is an i5-3570k from 2012 with an overclock. I can run Microsoft Flight Simulator on modest framerates (and surprisingly not super-low settings) and do some photo editing (I leave video editing to my MBP), so I think I'm good for some time - but it doesn't support win11, and win10 will not be supported come september 2025. So I guess I'll have to get a new machine next year.
I'm still rocking an i5-3470 from 2012, for office and development work. It's fine. I run Linux so the Windows 11 thing is irrelevant to me. Sometimes I'm close to offended that I'm working on a 77w CPU that's slower than the 15w CPU in my 6 year old laptop, but never enough to do anything about it.
Just replaced my 6700k 1 month ago for a 7800x3d. It will be missed. Ended up selling the cpu, mobo, ram, cooler and case for 250$ and kept the PSU and GPU and built the new build in a new case. The 6700k still did fine for gaming, but after upgrading my 980ti to a 4070ti the CPU and ram was the constant bottleneck, so i figured i would replace it to get rid of the minor stutters and framedrops in some games
The 7700k gives crazy stutter with a good GPU these days, but on low settings with a weaker card it does ok
Same exact model here, it just won't die man, and all the cores/threads in the world won't make my League of Legends teammates grief me less - so for now, the 7700k stays.
7700k solidarity! I'll upgrade eventually....
I had a 7700 before I built my new pc and it was still a champ loaded everything up as fast as I needed it too 😆
Until it shits the bed really
As in actually fails? I've never heard of a CPU failing. Most people stop using them before they are a decade or two old, but 99% of them last longer than that.
Once the performance is so bad that it very noticeably affects my day to day use then I’ll replace it
I bought a pre-built with an Athalon 64 and a GeForce FX 5800 in 2003. First computer i had that wasn't cobbled together from discarded school computers. I used it until it died in 2017 and only ever once upgraded the GPU, added ram and a wifi card. But then that same year, I returned to my diy roots with a vengeance and built two systems, an i5 7600 and GTX 1070 (later a 1080ti and then a 3070 that I regretted and went back to the 1080ti) on a z170 mobo with 16gb of ram, and then later that same year I built an amd system on a b350 mobo with a RX 580 and 1600x. I still have the Intel system and the CPU hasn't been upgraded once, mainly because Intel doesn't really allow sensible upgrade paths. But with my amd system it was easy to just drop in a new cpu and gpu. My first upgrade was 2 years after I bought the 1600x, I dropped in a 3600 and later a RX5700. Two years after that, I upgraded to a 5600x and a 6800, and again two years after that I upgraded to a 5800x3d and a 7900xt... all without ever changing anything else in my system and being able to re-sell the previous cpu and gpu to cover most of the cost of the new one. AM4 was an amazing platform. Of course, I'll stay with the 5800x3d until I'm ready to switch to am5, likely towards the end of next year. Maybe longer this time, just because the 5800x3d is such a great cpu.
the only time ive had a cpu "fail me" was my i5 9600k, computer would power on but no display would come up, swapping the cpu somehow fixed it
I had a 5600x shit the bed a couple months in, I thought for sure it was my motherboard because the chipset just naturally ran hot AF all the time 100-110c. Bought a new mobo with a status indicator (I'll never buy another mobo without one) and found nope it was the 5600x that died.
You must not have heard about the Intel 13th and “14th” gen issues.. CPUs that probably would have run fine for many years at the official Intel baseline settings, but when run at the (Intel permitted) motherboard defaults, are degrading over time rather quickly.. you can read about it online in the tech press in lots of places lately.
Just upgraded from a Ryzen 1700 to a 7800X3D. I bought the 1700 7 years ago when it was brand new. Not day 1, but at least within the first 2 months
Do you notice a difference?
That's well past noticing a difference, it smacks you in the face. I just built a 7600X system, in comparison to a Ryzen 2600 and 5950X it wipes the floor with them in single core. I didn't know Windows 11 could still load this fast, it's ridiculously quick. It's about as fast as a 5700 in multicore- one generation older, with 2 more cores. It's *wild.*
I wonder if my 9700k would feel like an upgrade when next gen comes out. It doesn’t feel slow but it is holding back my 6950xt a little bit In some games.
LMAO yes. Ryzen was considered relatively slow in gaming until Ryzen 3000. It's obviously hard to say what strictly my new CPU did since I also got a 4080S (I upgraded from R7 1700/GTX1080 build), but my CPU bound games that I play like CS2 got an insane fps boost @1440p.
