how many cores does clod use

[jayrc]

wanting to upgrade so bad, I don't want to buy something then regret it, right now I'm trying to decide on the i5 2500k or the amd 6 core. If Clod is going to use 6 cores should I go with the amd? I don't have an unlimited budget. I was actually thinking of spending 300 on a 5850 gpu and corsair tx 750 psu for now till prices on everything else drops and some definite answers as to what hardware works best. Would like to hear from as many people as possible, this will be my first build and I really need some advice

[patrat1]

for gaming the I5 2500k beats the amd pretty handily. plus you can easily and i mean easily, over clock it.
i have a I5 2500k and its playing COD just fine. ive run mine at 4.5 ghz with the stock cooler. however, i do have huge fans in my case.


as far as core usage goes, i let the experts handle that one. but as i see it, we're lucky if COD starts using 4 cores to their fullest, much less 6.

[addman]

wanting to upgrade so bad, I don't want to buy something then regret it, right now I'm trying to decide on the i5 2500k or the amd 6 core. If Clod is going to use 6 cores should I go with the amd? I don't have an unlimited budget. I was actually thinking of spending 300 on a 5850 gpu and corsair tx 750 psu for now till prices on everything else drops and some definite answers as to what hardware works best. Would like to hear from as many people as possible, this will be my first build and I really need some advice

Don't upgrade anything until this game is finished, at the moment it's like throwing money down a black hole. It's still very unoptimized but it's of course just my opinion;).

[kimosabi]

+1.

Wait a bit and see if they sort out the resource management, right now the engine can't fully utilize most systems.

[pupo162]

CLod uses 1 core fully and about half of my quad core 2.63

[Flashman]

I have an I5 2500k and it flies even though at the moment CloD only uses a single core. I have tired messing with the affinity mask to either try and force multicore or have it run on one of the other, however nothing appears to work.

[jayrc]

I'm leaning toward the i5 2500k, I just thought I saw somewhere that clod was using more than 4 cores, rise of flight uses 3 cores I believe.

I just need to be patient I guess, my gt240 just aint cutting it, that's why I want to upgrade so bad:(

[kimosabi]

IIRC there is no game that uses more than four cores yet. Probably won't be for a while either because quad core optimization is kinda still in its cradle.

[Vengeanze]

IIRC there is no game that uses more than four cores yet. Probably won't be for a while either because quad core optimization is kinda still in its cradle.
+1 on the i5 2500k

Also if you get a LGA 1155 motherboard (Socket H2) i.e. Sandy bridge to host your i5 2500k you will be able to swap for an Ivy bridge CPU when they are released in 2012.

Seems peeps with a i5 2500k and up and a good g-card run this game with full settings and good fps all the way which means that you'll be on the safe side...unless 1C un-optimize the game. :-D

[Rattlehead]

I've also earmarked the 2500k is the processor to upgrade to, but not right away. Maybe in three or four months.

[617Squadron]

It runs fine now for the moment on my quad-core Phenom II X4 B40 3Ghz system, with 4Gb memory and a 512Mb Radeon HD4770.

[Heliocon]

wanting to upgrade so bad, I don't want to buy something then regret it, right now I'm trying to decide on the i5 2500k or the amd 6 core. If Clod is going to use 6 cores should I go with the amd? I don't have an unlimited budget. I was actually thinking of spending 300 on a 5850 gpu and corsair tx 750 psu for now till prices on everything else drops and some definite answers as to what hardware works best. Would like to hear from as many people as possible, this will be my first build and I really need some advice

I5 2500k, but I would strongly recommend you go for a i7 instead for the extra threads, or if money is an issue for the a Nehalem i7-950 instead of the SB cpu which includes the price of a onboard gpu you wont use.
(The i7 has 8 threads where i5 has 4, even if Clod only uses 4 threads than the extra ones can be used to run your OS/background programs and will help your performance. In the future if they add more threads to Clod you will also be coverd in that case).

[TonyD]

My system runs CoD just fine at the moment, and I can vouch for the 5850 - I haven't had any of the hassles some Ati users have experienced, don't quite know why. I would also suggest that the 6-core AMD wouldn't give you any gain, at least not at the moment. You didn't mention whether you had a machine currently - if not, Sandy Bridge is probably your best 'bang for the buck' at present (the i5 2500 as Heliocon suggests).

[jayrc]

my current pc is intel core 2 3 ghz, gt 240 gpu, 350 psu, 3.25gb ram, win xp 32, pretty sad system, barely plays il2 1946, I've been waiting to upgrade for some time now, got money burning a hole in my pocket, not enough to waste though.

why wait 3 to 4 months to upgrade to i5 2500k (rattlehead)?

[TonyD]

...
why wait 3 to 4 months to upgrade to i5 2500k (rattlehead)?

If I may - there's a new Sandy Bridge chipset coming shortly, and another predicted towards the end of the year. But there are always new chipsets coming ... and it's always better to wait if you can. A new gfx card (and psu) should give you a nice gain in the meantime, and of course Win7.

[jayrc]

If I may - there's a new Sandy Bridge chipset coming shortly, and another predicted towards the end of the year. But there are always new chipsets coming ... and it's always better to wait if you can. A new gfx card (and psu) should give you a nice gain in the meantime, and of course Win7.
what gfx card and psu would you recommend? win 7 make much difference?

[Rattlehead]

why wait 3 to 4 months to upgrade to i5 2500k (rattlehead)?

Basically because not everyone who has high-end systems is enjoying high-end performance with this game yet. Once things settle down regarding optimization, then we'll talk.

[jayrc]

Basically because not everyone who has high-end systems is enjoying high-end performance with this game yet. Once things settle down regarding optimization, then we'll talk.
gotcha

[Rattlehead]

my current pc is intel core 2 3 ghz, gt 240 gpu, 350 psu, 3.25gb ram, win xp 32, pretty sad system, barely plays il2 1946, I've been waiting to upgrade for some time now, got money burning a hole in my pocket, not enough to waste though.



May I make a suggestion? Forget getting a CPU at this stage.

If you really must upgrade now, go for windows 7 64-bit (a must) a really decent graphics card and a PSU to match. I suggest a 700-750 watt PSU and a graphics card such as a HD6970 or Nvidia equivlalent. Maybe a bit more ram as well. (extra 1gb)

I am also running a core 2 3ghz, and it runs fine.

I've always been a big believer of video card, then ram, then cpu...in order of importance for gaming.

[Heliocon]

May I make a suggestion? Forget getting a CPU at this stage.

If you really must upgrade now, go for windows 7 64-bit (a must) a really decent graphics card and a PSU to match. I suggest a 700-750 watt PSU and a graphics card such as a HD6970 or Nvidia equivlalent. Maybe a bit more ram as well. (extra 1gb)

I am also running a core 2 3ghz, and it runs fine.

I've always been a big believer of video card, then ram, then cpu...in order of importance for gaming.

+1 - he is right

also a 1st gen i7 is better than a second gen i5, better perf per $ in the long run.

[jayrc]

May I make a suggestion? Forget getting a CPU at this stage.

If you really must upgrade now, go for windows 7 64-bit (a must) a really decent graphics card and a PSU to match. I suggest a 700-750 watt PSU and a graphics card such as a HD6970 or Nvidia equivlalent. Maybe a bit more ram as well. (extra 1gb)

I am also running a core 2 3ghz, and it runs fine.

