IMO, the older hardware make for GREAT internet surfing machines with which to keep your internet connection glued to. Especially if that older machine gives easy access to turning off IME. Newer rigs will always be faster if that's what you're after. Newer OS's however are getting less secure for the end user out-of-the-box without running a stripped build or a build that allows you to customize your OS optimization. Which is why the newer build being for a production machine should remain SANS internet. You'll have your internet access customized and beefed up super secure on your older rig.

 

This is good suggestion too, only if the thing in question doesn't cost more than 250 bucks, my friend got second hand HP Elitedesk 800 G4 i7-8700, 32GB DDR4, 512GB SSD for 240 bucks, just because he couldn't wait until some of the components for AM4 build I previously mentioned arrive, still, new is new and they perform about the same. Still, AM4 makes mores sense on long run, you can get something like 5900X down the line if you ever feel the need for it, add better GPU, better cooling, more RAM, i7-8700 is pretty much hitting the wall again immediately.

Right now is the best time to get AM4, this is the all time low they will reach and there are still supplies in the stores they want to get rid off, even second hand prices really can't get that high like it's the case for other stuff that isn't in production anymore and sellers pray on that, anyone that want to get rid off their AM4 need to form his prices based on the current ones, it's the only way they can sell it.

 

Last edited: Sep 21, 2023

and a low tdp cpu like the 5700x runs here 22celsius at idle, 30c under load, fans quiet all the time. i use revios 11 btw

 

You are quite right about the price. Many refurbs in Canada are still way to high compared to the U.S. & Europe as examples.
I am always looking out for refurbished Xeon based workstations that I can recommend to others. Prefer Xeon over i7 for better on die features along with ECC RDIMMS offering tight timings & consistent bandwidth.

Below that, something like the HP you mentioned is a good buy for the stated purpose.

 

Yeah, I'm about to pull the trigger on older Fujitsu Celsius M730, Xeon E5-1650v2, 32GB of RAM, nVidia Quadro FX580 512MB, 800W PSU, 120GB SSD, have RME 9632 lying around and want to put it in use again, make this machine dual Linux/Windows 10, asking price is 190 euros which is quite reasonable.

 

I disagree with this, I use big templates in Cubase 12, heavy sample usage, inserts galore, still got a i7 haswell devil's canyon, I don't have any of the issues people complain about regarding C12 cpu usage, and yes, chrome browser open full of tabs, youtube in the background, discord, steam, etc. I only bounce a track if it's a heavy granular synth patch in say pigments, but that's rare I even use those simply as a matter of taste.
Is an upgrade in order? Abso-fucking-lutely. But, if you build in the right sweet spot of value and performance, you don't need a new PC every 3-5 years, that's just misinformation.

 

It's 11-12 years old actually, proud owner of iPhone 4s, people freak out when they see it, love it to bits, 8-9 hours of battery life, small, have better coolness factor than latest most expensive thing, retro smartphones ftw lol

 

I've read very sound advice here. No need for me to elaborate, but the only reason I comment is that I had a setup very very similar to yours.

I7, 4th gen
Motherboard: Z87X-UD5H
RAM: 16GB Ram (Kingston Valueram DDR3 1333MHZ ECC 16GB, Kvr1333d3e9sk2/16g)
SSD: Samsung 860 EVO 500gb (plus a couple of HHD)

And I upgraded it to:

I7, 10th gen
Motherboard Asus ROG Strix
RAM 32Gb at 2200 mHZ
SSD; Samsung 890 EVO + 2 Sansumg M2 + 8tb HHD

And It improved dramatically the performance of my PC. I'm no expert in microprocessor's used threads, ram allocation, etc. I don't want to be either. The PC performance was noticeably better in terms of number of libraries and vst intances I could use, speed of process, lack of dropouts, etc and overall performance. I would recommed you to upgrade.

My PC has now changed to a I9 13th GEN, better MOBO, DDR5 RAM and the upgrade is not that noticeable from the pc I mentioned before. But that's a different story. Good luck

Cheers

 

I had a 4790k went to a 10700k I agree defiantly big improvement.

 

There's a fine line where one walks thru performance specs and susses out faults with the system hardware not having the gas to do what you want it to do, as opposed to simpler upgrades that could fix those issues without ever having to resort to replacing larger pieces of system hardware needlessly. Things like glitchy audio and instance numbers of plugins are wake up calls for improving audio hardware and drivers and maybe upgrading the amount of system RAM respectively.

 

Actually there is no performance problem today. An old (very) i7 2600k + 16gb is capable of doing everything you need to produce ANY music. If this is not enough for you, then this is a problem with your approach to work and the use of bloatware that spends much more resources than its works.

 

wow, a lot to read, thanks guys.

I do have a modern machine, its just i was mixing on this one the other day and it worked perfectly, to the point where i thought that if could achieve just a 15% or 20% performance increase I would be prepared to invest maybe a 150 to achieve that with the current motherboard.Then it would be just perfect. That was my initial curiosity

But def not more than that, if not possible i rather get some other newer setup like suggested or a completely new system.

 

Last edited: Sep 25, 2023

You can take a look at this https://compare.topgpu.net/cpu/core-i9-14900k-vs-ryzen-7-7800x3d.html