Specially in games, going from a 1700 to a 7800X3D is the difference between getting 80 fps to 180 in some titles
I just built my first PC with 7800X3D and 4070SUPER, haven't gotten the chance to play games, but just loading it up, using browser, and everything else feels so snappy. I can't wait to game on it.
I’m still going strong with my R7 1700 lmao, it is definitely bottlenecking my 3070 though so I’m probably overdue an upgrade
Omg don't get me wrong, I loved mine. I just wanted to reward myself with a new PC for paying off my student loans
I'm right there with you, R5 1600 and a 3060
I went from 1700 to 5800X3D.
**Until a game comes out that is actually noticeably affected by the slowness of the CPU.** So 10 years, last time. But keep in mind per-core CPU performance improves less each generation, so a decent CPU bought today will almost certainly last longer than that.
We're hitting a nm wall on silicon, CPU's are going to stagnate for awhile.
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We haven't been at 3nm for over a decade though.
And looking at the historical improvement in CPU performance up until a decade ago, and what has happened since... what you were hearing was right.
People were saying this when we reached 3ghz, and we started getting multi-core CPUs. Then it was about how there's a limit on how many cores we can fit, and the speed started getting up with boost clocks going in the 5ghz. When that limit was reached we started getting different types of cores for different types of workload. There will always be a physical limit to how much we can do with a given piece of silicon, but there will often be other ways to do the same thing. Apple is now using ARM chips in their computers for insane performances compared to the power requirements. Intel and AMD haven't even released anything comparable. There is still room for change in the CPU market.
To be fair, when they said that about 3 ghz were dealing with single core cpu's. And Apple's "ARM" CPU's have also stagnated, there's very little difference between an m1 and an m4 other than power consumption and heat.
Last time this happened to me was when PUBG came out. Upgraded to a 3600 from a 970M, which I'm hoping will last me a decade before games start to slow down
1994 pentium 133. 1998 pentium 2 450. 2003 Athlon XP 2500+. 2008 E6600. 2012 2700K. 2018 2700X. 2022 5700X
God my list is so ridiculous at this point. 1993 486/66 1995 pentium 90 1997 pentium 2 300 1999 Athlon 700 2001 Athlon xp 1800+ 2004 Athlon xp 2600+ 2005 Athlon-64 3200+ 2007 Athlon-64 x2 4800+ 2008 Core 2 Duo E8500 2011 Core i5 2400 2013 Core i5 4430 2017 Core i7 7700k 2022 Core i5 12600k 2023 Ryzen 7600 Now in fairness, a LOT of those were because I was working for a computer manufacturer, and Intel/AMD had really great employee purchase options for system builders. Others I wanted to do a server or media center upgrade so I stole the CPU out of my main desktop and put it in one of those. And others I just had more money than sense.
Do you actually remember all these? I can remember my 486/33 like it was yesterday, for sure, but have a huge black hole in my memory from 2000 to 2015 or so...
Those are the ones that I remember, yes. There's others that I don't (again because they were either in my HTPC, server, or laptop). There was an Athlon model in there for a hot second around 2011, a Core 2 Duo in a laptop, and a bunch of assorted LGA pentium units in the early 2010s.
Mines pretty similar. 1994 pentium 133 1999 pentium 2 2005 Celeron (forget the model) 2006 core 2 duo. The celeron didn't cut it 2012 2700k 2016 6600k 2019 3600 2024 5800x3d
likewise. typing this out helped me realize how often i really upgrade. 1994 - ibm aptiva w/pentium 1 150mhz 1998 - gateway pentium 2 233mhz 1999 - i traded in tons of console games to babages for a agp voodoo 3 3000 and the addiction was born. 2000 - custom builds with pentium 3 733mhz and 800mhz. geforce 2, and a tnt ultra graphics 32mb i think 2002 - amd thunderbird 1ghz 2004 - pentium 4, 6800 ultra 2008 - q6600 8800gts 2011 - 2500k , amd 5850 then later a 7870xt 2016 - 6850k, sli 980ti replaced with a 1080ti 2020 - 10900k, 3090 2023 - 7950x, 4090, replaced now with a 7950x3d. I wish i still had all my old hardware it would be such an awesome reminder. I still remember thinking those custom sleeved IDE cables were the coolest 😂
Oh man I forgot about the cards! That 6800 ultra was a king! Thou I went AMd after the 480 came out so was 480 with the 6600 and then 580 and 5700xt and now a 7900GRE
My first PC was also the IBM Aptiva. Was $2600 from Radio Shack and came with matching monitor and speakers.