I've always been a big believer of video card, then ram, then cpu...in order of importance for gaming.
what would the equivlalent be to the 6970 in nvidia, 570, 580? Is there a problem with going intel with ati, or amd and nvidia? do they mix well?

[Rattlehead]

what would the equivlalent be to the 6970 in nvidia, 570, 580? Is there a problem with going intel with ati, or amd and nvidia? do they mix well?

I would imagine those cards are the equivalent, more or less. The 580 GTX seems to be faster than the 6970, but it also costs more.
The best places to check would of course be guru3d, anandtech, tom's hardware...I don't keep up with the Nvidia side of things much these days...good cards, but I've got an Ati for now, so I don't see the need to know what's going on in the 'green camp'.

As far as your second question is concerned, there is no problems that I'm aware of mixing your Intels, Amds, Nvidia's or Ati's.

[Doc_uk]

This is all you need

[kendo65]

what would the equivlalent be to the 6970 in nvidia, 570, 580? Is there a problem with going intel with ati, or amd and nvidia? do they mix well?

The 570 is approx same level performance and price. 580 is superior and more costly.

[Zoom2136]

I've always been a big believer of video card, then ram, then cpu...in order of importance for gaming.

This is true of FPS. Flight sims suffer from a slow CPU (it really is the bottleneck in what we are concern).

So for flight sims, always buy the fastest CPU you can afford. Presently its the i7-2600K, followed closely by the i5-2500K. Remember that the newer i5 & i7 are faster clock for clock than the previous generation. See here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-intel-core-i7-amd-phenom-ii,2926.html

So get the best CPU with a good overclocking motherboard, then if you only run 1 GPU, you can live a less than 600W PSU, if you plan on running SLI/Crossfire go with a 750+ PSU.

In you case the last thing to upgrade should be the video card (GPU). Oleg's game seem to favor Nvidea. Don't know why? I prefer AMD myself. Here look here and decide.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-graphics-card-radeon-hd-6990-geforce-gtx-590,2912.html

[drive-by-pilot]

i am a amd fan to, i need to upgrade soon before the game released here.

[Heliocon]

This is true of FPS. Flight sims suffer from a slow CPU (it really is the bottleneck in what we are concern).

So for flight sims, always buy the fastest CPU you can afford. Presently its the i7-2600K, followed closely by the i5-2500K. Remember that the newer i5 & i7 are faster clock for clock than the previous generation. See here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-intel-core-i7-amd-phenom-ii,2926.html

So get the best CPU with a good overclocking motherboard, then if you only run 1 GPU, you can live a less than 600W PSU, if you plan on running SLI/Crossfire go with a 750+ PSU.

In you case the last thing to upgrade should be the video card (GPU). Oleg's game seem to favor Nvidea. Don't know why? I prefer AMD myself. Here look here and decide.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-graphics-card-radeon-hd-6990-geforce-gtx-590,2912.html

Not really and certainly not if they thread it well. You need ram to have the game in memory so the cpu can calculate, you need it for the gpu etc. Also the fastest CPU wont help you if your gpu is crap, in all honesty COD does not push hardware components atm. The fastest i5 will not perform as well as a low range i7 in the future, you may have high GHZ but when my cpu can get double the work done with threading then yours can, you hit a cap where as I havent, because I havent even OCed it yet.

Also I would stay away from anything that is watercooled for a noob, unless he will learn to OC and maintain the system its not worth the cost.

[jimbop]

I upgraded from i7 920 to a i7 2600k overclocked to 4.5 (basically the same as i5 2500k for this game) and I noticed a significant increase in fps and stutter reduction. I think this is something that is safe to upgrade immediately.

Wouldn't be so concerned about RAM as long as you have at least 4GB DDR3 now. I'm definitely waiting before getting another GTX480 though...

[jimbop]

Also I would stay away from anything that is watercooled for a noob, unless he will learn to OC and maintain the system its not worth the cost.

Absolutely. Water isn't needed for sandy bridge overclocks unless you go mad with your clock. I'd install water on my GPU instead of CPU for this game anyway.

[Rattlehead]

I upgraded from i7 920 to a i7 2600k overclocked to 4.5 (basically the same as i5 2500k for this game) and I noticed a significant increase in fps and stutter reduction. I think this is something that is safe to upgrade immediately.



What resolution do you run at?

[jimbop]

What resolution do you run at?

1600 x (something, can't remember)... I can get easily run at 1900 x 1200 but there are occasional slowdowns which infuriate me.

[jayrc]

so if I got a i5 2500k cpu, msi mobo, corsair tx 750 psu, gtx 570 gpu, corsair 8 gb ram, would I be making a mistake? I don't think I could afford the intel ivy bridge when it first comes out so thats off the table, unless it's priced at 250 or less, which I doubt. I like the fact that I could pick it up later, same with the video card, would like to spend 1200 US dollars or less and upgrade again when 580 and ivy bridge drop in price. would 2 570 gpu trump 580? would think so.

[jimbop]

so if I got a i5 2500k cpu, msi mobo, corsair tx 750 psu, gtx 570 gpu, corsair 8 gb ram, would I be making a mistake? I don't think I could afford the intel ivy bridge when it first comes out so thats off the table, unless it's priced at 250 or less, which I doubt. I like the fact that I could pick it up later, same with the video card, would like to spend 1200 US dollars or less and upgrade again when 580 and ivy bridge drop in price. would 2 570 gpu trump 580? would think so.

Should be fine depending on your power supply. Only the i5 if you're going to overclock (very easy though).

[Thee_oddball]

wanting to upgrade so bad, I don't want to buy something then regret it, right now I'm trying to decide on the i5 2500k or the amd 6 core. If Clod is going to use 6 cores should I go with the amd? I don't have an unlimited budget. I was actually thinking of spending 300 on a 5850 gpu and corsair tx 750 psu for now till prices on everything else drops and some definite answers as to what hardware works best. Would like to hear from as many people as possible, this will be my first build and I really need some advice

Do you remember the old Joke? Hey i just spent $1500 on a new computer to play a $50 game!... :)

You can only future proof yourself so much...the best bang for the buck right now is the I5 (and i am an AMD fan) the 6 core will do you no good at the moment...the only benefit to buying AMD right now would be getting one of the ASUS boards that "claims" will support the new bulldozer chip when it comes out...but that in itself is a crap shoot as to which will actually be better (AMD or INTEL).

I have always built my own systems and what i have learned is this A chain is a strong as its weakest link
You can buy the best video card on the market and put it in a 2 year rig and your performance will be relative to the over all power of the PC i.e PSU+CPU+MEM+MB+VIDEO=?

When i upgrade i choose the 4 horsemen first (CPU,MB,MEM,PSU) and video last...I got 30 more FPS out of an old video card once by just upgrading the back end (the 4 horsemen)

I try to build my PC with one upgrade in mind..why?..because most computer technology is obsolete by the time it hits the store shelf's.. and thats why i said you can only future proof your self so much.
My current rig (see sig) will get one more 5750 and maybe a 6 core but after that it will be a whole new build.
My advice to you would be to give us a price point (how much you got to spend) and we will spec you the best bang for your buck.

S!

[jayrc]

1200+- US dollars, what would you recommend?

[jimbop]

1200+- US dollars, what would you recommend?

I'm happy with my specs although could go for a better GPU. My PSU is excessive for most systems. Save $100 by getting the i5 instead of i7 unless you do a lot of video editing.

