upgrading my current PC/DAW

Why z97 and 4790k? I would rather go for z170 as it supports DDR4 and usb3.1.
 
If you are going to upgrade, this is what I would have done today (I'm waiting for Kaby lake or Cannonlake for my next build):
 
Asus z170-p 
Corsair V or HyperX F 16gb 2666mhz ddr4 ram (2x8gb)
i7 6700k (bundled or the i5 6600k if you want to keep the cost down)  
256 gb SSD for OS/Apps
usb 3 ac wireless11
win10
 
Power supply and graphics should be ok as long as you don't do gaming, videos or overclock. But due to age I wold consider changing the PSU to protect the new parts.
 
I would recommend to do a full new build.

Bat I would have a word with Jim Roseberry and check out StudioCat I suspect you will get a better PC in the end from him.  I tried to build my own last year but I could still not do better than three of the UK DAW builders.
Definitely think about an i7 quad core, 16 Gig of RAM should do you, a 500g SDD for your OS and Programs a 1Tb for your Audio and a 1 Tb for samples (superior drummer) and other stuff.

Best

fireberd
"Must" you have Wi-Fi?

yes, can't run cable, downstairs and too far, and NOT having connection has been smart from a stability point of view,
but with plugins and updates, i need to have a connection to the net.
what's the big deal about just turning all that stuff off until i need it?
 
 
 

fireberd Also, most (just about all) new motherboards do not have a true PCI card slot/bus.

  so, what are the names of the ones that do?
what's the budget solution for keeping the maudio card rolling?
is that an argument to let it go?
if i have a usb based interface as my soundcard, i would no longer need the pci card anyway, correct?
 
 

fireberdThe upgrade you mention may work, but why go with "old" technology?  If you are upgrading go with current technology hardware.

i'm sorry, that question throws me...
i'm trying to updgrade my box with new motherboard and chipset...
and more ram.
what is this 'old technology' you are talking about?
confusion is starting to set in....

The Wi-Fi can be turned off.  Best option is to get a USB Wi-Fi adapter and only plug it in when needed.
 
"Current technology" is newer CPU's than what you stated.  Its a fine CPU but is "several years ago model".
 
I don't know which ones specifically have a true PCI slot (if you need that).  Jim Roseberry can probably address that.
 
If you are going to go with a new motherboard and CPU you probably will need new (compatible) memory.  A new power supply should also be on the list.  The old one may work fine but if its more than a couple of years old its time for a replacement - they do not last forever.  Consider one of the "modular" power supplies as it eliminates many of the unused power leads and thus eliminates cable clutter inside case and better air flow.
 
Unless there is a specific need, you don't need a Video card replacement or even a video card.  The Intel HD Graphics that are built into the CPU will work fine for Sonar and many other applications. 
 
 
 

ok thanks for all the input, guys, i'm still chewing on this...
 

I would suggest you look at the age of your existing hard drives, that you seem to be porting over to the new system, from the old one.
 
The reason I mention that is two-fold.  First of all, those hard drives sound like they are more than a couple of years old, and in addition to being WAY slower than the SATA III drives (up to 6.0 gbps), your drives are SATA II drives (up to 3.0 gbps), they are likely GOING to fail.  Seagate drives seem to come with warranty support of from 1-3 years nowadays, and your new motherboard will have support for the SATA III drives.
 
You can pick up a nice shiny new 2 TB Toshiba SATA III 7,200 RPM HDD for $69.99, with a 3 year warranty, OR a 1 TB Toshiba SATA III 7,200 RPM HDD for $39.99.
 
You can also pick up a 120 GB SSD SATA III drive for around $40-$50, and a 240 GB SSD for around $60-$70.
 
Just some food for thought for you. :)
 
Bob Bone
 

With today's technology it's good to have a go to knowledge source if you run into problems, but - I'm somewhat of a knucklehead with hardware and I made it through my latest build a few weeks ago using the wealth of knowledge on the Internet and about 4 hours in total time. I kept the case, the DVD burner, and wanted to keep the power supply and video card. With my technology choices and age, those last two had to be replaced. The power supply rating was just over the total load and I had a few small issues with that in cpu performance as I was tweeking after the initial build.

I decided on erring on latest technology AND covering my bases with connectivity. I am happy with that beacon if you will. I went Skylake - i7 6700k. With that CPU and the ability to overclock, I went large with cooling - twin whisper quiet fans on rather large heat fin blocks and whisper quiet case fans - Well worth it because it cut the noise dramatically. I cut most of my tracks next to the PC. So for connectivity, I wanted to to make sure I had ALL current USB standards covered - 1,2,3 and 3.1 / C. I also wanted thunderbolt AND an Ethernet port that is already AVB - TNS compliant. I chose a gigabyte Z170 ud5 thunderbolt mobo - about 80 bucks more than a good average unit. .

The reason for all the different connectivity options? I have both a MOTU 1248 AVB Thunderbolt, and Presonus RM32 / CS18 AVB FireWire units. To be certain, the MOTU works just fine with USB 2 - but - Windows started supporting THUNDERBOLT 1, 2 and 3 back in November I believe. Motu just announced asio support this spring. Think about that - 40gb speeds. Boggles my average mind. I will need a TB3 to TB1 unit for the MOTU, they start coming out this month. The moral is - when I chose the mobo, MOTU had not yet announced. Both MOTU and Presonus are in the game with AVB TNS. Windows isn't ready with TNS support - yet. I will convert to TNS as soon as it is ready.

So you might want to consider.- right cooling - right amount of power - connectivity options.

Take care.

LL

May I chime in... I'm currently researching for a motherboard for either i7 6700K or i7 4970K. I needed the 2nd PC for outdoor / live use.
 