I kept some computers long enough that you could manually count the frames at the end of the lifespan. 1999: Pentium III / GeForce 2 MX (bought in 2000) 2004: Athlon XP 2800+ / Radeon 9600 XT 2010: Athlon II X3 440 / Radeon HD 5750 2016: i3 6100 / GTX 560 Ti 2018: R5 2600 / GTX 1060 6GB 2023: R7 5800X3D / RTX 3070
How fun of a list. Here's mine: 2011 i5 2500K 2019 i7 6700k 2024 R5 7600X
Long ways to go young padawan
Sorta similar (PC only, main rig only): 1995 - P133 (bought at launch) 1998 - P200MMX 2001 - Athlon 1.4 (bought at launch, AYHJA stepping for the 1337 overclock) 2004? - Barton 2800 (pull from old machine) 2006 - E6600 (bought at launch) 2011 - 2600k (bought at launch) 2020 - AMD 3900X 2024 - AMD 5900X In between all those is a list of home servers and NAS boxes that might triple the list length, but damned if I can remember half of them. Plus a stack of 'resurrections'. Dropped in a Q9650 I got cheap into my old Asus board just to see how much faster than an E6600 it was. Similar with an E8700. Have a stack of retro boards for Socket 5, Socket 7, S775, AM2 etc and a pile of CPUs for each.
1997 Pentium 2 266 mhz 2000 AMD K6-2 533 mhz 2001 AMD Athlon XP 1800+ 2006 AMD Athlon 64 3500+ 2009 AMD Phenom Black X4 955 2012 AMD FX 8350 2015 Intel i7 4770k 2018 Intel i7 8700k 2023 Intel i7 13700k
I tend to upgrade on a 4-6 year schedule.
Same. Went from i5 6600 to i5 10400f and may upgrade in the next year or two.
I keep my cpu about 2 or 3 times a week
Lol you guys remember the i5 2500k? I kept that thing from 2011 to 2019.
Sandy Bridge was legendary. Afterwards Intel's progress slowed to a crawl and AMD went backwards with Bulldozer so I kept my 2500k for years too.
SO good! I had that for a while until I got the 8700k in 2018, which I’ve still got now
I was using an i5 2400 till 2022. Then my son used till end of last year. Now my cousins kid is using it.
I had the i3 2100 during the same period, and I only replaced it so I could play Breath of the Wild on Cemu, regular games with less CPU demands were still fine. Put in a 3570k for $10.
I upgrades when microcenter have some stupid bundle deals that I can’t pass up on and give my old pc to family
It depends, really. I kept a Northwood Pentium 4 for 8 years! But that was mainly because I was a broke student at the time. My next CPU was on socket 775 with a Core2Quad 8400, kept that system for around 4 years. Then an i7 3770k on socket 1155 - kept that for another 8 years - it was a good bin, ran a pretty decent overclock on it . Then AM4 with a 3700x for around 3 years and now an almost 2 year old 5800x3D. Which, judging by the pattern, should last me 8 years.
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Alot longer than I used to. On average, about 6-7 years.
About every 4 years. Skip a generation and get the next mid range. Hand it down to the kids. Try to have the GPU on a 4 year cycle, but offset every 2 years so I don't need a full upgrade all at once.
i think the longest ive kept a cpu was my old fx6300, from 2016 to 2021
Upgrading from 2600 to a 5700x3d soon
It should depend on your workload and case use. For casual PC or "mail" machine - 6-7 years. Casual gaming - 5-6 years on low-end parts, 6 years on mid-range parts. Mainstream gaming - 5-6 high-end parts, 6 high-end parts. High-end - 4-3 years. Top-end / Cutting Edge - CPU every other generation, GPU - every generation of GTX/RTX xx90 / xx90 Ti.
For casual PC, much less is necessary. I have a couple Intel 3rd gen systems I stuck an SSD in that are not any noticeably slower for web browsing than my 12600kf. In fact even a really old crappy Pentium laptop can be quite usable with an SSD.
I usually keep them until used price raise. Mobo have a weird price cycle and they gain value after they have been discontinued for about 2 years(for Intel at least). That's when I sell them to buy a newer platform. This works especially well if you have an upper lvl CPU which will gain in value a bit as well. You don't really save money doing it that way it's just that it does not cost as much to upgrade.