[jayrc]

no video editing, I only play il2 1946, rof, lockon

[Heliocon]

so if I got a i5 2500k cpu, msi mobo, corsair tx 750 psu, gtx 570 gpu, corsair 8 gb ram, would I be making a mistake? I don't think I could afford the intel ivy bridge when it first comes out so thats off the table, unless it's priced at 250 or less, which I doubt. I like the fact that I could pick it up later, same with the video card, would like to spend 1200 US dollars or less and upgrade again when 580 and ivy bridge drop in price. would 2 570 gpu trump 580? would think so.

Sounds fine but like said I would go for a 1st gen i7 (save cash=SB i5) or a SB i7 rather than i5 because in a year or two 4 threads will be limiting.

[jimbop]

Sounds fine but like said I would go for a 1st gen i7 (save cash=SB i5) or a SB i7 rather than i5 because in a year or two 4 threads will be limiting.

Yes, I'd agree with that if your upgrade cycle is more than 2 years.

[Vengeanze]

Sounds fine but like said I would go for a 1st gen i7 (save cash=SB i5) or a SB i7 rather than i5 because in a year or two 4 threads will be limiting.
By then he swaps his cheap i5 2500k for an ivy bridge cpu instead.

[Heliocon]

By then he swaps his cheap i5 2500k for an ivy bridge cpu instead.

Nope - Ivy Bridge is not going to run on the PCH chipset, he will need to buy a completely new mobo for ivybridge.
Also a 1155 will be only quads, which is the entry level chip for ivybridge I believe (same socket 1155, but like said not using the Cougar point PCH chipset so it wont work) and the 1356 will replace the 1366 for mid range 6 cores - upper mid range 8 cores, while LGA2011 is for upper end 8 cores which will take the same market slot the 1366 (gulftown 980x) is currently in until 2012.

Basically everything will be reshufled at the end of 2011, so like said he will be left in the dust in a years time, its much better for him to save $ buy a mobo that runs a 40nm low end i7 and wait until the dust settles in early 2012 and then make a purchasing decision. This is the second major/BIG transition into multicore cpus and we will see low end pcs all with quads while a gaming pc will be 6-8 core in a years time.

[Rattlehead]

This is the second major/BIG transition into multicore cpus and we will see low end pcs all with quads while a gaming pc will be 6-8 core in a years time.

This is what I find a bit funny about the PC market, because I very much doubt there will be a single game that is optimized for six or eight cores before (at the earliest) 2013.
I'm willing to bet quad cores will still be the real world standard until then. Developers are not going to develop games for six or eight cores as it will be isolating 80% of the market.

Nobody is making uber game engines for PC right now, largely because of economics...even Crysis, Crysis 2 and Metro 2033 run perfectly well on a dual core on maximum settings.
So while it's nice to be able to boast a fast quad or hex core CPU, for 90% of games out there it's overkill, imo.

I'm willing to bet the same will apply to six and eight core cpu's in the foreseeable future.

[janpitor]

Not really and certainly not if they thread it well. You need ram to have the game in memory so the cpu can calculate, you need it for the gpu etc. Also the fastest CPU wont help you if your gpu is crap, in all honesty COD does not push hardware components atm. The fastest i5 will not perform as well as a low range i7 in the future, you may have high GHZ but when my cpu can get double the work done with threading then yours can, you hit a cap where as I havent, because I havent even OCed it yet.

Also I would stay away from anything that is watercooled for a noob, unless he will learn to OC and maintain the system its not worth the cost.

Dont overestimate hyperthreading...you have 8 threads, but it isnt like having 8 cores...it is a little bit faster...but the real purpose of hyperthreading is more programs can run at the same time...there is no point in optimising a game for 8 threads...no gain

Generally the only advantage is tripple channel Ram...THATS IT. Buy i5...best bucks for power in flight simulators especially because of better or same overclock.

[jayrc]

So I would have to get a new motherboard to run Ivy bridge? I'm having a hard enough time deciding on mobo already, any recommendations to get me started? Was looking at MSI because of the one touch OC, also Asus p8p67 Deluxe! Thank you

gotta go to work check back later

[W0ef]

So I would have to get a new motherboard to run Ivy bridge? I'm having a hard enough time deciding on mobo already, any recommendations to get me started? Was looking at MSI because of the one touch OC, also Asus p8p67 Deluxe! Thank you

gotta go to work check back later

I´d personally take the ASUS mobo but thats just because I have no good experience with the latest (so called military grade component) MSI mobo I bought. MSI forums are filled with people with boot probs and the moment I tried to install a somewhat better cooler on mine it just went poof after having it less then a week. It is that I paid for it but otherwise I would switch to ASUS in an instant.

One touch OC is utter marketing bullshit, if you really want to overclock you should do it in the BIOS anyway.

[Heliocon]

This is what I find a bit funny about the PC market, because I very much doubt there will be a single game that is optimized for six or eight cores before (at the earliest) 2013.
I'm willing to bet quad cores will still be the real world standard until then. Developers are not going to develop games for six or eight cores as it will be isolating 80% of the market.

Nobody is making uber game engines for PC right now, largely because of economics...even Crysis, Crysis 2 and Metro 2033 run perfectly well on a dual core on maximum settings.
So while it's nice to be able to boast a fast quad or hex core CPU, for 90% of games out there it's overkill, imo.

I'm willing to bet the same will apply to six and eight core cpu's in the foreseeable future.

Uhh lol - dont know what universe you are from. I have metro and I cant even max it out without bad fps slowdown in some places. Crysis and crysis 2 are old tech, bad choice.

BFBC2 uses 8 threads btw, WOP uses 4, BF3 will require a quad probably, so I dont know where you are getting this info from. Mulithreading is slow in uptake because its hard for programmers to learn, its biggest advantage was with DX11, but thats not used because so many games are made as cross platformers now.

But please dont give out misinformation, I get your point, you dont need a 6 or 8 core right now. 4 threads is fine, but in a year it will be limiting your pc badly, in 2 years = disaster.

Already if you look at tri sli 580s they are limied by mobo and cpu for example.

ANyway I am exhausted from writing a paper - OP dont listen to tech advice here, I can tell you from a years experience you wont get very good advice. Go to tomshardware and post there or another good pc/oc forum. This is not the place.

[Heliocon]

Dont overestimate hyperthreading...you have 8 threads, but it isnt like having 8 cores...it is a little bit faster...but the real purpose of hyperthreading is more programs can run at the same time...there is no point in optimising a game for 8 threads...no gain

Generally the only advantage is tripple channel Ram...THATS IT. Buy i5...best bucks for power in flight simulators especially because of better or same overclock.

Yes because you have plenty of experience with this stuff to base your opinion on? 8 threads = alot better than 4 threads/cores. Your cpu has to sit and wait for your ram, in the meantime if you have an i7 it will be far more active/productive.

[patrat1]

considering that the op only plays il2 1946, rof, lockon and now cod i hardly think he has to worry about getting a cpu with six or eight cores or fancy threading capability, for now or in the forseeable future.

in view of his limited game selection i think he cant go wrong with a I5 2500K.

[Rattlehead]

Uhh lol - dont know what universe you are from. I have metro and I cant even max it out without bad fps slowdown in some places. Crysis and crysis 2 are old tech, bad choice.

