I’ve a 9700K and I think this is what I’m going to do. I wasn’t happy reading about the heat and power the 13/14th gen have to deal with so I think a small upgrade now and a more substantial one in a couple of years is the best thing to do.

It’s still a really good budget CPU, can handle mostly anything you throw at it at a decent speed.

Absolutely worth it. I bought mine a few months back for 120 euro.

I went from a 8600 to a R5 5600 and it was worth it, could say the same for the 12400 since it’s a bit faster than the Ryzen.

Yes

Depends on usage, but you should be fine for a long time. I had a 9700k, and that was great besides the heat. 12400 is a bit faster, and runs cooler, but most the time you won’t notice it unless you compare FPS, or do CPU intensive tasks. At 1080p gaming, some games will get a noticeable boost, but others not so much. The differences shrink at higher resolutions. If you are a gamer, try to look for benchmarks with your video card, and a 12400, and compare them to what your 9600k is getting in the games you play at the same resolution. That should help a lot with your decision.

In general, most any modern CPU will do all the basics, and can be paired with any low to mid range video card for gaming. If you don’t push games, or do anything really CPU intensive, then even a CPU like your 9600k can be fine for around a decade. Just keep your OS clean. My old 4770k only retired a couple years back due to user error lol. Things like faster USB (type c), better wifi, NVME, etc were more noticeable than going from my 4770k to 9700k for basic use.

I got my 12400 for $140 when it came out for an ITX build. At the time it cost less with an ITX mobo than just the ITX mobo for my 10700k, and it performed around the same as that 8 core with much less heat. Paired it with a B660, RTX 3070, and have had no real issues. 12400’s been quiet, efficient, and powerful enough, but I’m not chasing max FPS, or doing really intensive stuff with my pc.

I’d advise you look at the total platform cost of moving up to 12th gen. Consider good RAM and a good motherboard with decent PCIe support for a current or future SSD you might acquire.

The LGA 1700 is a good socket and corresponding motherboards support 3 generations (mostly two since 14th gen changed next to nothing) with BIOS updates, so you may want to throw in a better 13600K/14700K down the line for not that much of an investment, while recouping close to your original cost for the 12400F.

If you don’t plan on ever upgrading from the 12400F, I’d be more wary, since it’s roughly a 50% boost in performance for a fairly large investment (proportionally).

wait for the 15th gen so you could buy the newest motherboard possible and let it last for more generations to come although I really wouldn’t worry much about how many gens it will last for as motherboards tend to last around 7 years.

I’m buying 11700 next month, so you should be good with 12th gen