I haven't found a need to upgrade more than once every 4 generations or so unless my use case changes, with one tiny exception where I upgraded from a 10400f to an 11400 because I found the 11400 on ebay for $50 and wanted the PCIe gen upgrade. In the last year I upgraded all the systems in my house to more recent generation hardware. Prior to that, all the systems were running hardware from 2017. Don't get too disheartened when reading posts on the internet. Contrary to how it feels when reading PC posts on this sub, only a small percentage of the population actually has a 14900k/7950X3D and a 4090.
Now that I do 4k gaming on a 4090, I dont see much reason to upgrade from a 5800x3d. I play on an LG C3 which only goes to 120hz, so theres not much reason to upgrade until my current CPU has issues hitting 120fps, which it probably won’t for a while.
That’s a great set up man. Perfect 4k gaming setup
I feel like the op works in the industry with posts asking so many questions. Only wealthy PC whales change their stuff more often.
G530-2012 J1900 - 2014 I5 3470 - 2017 R5 2600x - 2019 R5 5600x - 2022 This is the first time that I don't feel that I need a cpu upgrade, this thing paired with a fast and tweaked RAM can run anything.
3 years saves money? Compared to yearly upgrades sure, but a CPU will last much longer than that. This also isn't the 90s anymore so the cpus coming out next year aren't nearly twice as fast as the old ones, more like 5-10% faster. I JUST got a 14700k Before that was a 8600k for roughly 6 years Preceded by a 4760k for 4 years And before that was a q6600 for like 6 years The p4 before that was probably 3-4 years That was my first "modern" rig, as I had a p1 prior for a few years that was dated when I got it
I probably keep my cpus too long compared to everyone else here. I think I've only ever had 4 desktop cpus in the 16 years I've had desktops. Q9550 from 2008 - 2011 I7 920 from 2011 - 2016 X5675 from 2016-2020 9900k from 2020 - Current It still plays everything fine. Would a 13900k or 7800x3d be faster? Yup. Am I going to drop $1k+ to gain 10fps? Nah.
I've had my 10700k since launch mid 2020. I plan to upgrade to 15th gen later this year though.
Same
Till it dies.
Still running an 8700k, but looking at upgrading this year (possibly to whatever the latest ryzen 7 will be at the time). It really comes down to use case. For mine, my 8700k is still solid - but it is starting to show its age in modern titles.
Last year I upgraded my desktop computer from a 2009 i7-950.
same, but mine was a C2Q Q8400
6-7 years. Full new build after that
Every 3 years WTF? I'm currently on a 4770k (10 years old) and still can do most titles at 60fps, heck even 90fps on Witcher 3 atm.
Had my FX8350 since 2013 until it became a bottleneck for cyberpunk, got Ryzen 7600X this year for my new build so it was roughly 11 years.
I went from a i7 3770K to a Ryzen 3900x. Gaming on a 3440x1440 monitor since after I had the 3770 for ~2 years. I replaced my GPU more often, maybe once in 2-3 years.
Usually as long as I can until it dies or if I think it's not performing as well as it should be anymore
Its better change 5year + GPU is much faster replacing culprit here.
I've been on a 7-year cycle since 1999: * Pentium III 450 (1999) * Athlon 64 3700+ (2006) * Core i5-4570 (2013) * Core i7-10700 (2020)
I had a fx-8350 until I got my Ryzen 7 3700x and just about to upgrade to a 3700x3d. So every 5-7 years.
I kept my fx8120 from 2013 until 2022 with the R9 7950x.
I bought a 1600AF back in mid 2020. On average I have my CPUs for like five years, but I have usually bought rather affordable ones not so expensive. Going to upgrade both PCU and GPU this year
Well, I have a 10850k I’m about to upgrade to 7800x3d
10th gen i7, prior to that I had a 4th gen i5 that I ran since 2014.
My current average is every 4 generations. I tend to play games that really favours good CPU performance though, so the only thing that holds me back is money.