BFBC2 uses 8 threads btw, WOP uses 4, BF3 will require a quad probably, so I dont know where you are getting this info from. Mulithreading is slow in uptake because its hard for programmers to learn, its biggest advantage was with DX11, but thats not used because so many games are made as cross platformers now.

But please dont give out misinformation, I get your point, you dont need a 6 or 8 core right now. 4 threads is fine, but in a year it will be limiting your pc badly, in 2 years = disaster.

Already if you look at tri sli 580s they are limied by mobo and cpu for example.



I apologise about Metro...you're right, I was a bit optimistic about 'maximum' settings...but high settings is easily possible on a dual core, no question.

I dunno...maybe you and I simply have different perspectives on what constitutes running a game well. I honestly can't see that in two years owning a fast quad core would lead to a disasterous gaming experience. (That's how I'm reading your post, but please correct me if I'm wrong.)

Tri sli? How many people have money to afford setups like that? It's not indicative of the average gaming rig.

Anyways, it's all swings and roundabouts at the end of the day. One way or another, we'll all have to upgrade sooner or later.

[W0ef]

2500k is the best value for money you can buy for a gaming rig these days period.

While I fully understand people with a 2600k like to stress the fact it supports hyperthreading this feature is absolutely irrelevant for gaming, since no game supports it or will likely support it in the forseeable future.

HT is nice if you like to run several apps at the same time, what it does is basically split up a single processor so it can run two or more threads in parrallel. Gaming fully stresses (or should stress if it is properly optimized) all cores so hyperthreading would be kinda useless anyway.

Here´s a further explanation I took off another forum:

Hyperthreading is Intel's copyrighted term for Symmetric Multi Threading (there's something you can Google for and get good information). Symmetric multithreading is different than symmetric multiprocessing (multiple processors) for several reasons:

1. It's one processor that can process multiple threads at once, not actually two processors.

2. Since it's one processor, the two (or more) threads running share certain registers, L1 and L2 cache availability, etc.

3. Because they must share, there can be contention between the two parallel threads and so they must be scheduled (by the OS and by the processor prefetch logic) in an efficient manner.

Intel's hyperthreading has nothing to do with LONG pipelines, it instead has everything to do with multiple execution units in the processor itself. The P4 chips have seperate FPU, Integer, SSE, and SSE2 execution engines inside the core. Before Intel started using HT, only one of those execution engines could run at a time.

Thus, if an FPU instruction came through the pipes, the integer, SSE and SSE2 units were all inactive and just sat there waiting. With Intel's Hyperthreading, they now can allow two of those execution engines to run simultaneously. That doesn't DOUBLE your output, but it does increase it by a noticeable amount if you have unlike instructions that can be run parallel.

So for example, if you have multiple FPU instructions all streamed together, HT isn't going to help at all. If you have a mix of FPU, Integer and SSE that all needs to compute and the instructions are not dependant on eachother, they can be processed in parallel and can rip through them faster.

The absolute best case scenario is something like a 65% increase in processing ability because of cache coherency and branch prediction issues (so it never can actually double). Many multithreaded apps can see a 15-30% increase, basically all others see an average of zero

There are several older applications that will slow down when hyperthreading is enabled, mostly old multithreaded apps that were never actually meant to run in an SMT environment. These apps break off worker threads that are all interdependant of eachother, and often that scenario can make a Hyperthreaded processor stall out even worse than a normal processor would.

These apps are few and far between, and an SMT-aware operating system (Windows XP) can be forced to limit those threads to a single virtual processor in order to keep them from misbehaving and slowing down.

Both AMD and IBM are reportedly looking at SMT options as well, because most modern microprocessors have multiple execution engines that are (quite often) idling. Again, it has nothing to do with total pipeline length, it has only to do with the total number of seperate execution engines on the CPU core.



Basically, if you use heavy video programs or Photoshop (especially running them at the same time) HT would make a difference, for gaming, not so much.

[Heliocon]

2500k is the best value for money you can buy for a gaming rig these days period.

While I fully understand people with a 2600k like to stress the fact it supports hyperthreading this feature is absolutely irrelevant for gaming, since no game supports it or will likely support it in the forseeable future.

HT is nice if you like to run several apps at the same time, what it does is basically split up a single processor so it can run two or more threads in parrallel. Gaming fully stresses (or should stress if it is properly optimized) all cores so hyperthreading would be kinda useless anyway.

Here´s a further explanation I took off another forum:

Hyperthreading is Intel's copyrighted term for Symmetric Multi Threading (there's something you can Google for and get good information). Symmetric multithreading is different than symmetric multiprocessing (multiple processors) for several reasons:

1. It's one processor that can process multiple threads at once, not actually two processors.

2. Since it's one processor, the two (or more) threads running share certain registers, L1 and L2 cache availability, etc.

3. Because they must share, there can be contention between the two parallel threads and so they must be scheduled (by the OS and by the processor prefetch logic) in an efficient manner.

Intel's hyperthreading has nothing to do with LONG pipelines, it instead has everything to do with multiple execution units in the processor itself. The P4 chips have seperate FPU, Integer, SSE, and SSE2 execution engines inside the core. Before Intel started using HT, only one of those execution engines could run at a time.

Thus, if an FPU instruction came through the pipes, the integer, SSE and SSE2 units were all inactive and just sat there waiting. With Intel's Hyperthreading, they now can allow two of those execution engines to run simultaneously. That doesn't DOUBLE your output, but it does increase it by a noticeable amount if you have unlike instructions that can be run parallel.

So for example, if you have multiple FPU instructions all streamed together, HT isn't going to help at all. If you have a mix of FPU, Integer and SSE that all needs to compute and the instructions are not dependant on eachother, they can be processed in parallel and can rip through them faster.

The absolute best case scenario is something like a 65% increase in processing ability because of cache coherency and branch prediction issues (so it never can actually double). Many multithreaded apps can see a 15-30% increase, basically all others see an average of zero

There are several older applications that will slow down when hyperthreading is enabled, mostly old multithreaded apps that were never actually meant to run in an SMT environment. These apps break off worker threads that are all interdependant of eachother, and often that scenario can make a Hyperthreaded processor stall out even worse than a normal processor would.

These apps are few and far between, and an SMT-aware operating system (Windows XP) can be forced to limit those threads to a single virtual processor in order to keep them from misbehaving and slowing down.

Both AMD and IBM are reportedly looking at SMT options as well, because most modern microprocessors have multiple execution engines that are (quite often) idling. Again, it has nothing to do with total pipeline length, it has only to do with the total number of seperate execution engines on the CPU core.



Basically, if you use heavy video programs or Photoshop (especially running them at the same time) HT would make a difference, for gaming, not so much.

When I read this: "While I fully understand people with a 2600k like to stress the fact it supports hyperthreading this feature is absolutely irrelevant for gaming, since no game supports it or will likely support it in the forseeable future." I stopped reading because you have no idea wtf you are talking about clown. I have a 6 core system, BFBC2 uses up to 8 threads on an engine built for consoles. That means that it uses 2 virtual cores above the 6 I have = hyperthreading. A game cannot choose to use or not use hyperthreading, you cant program a game for hyperthreading. You just program for threads, the OS sees the hyperthreading as an additional core (called a virtual core) and assigns it tasks like every other core/thread would be (except there are preferance settings which I wont go into).

Anyway your info is BS

[Heliocon]

I apologise about Metro...you're right, I was a bit optimistic about 'maximum' settings...but high settings is easily possible on a dual core, no question.