Since my current i7 2600K is still going strong, I figure either 4970K or 6700K will do the job fine. Instead, I based my selection on Anantech DPC latency test, if it makes sense.
 
For Z97 (scroll down to DPC latency chart)
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8045/asrock-z97-extreme6-review-ultra-m2-x4-tested-with-xp941/6
 
Edit (more Z97)
http://anandtech.com/show/8276/z97-miniitx-review-at-140-asrock-z97e-itx-msi-z97i-ac-and-gigabyte-z97n-wifi/6


For Z170
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10206/the-asus-maximus-viii-extreme-review/6
 
Edit (more Z170)
http://anandtech.com/show/10236/the-msi-z170a-sli-plus-review/6
 
Sitting at the top (at 20 micro sec DPC latency) is Asus Maximus VIII (Z170) but the cost is way too high for me.
 
Next (at 39 micro sec DPC latency) is ASRock Z97 Extreme6, at a good price too. This board (the one tested) does not come with USB 3.1. However, there is another version of ASRock Extreme6 + USB 3.1 at a higher price.
 
To be fair, Anantech mentioned that any board with DPC latency of less than 500 micro sec (which all of them are) should do the job fine.

and, 
i don't quite understand the 'hyperthread' capability.....
and if i need i7 versus i5;
i don't want to mess with overclocking;
i mostly work with audio files;
 
i guess i'm not what you would consider a 'power user', because i don't do video or gaming,
and don't use large libraries, or any samples really, other than superior drummer....
 
 
 

With my limited understanding.. I suppose the 'hyperthread' capability makes a quad-core CPU appears have 8 threads.
 
Also, if I'm not sure if a target CPU is good, I'll always google 'target cpu' vs 'your current cpu' to try to have an idea if the performance / price is worth it. It may not be accurate, but at least some reference for me to make a decision ?
 

good to know about the 8400, i just might have to keep it to be able to update the other items that are more important...
i hate having to work inside a strict budget.
makes it much harder than it needs to be.
 
still chewing on all this info, i'm still doing homework

Hyper-threading basically the CPU's with this have a means of reconfiguring themselves so they look to the OS like they have more CPU's than they really have.  
 
So a Quad Core i7 or i5 has 4 cores or four CPU's four threads (processes)
An i7 or i5 quad core with hyper-threading has 4 cores but looks like 8 cores or eight threads (processes) to the OS.

If I remember correctly it is something Intel got when they acquired the technology from DEC and their ALPHA processor.  Which could reconfigure itself to look like different CPU's.

I would think an i5 would probably do you an i7 would just do it more efficiently probably and have a little more life expectancy because of the extra processing capability, as processing load increases.

eg, i5 something like this http://ark.intel.com/products/80817/Intel-Core-i5-4460-Processor-6M-Cache-up-to-3_40-GHz no Hyper-threading.

or i7 http://ark.intel.com/products/80806/Intel-Core-i7-4790-Processor-8M-Cache-up-to-4_00-GHz 4 core 8 threads
 
they do a variant 4790K which can turbo up to 4.4Ghz.  (I use this CPU)
 
or i7 http://ark.intel.com/products/82932/Intel-Core-i7-5820K-Processor-15M-Cache-up-to-3_60-GHz 6 cores 12 threads 
 
or i7 http://ark.intel.com/products/88195/Intel-Core-i7-6700K-Processor-8M-Cache-up-to-4_20-GHz 4 cores 8  threads latest generation of Intel CPU's
 

Starise,
 
i suppose, if i take a poll of my latest album tracks...
 
one song had 65 tracks.... all audio.
 
when i arrange drum tracks in superior drummer, i leave them as stereo output while in midi...
and leave them that way until i finalize an arrangement.
then i output all the drum tracks as mono 24 bit audio, and end up with as many as 30 drum tracks.
sometimes i'll pare that down, to a typical 16 tracks.
 
i do keys in midi, but commit to audio when i'm doing final mixing... (freeze synth)
 
i'm very liberal with EQ on every track,
i usually have at least 12 sub busses, all of those with either compression, limiting, eq, or all 3 on them....
at least 2 of those will be effects busses, with reverb or delay...
 
i rarely put plugs on individual tracks, rather, i'll sum them to a buss, and let the buss do the effects,
but i do use individual track effects sends/returns for room effects....
 
 
i did this whole album, "Stay", on a core 2 processor with only 2 gigs of ram, running Win XP.
did the computer strain?
 
no, not at all.
 
the only reason i want to upgrade, is that the system is 8 years old,
i cannot update any of my superior drummer midi packs and program itself, because they quit updating for Win XP.
 
i've been painted into a corner.
otherwise, with 8 gigs more ram, i'd probably be fine. don't know if my slots will even support 8 gigs, and win XP wouldn't see it anyway, if i updated the O/S, i could probably limp along fine for a few more years.
 
 

Here's an example of a cpu/mobo combo that's a few generations back but packs a lot of punch. You get an i7 cpu at 4.4ghz and an ASRock mobo with usb 3.0.  
http://www.portatech.com/products/product.cshtml?id=79417&o=85705
 
It isn't the latest and the greatest but it's plenty powerful enough for what you do. 
 
I guess it depends on if you want "cutting edge" or are willing to use something that works fine but isn't recent. This will still run win10 64 bit. The benefit to this is cost since hardware that's starting to get older but is still new in the box won't cost near as much.
 
Going to more recent chips and motherboards will be more expensive.
 
 

Let me know if I can help further. Shoot me a PM if you want. 
 
You could go for a slightly slower cpu and still be in the 3.5ghz range, be ok and save a little more dough. I didn't add the memory and cooling or the price of a new OS.
This is micro ATX form factor which would probably fit your case but I would make sure. I don't deal with these guys but they  look decent and they install the cpu for you.There's also plenty of others out there.
Good luck!