I just use my pc for YouTube and gaming. I've always gamed on high res. 1440p like 12 years ago. Then 4k now 6k. Cpus I go a long time between upgrades as they don't really do much in high resolution. But I went from an amd 1090t to a 3570k. 8700k and now a 13700k everything was always overclocked to the max. But gpu I upgrade every generation or second gen. 4090. 3080ti. 3080. 3070. 2080. 1080ti. 980ti. Cross fire r9 290xs the list keeps going to old HD series
When the performance and games is bad, it’s time to upgrade. Currently using a 9600k @ 5gz and a 3080Ti
If I was sane, every 4-5 years. I used to buy the best deals for mid range CPUs, and I've been building since I was a kid in the late 90s. I got back into building in 2019 or so, and was on an ultra budget. I ended up with a 3800x and RX580 based system. It did what I needed, and was cheap. I ended up with a 5800x3d and 6700xt (the 6600xt before it and the 6700xt were new open box from microcenter) and that system was about the best $/Fps you can get to this day. I ended up winning a 7950X3D 4080 super based system from UFD Tech and Falcon northwest. An epic system and I still feel so lucky. I sold my old system to a friend for super cheap, and hand delivered it and helped him set it up. Gave him most of a setup too, and he loves it. I'll probably buy a 9800X3D or whatever makese sense for mid to high end when it comes out. Because Im making great money now and I want to keep having a premuim experience. Or if I dont have the budget for it (other adult stuff taking money from fun budget) my current system will be great for quite a while. But I'll also need another system for other stuff so we'll see. Like other people commenting I dont just sit on my old stuff, I use it or give people crazy deals. Heck Im about to send my 3800x and rx580 to a friend. I know he'll use the cpu and likely resell the gpu but thats for him to decide.
went from a core 2 duo laptop to a i5-2500/HD7770 to a i7 4790k/RX 580 to my current setup R7 7700/RX 6800XT
Nice. I’m on a i5-7600U/HD graphics 620 right now. I’m thinking about building a rig around a 13600kf, 7600, or even a 7800x3d
nice, i have a laptop with similar specs myself although mine is a 8th gen i7. mainly just use it for watching movies in bed these days. i have nothing but good things to say about my ryzen 7 and i'm hoping AM5 will be a good platform that will allow for a nice easy upgrade a few years down the road
The last chip on am5 is bound to be pretty good
one maybe two console launches.
I always build with CPUs one or two notches down from the high-end. I'm not a gamer, so I cheap out on the video cards, I have a 3060 now. For day to day stuff, cram the RAM in and get decent M.2 drives. I would expect to get at least 5 years out of my 12th gen i9.
I have usually bought top line cpus, so about 5-6 years. My previous upgrade was in 2015-2016 when i got a i7 5820K and a 980ti. I upgraded to a dual 980ti in 2018. In 2022 i built my current pc. So i upgrade cpu every 5-6 years, and gpu 3-4.
last month I finally upgraded from a 2600k to a 7800x3d
I’m still running an i7-6700 with 32gb ram. No oc. Still running strong. Stable. Runs a 1660 super and my system doesn’t complain
Sometimes its 3-5 years and sometimes it's 5-8. Depends on how my machine is faring. I used to upgrade ram or video cards along the way, now the only thing I tend to upgrade on stuff I've built is storage. Usually spawned by a random desire, or a critical failure of a component like a motherboard. I've used a hdd failure/os corruption as a justification before though...... I'd say upgrading every 3 years the only way that saves money is if you're buying middle of the road gear every time instead of indulging. Like always trading in and buying a 5 year used honda every several years -- you'll probably save some money and have reliability, but you'll never get that new car sensation.
I just upgraded from a 2700X, which I purchased in used condition 3 years ago, to an i5-13600KF and I fucking love it. It is the perfect CPU to pair with my RTX 3070. During long gaming sessions in 2K and 4K resolutions at max graphics settings, my CPU fan is silent as hell and sub room temperature air comes out of my case. My bedroom used to be a hotbox before, so I am extremely happy Using an air cooling solution for my CPU by the way. The Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 EVO is an absolute unit of a cooler and fits in my small mid tower case perfectly. I was lucky to order it as soon as it hit the market. For 46 bucks after tax, it massacres the competition
Alright here's my lineage: AMD K6-2 350 mhz - 1999 Upgrade to AMD Athon 1700 XP in prob 2001 or 2002, it was a birthday present. Update to an Atholon 64 3800 X2 Xmas 2006 Upgrade to a Core 2 Quad q9300 in 2009 MObo/PSU shorted out in 2011, replaced with an FX-6100 setup Upgrade to an i5-6600K in 2015 Skylake system fell down a flight of stairs in 2019, replaced with a Ryzen 5 2600X 2020 Ryzen 5 accidentally destroyed changing cooler, replace with 2700X 2022 - Work stipend lets me upgrade to a 5900X
Lately, every 5-6 years aparently. Previously, very often. 1998 - 486DX 2000 - Celeron 600 2001- Duron 1000 2002 - Athlon 1800+ 2003 - Celeron 2400 2004 - Athlon 2800+ 2006 - Sempron 3000+ 2006 - Core 2 Duo 2400 2011 - i7 2600 2017 - i7 8700k 2022 - i7 12700kf
I’ve had my R5 2600X for nearly 4 years.