I dunno...maybe you and I simply have different perspectives on what constitutes running a game well. I honestly can't see that in two years owning a fast quad core would lead to a disasterous gaming experience. (That's how I'm reading your post, but please correct me if I'm wrong.)

Tri sli? How many people have money to afford setups like that? It's not indicative of the average gaming rig.

Anyways, it's all swings and roundabouts at the end of the day. One way or another, we'll all have to upgrade sooner or later.

What I meant about quads is that in 2 years they will be bottom of the bucket cpus, it wont be disastrous, but he will have to upgrade his mobo to transition to ivy, the p67 mobos are already comparably more expensive thatn x58 etc. Now in 2 years a quad that has 8 threads will fair far better, and the components will be cheaper to buy now allowing a later upgrade (if he goes with G1 i7).

[Rattlehead]

What I meant about quads is that in 2 years they will be bottom of the bucket cpus, it wont be disastrous, but he will have to upgrade his mobo to transition to ivy, the p67 mobos are already comparably more expensive thatn x58 etc. Now in 2 years a quad that has 8 threads will fair far better, and the components will be cheaper to buy now allowing a later upgrade (if he goes with G1 i7).

Gotcha.

[W0ef]

@ Heliocon

Whatever dude, while I would never claim to be a pro on Hyperthreading I did read into it quite a lot when I was deciding what processor to get next. Literally every forum I read stated the 2500k to be a much better choice bang for buck wise when it comes to gaming, period.

Seems like you just want to justify your e-peen i7-980x investment though (and yes that is an insult since you dont seem to pull any punches either)

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/297649-10-2500k-2600k-gaming-programming

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=665465

And about Bad Company 2:

http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/30/413400.page

Some guy did a test on BFBC2 with HT on and off (see page 3), put it short, except for generating a shitload more heat it doesn´t do much for fps.

Now it is all fine and well if you want to run an i7 with HT (great if you do loads of video editing and stuff) but do not advice people that it is the better option for a game like CoD because that is just total (potentially costly) bs to justify your own investment.

If you want to spend $1000 on a processor alone which isn´t even properly utilized then be my guest but I´d rather spend $250 if the performance gain isn´t totally worth it.

[janpitor]

Yes because you have plenty of experience with this stuff to base your opinion on? 8 threads = alot better than 4 threads/cores. Your cpu has to sit and wait for your ram, in the meantime if you have an i7 it will be far more active/productive.

8 threads isnt the same as 8 cores...with or without hyperthreading, the total processing power available is approximately the same (if the frequency and number of cores is the same)...you can just run more applications at the same time...8 threads could be usefull only if the game could use more threads but couldn´t use them to their full capacity (less than 50%load on every thread)

Just try to switch off hyperthreading on your CPU and see the minimal difference in FPS

[TonyD]

Jayrc; if you want an unbiased opinion from a long-time AMD fan, the current best gaming cpu for the money is a Core i5 2500, which took the crown from the previous best – the Core i5 750. (http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-core-i3-2100-recommended-processor,2895-4.html) Get the ‘k’ model if you want to overclock and the price difference isn’t too high, remembering that overclocking your cpu will not provide a huge gain in frame rate anyway.

My favourite for reading up on comparisons is Tom’s Hardware, although there are plenty of others (type ‘pc hardware review’ into Google and follow your nose), but you will find that this is the general consensus.

If you use your pc for work as well as gaming, you might want to look at a (hyper-threaded) Core i7 2600 (k or vanilla model), as this could be beneficial.

Good luck!

[Rattlehead]

Jayrc; if you want an unbiased opinion from a long-time AMD fan

AMD fan here as well. To me they have always been 'cooler' than Intel, and also one has to root for the underdog.

Sadly, I can't justify buying AMD over Intel right now.
Anyways, let me scoot before I start a flamewar or something.

[TonyD]

...
Sadly, I can't justify buying AMD over Intel right now.
...

Oh, I could, but then I’m of the opinion that you require an adequate cpu for a gaming rig, rather than the best. A budget allocation should prioritise a graphics card rather than a cpu, but if it stretches to a SandyBridge quad-core, why not?

Your choice of phrasing is also pertinent – who knows how this may change next month? ;)

[Heliocon]

@ Heliocon

Whatever dude, while I would never claim to be a pro on Hyperthreading I did read into it quite a lot when I was deciding what processor to get next. Literally every forum I read stated the 2500k to be a much better choice bang for buck wise when it comes to gaming, period.

Seems like you just want to justify your e-peen i7-980x investment though (and yes that is an insult since you dont seem to pull any punches either)

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/297649-10-2500k-2600k-gaming-programming

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=665465

And about Bad Company 2:

http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/30/413400.page

Some guy did a test on BFBC2 with HT on and off (see page 3), put it short, except for generating a shitload more heat it doesn´t do much for fps.

Now it is all fine and well if you want to run an i7 with HT (great if you do loads of video editing and stuff) but do not advice people that it is the better option for a game like CoD because that is just total (potentially costly) bs to justify your own investment.

If you want to spend $1000 on a processor alone which isn´t even properly utilized then be my guest but I´d rather spend $250 if the performance gain isn´t totally worth it.

Before you attack me stop being an idiot and read my post. I never suggested the 2600k, or any SB i7. I specifically said using many names since you seem to be completely ignorrant, that i was refering to the Nehalem/40nm/Gen 1 quad= Intel i7 920->960 range of cpus. So stop being a moron and actually read my post, and I wont insult you aslong as you know what you are talking about.

I spent $1000 on a processor because I will be using this computer and mobo for a long time, and I do graphics design with Maya on it which is computationally intensive.

Also just because you find one thread supporting your argument that HT isnt good does not make it true. Atleast we have moved on from the stage of you bsing facts our of thin air to the stage where you try to cover up your misinformed comment with a single forum link. Because that provides hard evidence! fail.

Dont post unless you have a clue, once you do I will be polite, and if you can make a solid and cogent argument all the better.

[Stanger]

I like my epeen 980x cpu.

[TommiVH]

my old trusty 2.67@750 i5 is working just fine with this game...it can easily oc to 4 Ghz. I tried 3.7Ghz but my case needed more air to cool it (Antec Sonata III). Maybe with bigger case and couple of external fans it is easily done.... :) But in 3 Ghz it easily run this game, so no need to OC now...

[TommiVH]

well in Arma 2 that was not to get more fbs but getting the game work in the first place. That HT was causing fatal error to game...

[Heliocon]

well in Arma 2 that was not to get more fbs but getting the game work in the first place. That HT was causing fatal error to game...

Really? Because i5s dont have HT, your one must be a unique and special case... nice one!

[Tiger27]

This is true of FPS. Flight sims suffer from a slow CPU (it really is the bottleneck in what we are concern).

So for flight sims, always buy the fastest CPU you can afford. Presently its the i7-2600K, followed closely by the i5-2500K. Remember that the newer i5 & i7 are faster clock for clock than the previous generation. See here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-intel-core-i7-amd-phenom-ii,2926.html

So get the best CPU with a good overclocking motherboard, then if you only run 1 GPU, you can live a less than 600W PSU, if you plan on running SLI/Crossfire go with a 750+ PSU.

