To upgrade my current Intel processor
 

... I would be upgrading my Intel Q9550 2.85 Ghtz Intel Quad Duo Core2.
Which of the Sandy or Ivy Bridge current Intel processors is the first level that upgrades mine?

Thank you kindly.

Well depends on what you do, if you game an i3 would be an upgrade. If you use multiple threads, an i5 or i7 would be.

Zero gaming, but Heavy duty Web surfing. 50 pages open at once
 

Thank you supaflyx3 for responding,

I do record TV and watch online -both-, also eMail, intensive use of Office Suite. All of this supported with 6 GB of RAM memory.
AND ... I do not need to overclock the processor..

Hope this helps to decide which would be the first level of current Intel processor that outperforms mine in terms of speed.

Thank you again

Intensive office :rofl:

An i3 would do you just fine but if you wanted SB then get a i5 2500 on the cheap

Thanks for responding.

a.What does your "SB" stand for?
b. care to explain your emoticon regarding "intensive Office"? (smile... -I am confused with emoticons-)

So you are saying that even the i3 is faster than my current Q9550 in terms of speed for each and every one of my uses?

There really isn't anything "intensive" about Office hence the laughter.

SB = Sandy Bridge

And yes a SB i3 would be worlds ahead in many ways of the q9550

Thank you


Well if I work on 10 Word Documents and 15 spreadsheets all opened at the same time, it seems pretty intensive to me. Going back and forth permanently (aside from having other programs also running) Don't you think?

Thank you for the contributions though.

Just realized that next generation of Intel processor comes with the TOCK jump and with it a new motherboard socket.. Think I will wait till the end of the year to upgrade by assembling a totally new system. By then the current Dell computer will be 4 years old and I will feel justified in spending the money.

Thank you again

Your current machine should be plenty for what your currently doing,
the only thing that may help is to throw in more ram if you see your memory usage close to what you have installed but I think 6 GB should be enough for you.

Where do you find your computer too slow for what you're doing? Unless you have Excel spreadsheets that are so formula/macro-loaded that they take several seconds or minutes to load up, your computer seems more I/O bound than CPU-bound. (Meaning those tasks are better served by ways to make stuff load faster off the disk rather than making your computer crunch the numbers faster.)

Do you have a solid state drive (SSD) yet? Installing Office and your OS on an SSD would cut your loading times by 75% or so right there. The going back and forth, assuming the documents are already open, is just RAM, which you have plenty of at 6 GB.
You also mention that you have a bunch of hard drives in a USB/eSATA enclosure. If you're using USB 2.0 then that's a major source of your "slowness".

To Frontier
 

Do you have a solid state drive (SSD) yet? Installing Office and your OS on an SSD would cut your loading times by 75% or so right there. The going back and forth, assuming the documents are already open, is just RAM, which you have plenty of at 6 GB.
You also mention that you have a bunch of hard drives in a USB/eSATA enclosure. If you're using USB 2.0 then that's a major source of your "slowness".[/QUOTE]

Yes I own an Intel 320 Series, and 7 other HDDs all USB 2.0.

Thank you for your contribution