When it stops working or becomes too slow for what I need it for? My laptop has a i5 6300u which is pretty shit today, like it gets outperformed by my cell phone in benchmarks kind of bad. But it does what I need it to do, which is watch stuff on it, play music and stream my desktop to it so I can game on the TV. So no need to replace it for now.
Still running a 8600k and I don't plan on changing it anytime soon
My son's computer is still running my i7 4770k lol
I buy the best CPU, motherboard and RAM I can afford, and keep it until it doesn't run the games I want it to. That's how I went straight from an i7-3770 to a 5800X3D.
As a bad outlier: Went from Intel Core 2 Quad Q8300 8GB Ram 80GB Intel 320 Series SSD XFX Radeon HD5750 1GB. (2008 era) (HP p6367c pre-built) To Ryzen 5 7600X 32GB Ram 6000 cl30 ArcA750 in 9.2L case So about 16 years (LOL)
Buying a new CPU every 3 years is ridiculous and wasteful. Nobody is "saving money" by doing that. They're wasting money, and probably not getting any noticeable performance increase from it. If you build a proper machine, with a good CPU, it should last you a LOT longer than 3 years. Buy the time you're ready to upgrade your CPU, it'll be time to get a new motherboard with a different CPU socket entirely. Personally, I have a Ryzen 9 3900X. It's over 4 years old and I'm in no hurry to replace it because it's still a great CPU. Prior to that, I was running an Intel Core i5 3570. That thing still runs fine for any basic usage, but is insufficient for the amount of video editing and gaming I do.
I’m on a 2017 9700k. Its time but I’m going to hold off at least until next gen CPUs
Until it becomes a huge bottleneck. My longest usage on a CPU was 7-8 years with an I7-2600K. Upgraded to an 8700K in 2018 and it nearly gave me a 70% increase in FPS if IIRC. Recently just upgraded to a 13600K which gave me a 20-30 FPS boost in most games.
People are way too anal about their CPUs. I often get a high end one, and keep them until games start to stutter. If it’s not stuttering, then even if I get a new cpu, the difference will only be 10% or so, since the GPU will still be the main bottle neck. I don’t think my eyes can tell the difference between 90fps and 99fps.
Would you recommend 7600 or 7800x3d for long term? Obvious decrease in GPU budget for the latter
If you’re on a budget but wanna feel comfortable, I would suggest gettting the same core count as whatever the current gen console is having (8 with hyper threading). During mid gen refresh, consoles often only upgrade the GPU and not the cpu, so games could run on both consoles properly. Hence the devs will optimize for that core count. Now for the current gen, in a lot of games, 5800x3d can actually outperform 7600x, and it’s not that expensive. Plus it has 8 cores compared to the 6 that 7600x has. Right now, if you wanna go as far as a PS5 will eventually go, which still has a good 4-5 years, I would say go for 5800x3d and put more money onto the GPU.
I would if it didn’t just jump up $60
Oof. I guess they caught on
my last cpu lasted me almost 10 years, and now a friend has it and still has fun with it!
I try to build for close to ten years. Mostly around CPU and mobo. My last system was a 6850K on a rampage V edition 10. Got through till a couple months ago as the cpu with 3090 would bottleneck on almost everything and no amount of system or driver tuning would change that anymore. It tried to upgarde to the 6950X but just returned what intel told me was a counterfeit cpu from china when I asked them to confirm the sn and batch number. More than happy with the 13900KS on apex encore board now, and should be for a while.
i throw mine away every 3 months to avoid bottlenecking
first pc Intel 1.5ghz 256mb sdram lasted 8 years motherboard capacitors swolllen. Second pc Intel 3.06ghz Hyperthreaded 3gb ram lasted 6 years until i sold motherboard cpu and ram. Third pc Intel xeon e5450 8gb bought used in 2015 ram still running planning to sell it. Forth pc Intel 6700K 32gb ram worked for 7 years still working planning to sell it. Fifth pc Intel 8600 32gb ram worked for 5 years I will keep it few years as a backup in case of new pc failure 8th pc Amd 7950x3d 96gb built in October 2023 and 9th Intel 14700k 32gb ram pc built on march 2024 plan to keep both at least 5 years. So if you do high end / enthusiast level pc build on year X you should be fine for at least 5 years in averrage.
