CPU Bottlenecking at Digit-Life, yes we need faster CPUs as much as we need faster GPUs

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: chizow

So then why do you keep trying to argue CPU bottlenecks on current parts don't exist? I've never once said every game and every card solution is CPU bottlenecked, so what is your point?

I'm not arguing they don't exist, I'm arguing they aren't the norm unless you stick to low detail settings and use slow CPUs. In most cases the GPU is overwhelmingly the bottleneck.

Sure, you can show me examples of 1920x1200 of 4xAA with CPU bottlenecking but I can show you examples of GPU bottlenecking at 1280x1024 with no AA.

When I was putting up benchmarks about five years ago it was common for me to include several from each game and I often observed some benchmarks were more GPU limited than others.

Here?s an example:

http://episteme.arstechnica.co.../5280912435#5280912435

Look at the ?Serious Sam II? scores. For a CPU clock increase of 33%, ?Yodeller? only went up 2% while ?Cathedral? went up 33% (i.e. it scaled 1:1 with CPU clock speed).

What does this tell us? It tells us not all benchmarks are created equal and that not all reviewers pick the right benchmarks to test graphics cards.

I've shown similar CPU bottlenecking in WiC, The Witcher, AC, AoC and even Crysis. I'm sure I could find more but why would I need to, that's what reviewers are reviewing and what gamers are playing.

Likewise, I've shown plenty of newer and older titles being GPU bound, including Crysis which was GPU bound at 1280x1024 with no AA.