In you case the last thing to upgrade should be the video card (GPU). Oleg's game seem to favor Nvidea. Don't know why? I prefer AMD myself. Here look here and decide.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-graphics-card-radeon-hd-6990-geforce-gtx-590,2912.html

Have to agree with this, I know ROF got its best boost for me when IO upgraded to an I7-920, I7's and I5's seem to be the way to go with flight sims, I run both ROF and CoD on med to high with the I7 and an old 8800gt, although I will be upgrading this when I see what amount of vram is going to be needed to run CoD with high settings.

[TonyD]

Really? Because i5s dont have HT, your one must be a unique and special case... nice one!

If I may, and before this starts another argument, I’m sure that you meant the quad-core Core i5's don’t have HT – as far as I am aware, all other i5’s (sockets 1156 & 1155) do.

To be honest, few games that I have come across benefit from HT; but in your case, using your pc for processor-intensive tasks other than gaming, I’m sure there is a performance related justification. I would never suggest using a 6-core i7 solely for the basis of a gaming rig, as the new SB chips easily match them in terms of performance, and the cost difference is huge. To quote THG from their recent test on the new i7-990X, ‘Frankly, enthusiasts and gamers need not apply.’

There may be a case for the possible longevity of such a system, but most would want to upgrade in a year or two to a more modern platform any way (PCI-ex 3.0, USB 4.0, SATA-4, and who knows what else.). And typically, in Intel’s case, this would require a new cpu and RAM, which incurs additional expense.

[W0ef]

Before you attack me stop being an idiot and read my post. I never suggested the 2600k, or any SB i7. I specifically said using many names since you seem to be completely ignorrant, that i was refering to the Nehalem/40nm/Gen 1 quad= Intel i7 920->960 range of cpus. So stop being a moron and actually read my post, and I wont insult you aslong as you know what you are talking about.

I spent $1000 on a processor because I will be using this computer and mobo for a long time, and I do graphics design with Maya on it which is computationally intensive.

Also just because you find one thread supporting your argument that HT isnt good does not make it true. Atleast we have moved on from the stage of you bsing facts our of thin air to the stage where you try to cover up your misinformed comment with a single forum link. Because that provides hard evidence! fail.

Dont post unless you have a clue, once you do I will be polite, and if you can make a solid and cogent argument all the better.


First of all, I sincerely hope that OP listens to people like TonyD and Zoom instead of you Heliocon, maybe you should read the link Tony posted which pretty much sums it all up:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-core-i3-2100-recommended-processor,2895-4.html

Or will you say Toms hardware pulls fact out of their arse too?

The way you win an argument seems to be by calling anyone who doesn´t agree with you an ignorant idiot amongst other things, which is all fine but not the most convincing way to prove your point.

Now I would have just bailed out of this useless discussion where it not for the fact you seem persistent in pushing through a choice of CPU that would not benefit OP at all for his purposes and his budget, and this pisses me off.

I have posted several links, one directly related to your claim that BF:BC2 makes effective use of 8 virtual cores (which it doesnt imo) to try and prove HT is supposedly worth it for a pure gaming rig (since that is what we ARE talking about, OP states clearly he uses his rig solely for gaming purposes). The link I posted about BF:BC2 has a guy who obviously took the time to run a more extensive test then you have done (as a matter of fact I have yet to see you post any link to an unbiased source to prove any of your claims).


If you read reviews on the best CPU to get for gaming one thing at least is for certain, you'd be a fool going with a non Sandy Bridge CPU for your build right now.

Here is one more, they even run HT tests (for our gaming rig purposes note the fps dif on Left for Dead with HT on and off):

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/16.jpg

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/39555-intel-sandy-bridge-core-i5-2500k-core-i7-2600k-processors-review.html

For our purposes you can skip on to the gaming test section of that review.

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart23.jpg

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart24.jpg

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart25.jpg

The guys over @ bit-tech.net said it best:

Quote:
The Sandy Bridge lineup gives us some of the easiest conclusions to write that we've ever come across: the new range of Intel CPUs renders almost every other processor redundant and pointless. Only if you need incredible performance in multi-threaded applications should you look beyond the Core i5-2500K for your next CPU.


Take in mind the 2500k is actually not more expensive than the by now almost 3 year old i7-920 (even more cheap if judging by the prices I could find).

Lets for the sake of argument see how the top of the line CPU in the line you promote fairs against much more affordable Sandy Bridge CPU.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2011/03/23/intel-core-i7-990x-extreme-edition-review/6

Conclusion:

The i5-2500K is roughly as quick as, and sometimes quicker than, the i7-990X in all but the most heavily multi-threaded tasks. It's also very overclockable, and considerably cheaper. As a result, only those running professional-grade multi-thread-optimised applications should consider the i7-990X, and even then, you'd be better off buying in an i7-980X, which is nearly as fast but £50 cheaper.

I´m not here to diss anyone for having a 980X or whatever, if you need it for programs like Maya or heavy video transcoding fair enough. It is people recommending them for gaming rigs I cannot possibly understand, not to mention recommending to buy the i7 920 or 960 Nehalem now instead of a 2500k or 2600k Sandy Bridge, that is just mindboggling to be honest, even more so because of the fact both are basically end of life and he will probably have a hard time even getting his hands on one if for some reason he wanted to. Even more annoying is when all they do to prove their own point is pull some facts out of their own arse, talk about how it will own in 2 years time (in two years time I can probably buy your 980X in the budget bin tbh) and personally attack people who don´t agree with them.

If you want to go for a HT processor I would do like others here said and go for the 2600k personally. A lot more affordable and actually performs great with games as well.

Let me pull on last review out of my bum: http://www.guru3d.com/article/core-i5-2500k-and-core-i7-2600k-review/23

Now one more thing, the next time you personally insult me without proving ANYTHING yourself I will report you. If you can´t have a proper discussion without resorting to lame tactics like that it only proves how you are unable to prove your point using facts instead of blabbering on. Maybe the misses believed you when you tried to explain to her why you splashed out $1000 on a single processor but I sure as hell won´t be intimidated just because you resort to calling anyone who doesn´t agree with you a moron.

Peace out.

[Heliocon]

First of all, I sincerely hope that OP listens to people like TonyD and Zoom instead of you Heliocon, maybe you should read the link Tony posted which pretty much sums it all up:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-core-i3-2100-recommended-processor,2895-4.html

Or will you say Toms hardware pulls fact out of their arse too?

The way you win an argument seems to be by calling anyone who doesn´t agree with you an ignorant idiot amongst other things, which is all fine but not the most convincing way to prove your point.

Now I would have just bailed out of this useless discussion where it not for the fact you seem persistent in pushing through a choice of CPU that would not benefit OP at all for his purposes and his budget, and this pisses me off.

I have posted several links, one directly related to your claim that BF:BC2 makes effective use of 8 virtual cores (which it doesnt imo) to try and prove HT is supposedly worth it for a pure gaming rig (since that is what we ARE talking about, OP states clearly he uses his rig solely for gaming purposes). The link I posted about BF:BC2 has a guy who obviously took the time to run a more extensive test then you have done (as a matter of fact I have yet to see you post any link to an unbiased source to prove any of your claims).


If you read reviews on the best CPU to get for gaming one thing at least is for certain, you'd be a fool going with a non Sandy Bridge CPU for your build right now.

Here is one more, they even run HT tests (for our gaming rig purposes note the fps dif on Left for Dead with HT on and off):

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/16.jpg

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/39555-intel-sandy-bridge-core-i5-2500k-core-i7-2600k-processors-review.html

For our purposes you can skip on to the gaming test section of that review.

