How would you rank the following new and used CPUs in the $50 to $60 range for modern AAA gaming?

[IllogicalGlory]

Interesting that the two most popular results are the opposite of one another as of right now.

 

[crashtech]

It's team moar cores vs team fast cores.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Call it a 2500k and you have a race.

 

[crashtech]

2500K and the race is over.

 

[cbn]

Call it a 2500k and you have a race.

2500K and the race is over.

Core i5 2500K not overclocked = Core i5 2500. This unlike the Core i5 6600K which (at stock speed) actually has a 200 Mhz higher base clock than the Core i5 6600.

P.S. Delta between non-overclocked Core i5 7600K and Core i5 7600 is even larger (Non-overclocked Core i5 7600K has 300Mhz higher base clock and 100 Mhz higher turbo than Core i5 7600).

 

[crashtech]

Yes, I meant OCed, for some reason I thought that was self-evident, sorry.

I think for $75-80, it's still a winner:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/CPUs-Processors/164/i.html?_from=R40&LH_BIN=1&_sop=15&_nkw=2500K

 

[cbn]

I like how currently the two most popular orders are completely opposite of each other.

Interesting that the two most popular results are the opposite of one another as of right now.

It's team moar cores vs team fast cores.

Yes, that is how it appears to be shaping up.

And I wonder how the scene will look six months from now with prices of used hexcores (X5675, X5680, E5 1650) dropping further and games potentially becoming more multi-threaded?

Meanwhile I don't expect the price of Pentium G4560 to drop much (if at all) in the same time span.

 

[unseenmorbidity]

For what it's worth, the question seems pretty theoretical. Most gamers probably already have an i5 built within the last five years, so there's no need to "upgrade" to one of these.

If we're talking about a new build, the pentium is clearly the correct choice, since when the money becomes available, you can swap the processor for a genuine gaming kaby lake CPU without investing in any other component. Still, I would not advise anyone to take that route unless they literally had to replace a machine that died before there was money for a better one. Wait a month or two, save an extra $180, and get a system that will actually game through a few generations of graphics cards.

I disagree here.

I used to advocate for i3 +z170 + fast ddr4 combos for budget gamers al the time.

You take that system and it will be decently competitive with an i5 in most titles. You oc it, and now it's straight up competitive.

And the best part is its upgradeability. All you need to do is buy a new i5 or even i7, and sell the old i3, and you have a top of the line system. The amount of money you lose flipping the i3 will basically be inconsequential compared to normal devaluation of pc hardware. It cost money to enjoy this hobby. $30 in a year is nothing!

Yes, I meant OCed, for some reason I thought that was self-evident, sorry.

I think for $75-80, it's still a winner:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/CPUs-Processors/164/i.html?_from=R40&LH_BIN=1&_sop=15&_nkw=2500K

OC'd the xeon wins hands down imo. This is about current and future Triple A titles mind you, but even if it wasn't, I think I would still rather have my xeon.

The only problem with 2c/4t chips is there is more often an issue with minimum frame times, or stuttering.

The averages work out fine, but I notice hitches on my i3-6100 and it drives me nuts (not my main machine, but it's paired with an RX470).

EDIT: But at the same time, the G4560 leaves upgrade room and puts you on a modern platform...

I alluded to this point earlier, but i don't think people caught on.

A lot of people tend to only look at fps averages without giving consideration to spikes in frame latency that causes stuttering. This is why I like Gamer's Nexus benchmarks, because he includes 0.1% lows.

Another thing to keep in consideration is running other programs in the background. Benchmarks are often done on fresh installs of windows.

 

[cbn]

Updated Results:

1. Pentium G4560 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   10 vote(s)
   41.7%
2. Pentium G4560 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   2 vote(s)
   8.3%
3. Core i5 2500 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
4. Core i5 2500 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   3 vote(s)
   12.5%
5. Xeon X5670 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
6. Xeon X5670 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   7 vote(s)
   29.2%

24 total votes.

13 votes place Pentium G4560 ahead of Xeon X5670 and 11 votes place Xeon X5670 ahead of Pentium G4560.

So pretty divided voting when comparing 2C/4T with higher single thread and 6C/12T with lower single thread.

I wonder what would have happened if I had a decent 4C/8T as one of the options?

 

[Magic Hate Ball]

I disagree here.

I used to advocate for i3 +z170 + fast ddr4 combos for budget gamers al the time.

You take that system and it will be decently competitive with an i5 in most titles. You oc it, and now it's straight up competitive.

And the best part is its upgradeability. All you need to do is buy a new i5 or even i7, and sell the old i3, and you have a top of the line system. The amount of money you lose flipping the i3 will basically be inconsequential compared to normal devaluation of pc hardware. It cost money to enjoy this hobby. $30 in a year is nothing!



OC'd the xeon wins hands down imo. This is about current and future Triple A titles mind you, but even if it wasn't, I think I would still rather have my xeon.


I alluded to this point earlier, but i don't think people caught on.

A lot of people tend to only look at fps averages without giving consideration to spikes in frame latency that causes stuttering. This is why I like Gamer's Nexus benchmarks, because he includes 0.1% lows.

Another thing to keep in consideration is running other programs in the background. Benchmarks are often done on fresh installs of windows.

I ran about 20 minutes of gametime in BF1 on my i3-6100 RX470 HTPC tonight. These are not including load screens/initial map time which are frequent sources of terrible spikes.

I ran it at 1080p with Medium settings for best FPS without too many sacrifices on Fao Fortress (or whatever that one is called on the beach in the desert). This is with a 95 FPS average for the whole run.

EDIT: to clarify, "lowest 50" is the 50th frame from the slowest frame time, so there are 49 frame times even worse, I think 10th worst was 50+ ms.