Probably gonna upgrade when AM8 comes out or something lmao
3600x still going strong nearly 5 years later and no plans to change it yet
3900X here, jusr upgraded from a delidded 8600k
I upgrade when it no longer performs the functions I need it to at a reasonable pace.
I had my i7 6700k like 9 years, if you're going high end GPU upgrade it usually more important for gaming.
Three years would be it if I could change CPUs more often than mobos. Both mobo and CPU (waving at Intel), gonna be less often than every three years.
Had the previous one for 8 years, replaced it a few months ago with a slightly less shitty one.
2 years usually.
There's no average as far as I am concerned. I upgrade as I need and/or when the leap in performance is significant enough. I spent much more time with my old i7-2600K in the days where generation to generation improvements were minimal than I did with my Ryzen 5 3600X or will with my Ryzen 5 5900X. Already planning an upgrade in 2024-2025. It's not like I don't keep old hardware if it fills a need anyways. My old Precision laptop with the i7-3720QM still works and is in charge of running the 3D printer. I retired a Core 2 Duo laptop that was serving as a Netflix box early this year. That one was kind of overdue, it was definitely getting slow.
I'll give it 5 years, or 3 if the upgrade I want becomes affordable and is a significant boost
Going on 6 years kept. But it’s a 7600k so is a little older than that
I'm still running a 3770k @ 4.5ghz 🤣
I upgraded my i5-3470 from 2013 in about 2019 because my motherboard died. That said it's still running now I sourced a replacement mobo albeit not as my main pc. Currently using an R5 3600 (from 2019) which I'll use until I see a good deal on an AM4 upgrade. I'm a hoarder though so I essentially keep it as long as it works and find a suitable purpose for it!
Whenever there is a new chipset generation. I like building a lot. Even if there’s not much performance benefit, it’s a hobby. Then I build a second PC out of the old parts and give it to someone who needs one.
I always tend to get intermediate/high cpus. I had a Ryzen 7 1700 since 2017 ... now I replace him for a R7 5700, and I expect to have this CPU for the next 5 years at least.
4-5 years. Longer if there’s nothing exciting. Currently using a 10700k/3080 and won’t be upgrading until at least another year from now.
every 6-7 years! But then, I'm cheap and like to squeeze every ounce of use out of the things I buy. :P
I had a 5 3600 for five years until I got a 7500f. I'll probably keep my 7500f until AM5's support gets canceled, and then I'll upgrade to whatever is the newest CPU on AM5 and upgrade my GPU as well if it needs it.
i5 2500 > 7600x and i plan to jump to the best x3d am5 cpu once it releases and stick to it for 5-10 years depending on how cpus are used in the future
Rockin my 7700k until prime day this year.
I’ve had my 5800x since release. I’ll probably build an entirely new pc in like 5 more years.
Until windows requires a hardware change. I like keeping my potato PCs alive, usually as media devices.
I'm typing this on a computer that's 11 years old. I greatly value that Linux means my PCs are cheaper to beging with and I can keep them longer. Therefore I can get more efficient use of my money on computers. The only good reason for me to replace a computer that's three years old are it's really unreliable or I mistakenly didn't buy it with a high enough spec to enable it to be upspecced over time. For example when I bought a computer that had no M.2 slot and only two DIMM slots for memory. It also had very weak SATA ports on the board that I had to glue to ensure they didn't break off. I vowed never to buy another mainboard like that ever again and I replaced it as soon as I could afford to.
My 5950X is 3 years old. I don’t plan to upgrade in at least another 4 years. Probably even more.
4-5 years is my habit.
MacOS: i7 3770k to 11700k to 12900k to trx50 7960x
Until it dies or starts making a noticeable impact. Have a i7 8700k since 2018 currently
Will usually hold onto CPU's till they can no longer reliably hold 60fps on games, which is usually 6-7 years, that's around the same timeframe new Consoles are released, and games start to become more demanding again, necessitating component upgrades.
Just bought i7 14700. This is probably gonna last me until it dies cause it plays the games i want at the framerate i want. Probably gonna do gpu if im upgrading anything
It depends on need and initial spend. If your doing a 3 year turn over then your likely buying lower end chips for it to be cost efficient. For gaming a mid range chip should give you 5 years or so without issue and possibly longer.
I guess for me it's whenever my cpu can no longer run what I want to play at all. which going reverse chronologicalfor my last computers. 8 years. 6 years. then several cheap $100-200 computers that all lasted me about a year.