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart23.jpg

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart24.jpg

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/image/mac/reviews/intel/sandybridge/chart25.jpg

The guys over @ bit-tech.net said it best:

Quote:
The Sandy Bridge lineup gives us some of the easiest conclusions to write that we've ever come across: the new range of Intel CPUs renders almost every other processor redundant and pointless. Only if you need incredible performance in multi-threaded applications should you look beyond the Core i5-2500K for your next CPU.


Take in mind the 2500k is actually not more expensive than the by now almost 3 year old i7-920 (even more cheap if judging by the prices I could find).

Lets for the sake of argument see how the top of the line CPU in the line you promote fairs against much more affordable Sandy Bridge CPU.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2011/03/23/intel-core-i7-990x-extreme-edition-review/6

Conclusion:

The i5-2500K is roughly as quick as, and sometimes quicker than, the i7-990X in all but the most heavily multi-threaded tasks. It's also very overclockable, and considerably cheaper. As a result, only those running professional-grade multi-thread-optimised applications should consider the i7-990X, and even then, you'd be better off buying in an i7-980X, which is nearly as fast but £50 cheaper.

I´m not here to diss anyone for having a 980X or whatever, if you need it for programs like Maya or heavy video transcoding fair enough. It is people recommending them for gaming rigs I cannot possibly understand, not to mention recommending to buy the i7 920 or 960 Nehalem now instead of a 2500k or 2600k Sandy Bridge, that is just mindboggling to be honest, even more so because of the fact both are basically end of life and he will probably have a hard time even getting his hands on one if for some reason he wanted to. Even more annoying is when all they do to prove their own point is pull some facts out of their own arse, talk about how it will own in 2 years time (in two years time I can probably buy your 980X in the budget bin tbh) and personally attack people who don´t agree with them.

If you want to go for a HT processor I would do like others here said and go for the 2600k personally. A lot more affordable and actually performs great with games as well.

Let me pull on last review out of my bum: http://www.guru3d.com/article/core-i5-2500k-and-core-i7-2600k-review/23

Now one more thing, the next time you personally insult me without proving ANYTHING yourself I will report you. If you can´t have a proper discussion without resorting to lame tactics like that it only proves how you are unable to prove your point using facts instead of blabbering on. Maybe the misses believed you when you tried to explain to her why you splashed out $1000 on a single processor but I sure as hell won´t be intimidated just because you resort to calling anyone who doesn´t agree with you a moron.

Peace out.

HOLLY **** WHY DONT YOU READ? I never EVER told anyone to get a 980. I als NEVER said to get a i7 sandy bridge idiot. READ MY ACTUAL POST!

Also you only ever posted 1 forum link.

Also you never refuted my argument, in fact you dont even know what it is - because if you did you wouldnt look like an idiot, so for now on quote me moron - because a i7 980x IS A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ARCHITECTURE FROM OTHER 1ST GEN i7S! 980X IS A GULFTOWN CPU AND THE REST ARE NEHALEM. Your are incredible ignorrant, you are arguing against something I never said.

If you really want to poke fun at my processor, maybe its because I have an iq and a job that lets me spend all the $ I want on a computer? I dont know... I mean its kinda a dumb ass idea to try and descredit me because I have the best cpu on the market and therefore I am trying to validate my purchase. you fail.

-Just to make it 100% clear how thick you are go back and read the 4 CONSECUTIVE POSTS IN A ROW WHERE I SAID I WAS NOT TALKING ABOUT A SB i7 BUT ABOUT A NEHALEM i7 BECAUSE OF THE PRICE. YOU JUST PROVED MY ARGUMENT FOR ME BY SAYING HT IS WORTH IT ON MULTI TASK OPERATIONS WHICH THOSE GAMES DONT COVER - BECAUSE THE I5 DOES NOT HAVE HT! SORRY I HAVE TO TYPE IN ALL CAPS, YOU NEED SOME GLASSES BECAUSE IS SPECIFICALLY SAID GET A SB i5 OR A 40NM I7 NOT A SB I7!

[W0ef]

HOLLY **** WHY DONT YOU READ? I never EVER told anyone to get a 980. I als NEVER said to get a i7 sandy bridge idiot. READ MY ACTUAL POST!

Also you only ever posted 1 forum link.

Also you never refuted my argument, in fact you dont even know what it is - because if you did you wouldnt look like an idiot, so for now on quote me moron - because a i7 980x IS A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ARCHITECTURE FROM OTHER 1ST GEN i7S! 980X IS A GULFTOWN CPU AND THE REST ARE NEHALEM. Your are incredible ignorrant, you are arguing against something I never said.

If you really want to poke fun at my processor, maybe its because I have an iq and a job that lets me spend all the $ I want on a computer? I dont know... I mean its kinda a dumb ass idea to try and descredit me because I have the best cpu on the market and therefore I am trying to validate my purchase. you fail.

-Just to make it 100% clear how thick you are go back and read the 4 CONSECUTIVE POSTS IN A ROW WHERE I SAID I WAS NOT TALKING ABOUT A SB i7 BUT ABOUT A NEHALEM i7 BECAUSE OF THE PRICE. YOU JUST PROVED MY ARGUMENT FOR ME BY SAYING HT IS WORTH IT - BECAUSE THE I5 DOES NOT HAVE HT! SORRY I HAVE TO TYPE IN ALL CAPS, YOU NEED SOME GLASSES.

Dude, you seriously need a mental health checkup, I'm trying to keep this post objective yet time and time again your resort to personal insults. Sad really but I refuse to bite.

I clearly mentioned the Nehalem 920 and 960, heck I can post several threads about the 950 as well if you want.

Now please at least learn to have a normal conversation, typing in caps wont make you put your point across, neither does constantly using the word idiot help stress it much.

So why don't you be a big boy for a change and come up with some proper links to reviews or unbiased tests showing how much of an impact HT has on games or how ANY of the Nehalem CPUs is prefferable over a SB 2500k or 2600k these days, or whatever it is you're trying to bring across?

You have not posted a SINGLE valid link so far, nothing.

Oh and cheers on having the best CPU in the market, you clearly have a lot of $ to throw around, grats bro, well done.

I'm not here to diss your setup, just to give the guy a proper recommendation on a gaming rig for around $1200,=

I'll happily take my 2500k and throw in say two XFIRE HD6970s or heck two GTX580s running in SLI, and hey, Ill buy me an SSD and some RAM too, for less then what your friggin processor costs.

You advicing him to get a Nehalem CPU these days with SB out is just too silly to even go into further, but I threw in ample links to point that out. You don't seem to like doing much reading though it seems. Otherwise you might have been able to get some sense.

Cheers.

P.S. About your first line. I wish you had recommended him an I7 SB at least, that would at least have reason behind it.

P.P.S. I have some funny links for you, yanno to lighten the mood a little ;)

http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/allcaps.htm

http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/compost.htm

Now, lets hope Nanny comes in soon huh?

[jayrc]

please don't call people names if they don't agree with you, keep this civil please. I'm listening to everyone and will make an educated guess as to what will be best for me with my budget, keep it coming though.:grin:

[TonyD]

Hi jayrc – I thought we may have lost you long ago :roll:

As a cheaper alternative, why not consider an AMD setup? If you were to buy a new AM3+ mainboard (marked as AM3b on the socket, and black in colour) and a cheap Athlon-II X4 cpu, you would have the option of upgrading to one of the new ‘Bulldozer’ cores later if you wanted to, and the money saved could be spent on a better graphics card. This would not be as fast as a SB setup, but would still be more than adequate, with future upgrade options.

