New "best bang for the buck" CPU for rendering

[Ecuadorian]

Looks like, right now, the best performance/price ratio is with the "Sandy Bridge" Core i7 2600(K):

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the- ... -tested/17

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/desk ... ,2420.html

The "K" version is for overclocking:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/san ... 850-7.html

[Fletch]

A bit more info :
Currently i7-2600k retails at around $315USD ($314.99 at NewEgg as of end of April 2011) and runs at 3.4Ghz out of the box.
This is approx. twice as fast as the laptop version of the currently available i7 CPU.
This is also approximately 1.27x faster than the i7 920 stock speed of 2.66Ghz from 2-3 years ago. (which sold for about the same price at the time it was released)
This is also faster than the Core i7-980X Extreme 3.33GHz which is still retailing for over $1000.

Of course, an overclocked 920 will still perform strongly against (i.e. "beat") the stock 2600k.

Prices from April 2010:
Intel Core i7-975 Extreme 3.33GHz 4 / 8 3.60GHz 130W $999
Intel Core i7 965 Extreme 3.20GHz 4 / 8 3.46GHz 130W $999
Intel Core i7 940 2.93GHz 4 / 8 3.20GHz 130W $562
Intel Core i7 920 2.66GHz 4 / 8 2.93GHz 130W $284
Intel Core i7 870 2.93GHz 4 / 8 3.60GHz 95W $562
Intel Core i7 860 2.80GHz 4 / 8 3.46GHz 95W $284
Intel Core i5 750 2.66GHz 4 / 4 3.20GHz 95W $196