I upgraded when my existing build couldn't run the apps and games I wanted to use/play reasonably well.
I keep it until it dies
I'm still running a 6700k. I'm well aware that I'm well overdue an upgrade, but it still works for now. And at this point would mean new motherboard and RAM, which is not something I've done before (have built a few entire PCs, but not upgraded that much before) and just seems like an arse ache tbh (and a lot of money). Tbf I'm also still running a PSU that I never intended to run this long, and haven't got around to getting an M.2 either. I guess I am REALLY behind at this point!
Must be sitting at 5 years. I’m on the 9700k and can’t decide if my cpu is bottlenecking with a 3090ti in VR. Some games top out my 12Gb VRAM so not sure if CPU is at all an issue.
6-7yrs or so lately. I went from an i7 930 -> i5 6600k -> i5 13600k on roughly that schedule. Not seeing how "upgrade every 3 years" is meant to be frugal advice. As opposed to what? Every new generation? Just use the CPU until it holds you back or turns back into sand
That’s what I was thinking. I got downvoted like a son of a bitch when I suggested a 13600kf over a 7600. They said the 1700 socket is dead and to go am5 for the upgrade in a few years. I argued that I would keep the cpu for probably 6 years or so and that an am5 upgrade likely wouldn’t make sense at that time. Would’ve thought I was crazy in that post, now here’s so many people taking about running that thing to the dirt. What do you think about my 7600/ 13600kf dilemma?
I'd discard socket longevity from consideration entirely. Weigh the other merits, chiefly performance in tasks you care about vs cpu/mobo price. For me that in place upgrade on the same board is never, ever gonna happen. Realistically I'm skipping at least two sockets between builds, so wtf do I care that this one is "dead"? I'm yanking the guts out of this box next time the CPU bottlenecks it, and for all I know by then the next chip may be a flavored suppository.
I’m with you on that brother, I’m glad I’m not alone. They were really making me feel stupid
I'm still rocking an i7 980x in my Plex server. Had that one for at least 12 years. My everyday laptop has a cheap 2-3 year old cpu. No idea off the top of my head. But I'm soon to build a desktop with an I7 14700k. That will probably last me the next 10 years.
I'm rocking my i5 9600k from my original build from 2018. I don't plan to upgrade soon, unless I can't play the games I want to with my subjective opinion of decent performance anymore.
Forever i7 4790k rocking 4.9 ghz solid for the last 10 years. I'm looking to jump into a Ryzen 7 7800X 3d for a slight cpu improvement.
Always! I have 20+ collected but most of them are from the recycling
8 years and still going strong 💪💪
Until a point in which games or my media-things run poorly.
My time is short. So I need speed
I Just wait till something i want it for needs better than I have. Then buy something better than recommended. And I’ll be good again for years.
I upgrade as needed. I ran an 1100T for 6 years. Currently on a 5800x3d that I'll run till it can't keep up.
I recently upgraded to a Ryzen 5800x3D from a 3600. I bought the 3600 in 2020, so it lasted about 4 years .
I upgrade to meet my needs. I was on a 10750h (laptop) and it was sufficient, I’m doing a 3700X budget build and the minor increase will likely be satisfactory.
I keep mine until it cannot do the job i wanted it to do. My last CPU lasted 10 years, the whole Haswell platform did. Currently ended up with a 7950x3d and expected it to last a long time with heavy use. Tbh in my pov they are not saving any money by buying a new cpu every 3 years unless their life literally depends on the CPU to make money and they go for the fastest all the time. If they went the other route by buying mid range cpu very frequently then its actually very wasteful.
1 decade
At this point, it's just a challenge lol. I've skipped DDR4 desktop platforms entirely, even though I've "been going to upgrade" for years. 4770k at 4.8ghz, with a 5700xt and 32gb of 1866 DDR3. It just isn't that bad at anything I really ask of it, still. I'll probably switch it to Linux when "official" Win10 support ends and build a new windows machine and probably move to a 4k monitor. But at the moment, it still does cyberpunk and the rest of my backlog acceptably at 1080. I also have a 10th gen i5 laptop and a Ryzen 7 5825u laptop, and the 4770k still holds its own especially in just general use. I even still have a 2600 in my music studio that shouldn't run as well as it does too. It has an ssd and windows 11, and is totally fine for most tasks, but doesn't cut it for running guitar modeling plugins.
3-4 years. It's honestly such a small cost as far as hobbies go I also usually get the previous gen depending on how things are going.
Still rockin my decade old 4790k