I build gaming machines as a hobby, and have built many over the years, mostly for youngsters who don’t have a lot of money to spend. My advice is always to go for a good gfx card and an adequate processor, rather than the other way round. Games don’t generally require very fast cpu’s to work properly (they wouldn’t sell many, if this was the case), but do benefit enormously from fast gfx cards, particularly if you like to turn the detail up.

This advice does depend on the cost of the components where you live; the cheapest LGA1155 Core i3 is $145 where I live (wholesale from supplier), while an Athlon-II X4 640 is $114. A Core i5 2500k is around $300. AMD maiboards are also cheaper than LGA1155,with native support for 6 SATA-3 ports.

One advantage in going for the 2500k though, is that you are unlikely to want (or need) to upgrade your cpu anytime in the near future.

Have I now confused you further?

[Rattlehead]

Upgrading always presents a few choice difficulties, especially now with Sandy Bridge, Bulldozer and Ivy Bridge all out this year.

For me, the 2500k seems like the best bang for the buck CPU, but what if Bulldozer proves as fast or faster for similar money? Then, there is Ivy Bridge that certainly will be faster than Sandy Bridge...decisions, decisions...on the other hand, if one keeps waiting for the new tech to arrive, one will wait forever.
Oh bugger.

[jayrc]

amd was my first choice but with everyone's performance issues in CloD I'm having a hard time pulling that trigger, Rof users are getting great performance with amd 965 and there overclocking them to 3.7 or 3.8 I believe without any problems. Think I might have to wait even longer still till this sim gets optimized. Anyone have any ideas on what bulldozer's bringing to the table?

[TonyD]

Ha! You’d have to be clairvoyant to know that. It is assumed that performance should match SB, although AMD claims better. It will only really be known when they arrive. Pricing will then depend on how they perform in relation to Intel’s offerings, although should be a bit keener.

I have no issues running CoD currently, with everything on ‘medium’, except Model, Effects and Terrain which I have on ‘high’ (shadows on, grass off) at 1920 x 1080. RoF I run at max. I also don’t OC my cpu, as it really makes very little difference – a couple of fps average in Black Death when raising it to 4.0Ghz. I’m not aware of any AMD cpu user having any particular hassle with CoD, other than what everyone else has, that is.

THG did a test with an i5 750 running at default speed and 4.0GHz, and there was a negligible difference in the frame rates over a number of games. Clocking your cpu will only produce a meaningful increase if it’s a bit too slow to start with, and even then the gain will not be great. There are certain routines that benefit when increasing your cpu speed, but games generally do not.

There is also no issue with running a nVidia gfx card in an AMD board; in fact THG did test each in each other’s boards at some stage, and surprisingly the GeForce was a bit quicker in the Ati board, than both the Ati card in the nVidia board, and the nVidia card in their board :P

[nearmiss]

The heat is building on this thread. Either bring it down or the thread will be locked.

Some of you need to go online combat and vent on some poor souls there.

[Heliocon]

Dude, you seriously need a mental health checkup, I'm trying to keep this post objective yet time and time again your resort to personal insults. Sad really but I refuse to bite.

I clearly mentioned the Nehalem 920 and 960, heck I can post several threads about the 950 as well if you want.

Now please at least learn to have a normal conversation, typing in caps wont make you put your point across, neither does constantly using the word idiot help stress it much.

So why don't you be a big boy for a change and come up with some proper links to reviews or unbiased tests showing how much of an impact HT has on games or how ANY of the Nehalem CPUs is prefferable over a SB 2500k or 2600k these days, or whatever it is you're trying to bring across?

You have not posted a SINGLE valid link so far, nothing.

Oh and cheers on having the best CPU in the market, you clearly have a lot of $ to throw around, grats bro, well done.

I'm not here to diss your setup, just to give the guy a proper recommendation on a gaming rig for around $1200,=

I'll happily take my 2500k and throw in say two XFIRE HD6970s or heck two GTX580s running in SLI, and hey, Ill buy me an SSD and some RAM too, for less then what your friggin processor costs.

You advicing him to get a Nehalem CPU these days with SB out is just too silly to even go into further, but I threw in ample links to point that out. You don't seem to like doing much reading though it seems. Otherwise you might have been able to get some sense.

Cheers.

P.S. About your first line. I wish you had recommended him an I7 SB at least, that would at least have reason behind it.

P.P.S. I have some funny links for you, yanno to lighten the mood a little ;)

http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/allcaps.htm

http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/compost.htm

Now, lets hope Nanny comes in soon huh?

Please cite were you mentioned the nehalem 920/960 directly without confusing them with another cpu. As the tests you posted show, the HT does give better performance, you have a % performance increase graph for the love of god. Then you carry it over to gamebenchmarks - they are not meant for more then 4 threads, and often less then that so it is not a fair assesment of ability. On the other hand your graph shows benchmarking software improving performance due to HT - this will only increase as programmers get better and games implement more threads. The reason I insulted you is because of idiot statements like this:
"Conclusion:
The i5-2500K is roughly as quick as, and sometimes quicker than, the i7-990X in all but the most heavily multi-threaded tasks. It's also very overclockable, and considerably cheaper. As a result, only those running professional-grade multi-thread-optimised applications should consider the i7-990X, and even then, you'd be better off buying in an i7-980X, which is nearly as fast but £50 cheaper."

Whats your point? You are not even talking about what I am, when did I EVER suggest a gulftown cpu? I didnt, you are putting up strayman arguments to knock down. My argument was that he should go for the SB i5, OR the older Nehalem i7 which has the same performance as the SB i5 when clocked at the same speed. Your links dont matter because they are IRRELEVANT to the argument I am making. He wanted the upgrade to an ivy bridge cpu = new cpu and new mobo. Its cheaper to buy a 1156 socket mobo which are very cheap now and a equavalently priced but low range 40nm i7 that will give par for par better value for money than a SB i5 because the i7 has HT, and the mobo required will be alot cheaper. The biggest change of SB is the nm shrink which allows them to default overclock the cpu and get better off the shelf performance when in reality it is just a shurnken version of the earlier processors in general. You are also being forced to pay for the added onboard gpu which he wont use.

Also love your self contradiction - you posted a chart showing that the SB i7 = SB i5 in game performance and based your argument off of that - then wtf would I suggest a SB i7 which is the most expensive options when you say HT doesnt matter? You keep contradicting yourself, not to mention arguing against a argument I NEVER made in the first place, check your ignorrance because theres no point in giving you links unless you are capable of reading in the first place.

Clock for clock example: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/sandy-bridge-core-i7-2600k-core-i5-2500k,2833-2.html

Bad OC change example: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/sandy-bridge-core-i7-2600k-core-i5-2500k,2833-9.html

Comparing a i7 SB and a i7 Nehalem: http://www.behardware.com/articles/815-15/intel-core-i7-and-core-i5-lga-1155-sandy-bridge.html

-SB of course wins in performance on equal ground (i7 vs i7) but if you consider a Nehalem i7 $ = SB i5 - then figure the i7 can use HT and the i5 cannot, then the i7 wins, not to mention the Mobo for it will be cheaper.