Obviously not world ending results, but I hate stutters and I do notice it far more than when I was running my i7-4770K with the RX470 before.

 

[unseenmorbidity]

What memory are you using? The i3 greatly benefits from fast DDR4.

 

[cbn]

What memory are you using? The i3 greatly benefits from fast DDR4.

He is using DDR4 2133:

https://forums.anandtech.com/thread...-for-modern-aaa-gaming.2499270/#post-38738477

.....which would be typical of most Skylake Core i3 installations.

 

[Magic Hate Ball]

In comparison, since I don't feel like tearing my rigs apart right now to transplant graphics cards, my i7-4770K with Fury (non-X) running Ultra settings at 1080p gets:
Only 103 avg FPS but:

Significantly less noticeable stutter over 20 minutes.

This is only running DDR3 1600mhz.

EDIT: 10th worst frame time was only 27ms vs 50+ ms on i3.

The VERY worst frame time on i7 was 44ms (out of 178313 frames) vs i3 at 114ms (out of 119028 frames)

 

[unseenmorbidity]

Memory speed isn't going to make a lot of difference on a relatively new i7.

 

[jihe]

Comparing Xeon X5670 (6C/12T @ 2.93Ghz/3.33 Ghz) vs. Xeon X5677 (4C/8T @ 3.46Ghz/3.73Ghz)......both LGA 1366 Westmere processors..... I do wonder how high the clocks would be on the X5670 if only four cores were active?

According to CPU world X5670 would have 3.2 Ghz if 3 or more cores are active:

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Xeon/Intel-Xeon X5670 - AT80614005130AA (BX80614X5670).html

This compared to X5677 which would have 3.6 Ghz if 3 or 4 cores are active:

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Xeon/Intel-Xeon X5677 - AT80614005145AB.html

So for less threaded games the X5677 definitely wins.

But then I got to wonder if X5670 could hold 3.2 Ghz if all 6 cores were active? (re: E5 Xeons are known to keep all cores turbo'd above base clock, but then again this is only with AVX off. Westemere Xeons do not not have AVX).

Nobody gets an X5670 without overclocking it. 6 cores 4.0Ghz is baseline for 5650, 5670 should get about 4.2 and there's really no point in quad core westmeres anymore. However the old westmere memory controller, cache system, and power consumption are significantly worse than the new platforms. I wouldn't get one for gaming, they are only really for cheap number crunchings that does not use avx.

 

[cbn]

Nobody gets an X5670 without overclocking it.

Many people do like to overclock the Westmere hexcores...... but surplus used workstations (like the Dell Precision T3500) can't do this.

P.S I wrote down some thoughts on why someone might want to buy a refurbished LGA 1366 workstation over an overclocking LGA 1366 motherboard in posts #10 and #17.

 

[MrTeal]

Overclocking would be better, but surplus used workstations (like the Dell Precision T3500) can't do this.

P.S I wrote down some thoughts on why someone might want to buy a refurbished LGA 1366 workstation over an overclocking LGA 1366 motherboard in posts #10 and #17.

I have a couple of T3500s, for the price they go for (I see them <US$100) they're awesome machines. The case is built like a tank, the included PSU is good, and the airflow is good as well. The PCIe slots aren't super well spaced if you were wanting to run CF/SLI, but then you wouldn't with a system like this anyway.

The downsides are the same that you're going to get with any LGA1366 system, in that the platform is getting quite long in the tooth. You'd definitely want to be looking at adding in at least a USB3 card, but even then you're not going to have any front panel USB3 ports. You do give up some niceties when you go with an 8 year old system.

 

[bigboxes]

The downsides are the same that you're going to get with any LGA1366 system, in that the platform is getting quite long in the tooth. You'd definitely want to be looking at adding in at least a USB3 card, but even then you're not going to have any front panel USB3 ports. You do give up some niceties when you go with an 8 year old system.

You can add in a USB3 card and run a cable to the front. I did that on my HTPC. But you're talking about the T3500 and I'm talking about the P6T Deluxe v2 and a new case.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Updated Results:

1. Pentium G4560 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   10 vote(s)
   41.7%
2. Pentium G4560 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   2 vote(s)
   8.3%
3. Core i5 2500 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
4. Core i5 2500 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   3 vote(s)
   12.5%
5. Xeon X5670 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
6. Xeon X5670 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   7 vote(s)
   29.2%

24 total votes.

13 votes place Pentium G4560 ahead of Xeon X5670 and 11 votes place Xeon X5670 ahead of Pentium G4560.

So pretty divided voting when comparing 2C/4T with higher single thread and 6C/12T with lower single thread.

You know the poll results are visible to us too, right?

I wonder what would have happened if I had a decent 4C/8T as one of the options?

Decent = Overclockable so everybody would have picked that.

 

[cbn]

Updated Results:

1. Pentium G4560 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   10 vote(s)
   41.7%
2. Pentium G4560 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   2 vote(s)
   8.3%
3. Core i5 2500 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Xeon X5670 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
4. Core i5 2500 1st, Xeon X5670 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   3 vote(s)
   12.5%
5. Xeon X5670 1st, Pentium G4560 2nd, Core i5 2500 3rd
   1 vote(s)
   4.2%
6. Xeon X5670 1st, Core i5 2500 2nd, Pentium G4560 3rd
   7 vote(s)
   29.2%[

24 total votes.

13 votes place Pentium G4560 ahead of Xeon X5670 and 11 votes place Xeon X5670 ahead of Pentium G4560.

So pretty divided voting when comparing 2C/4T with higher single thread and 6C/12T with lower single thread.

You know the poll results are visible to us too, right?

Of course I do. The updates are just a way of providing a "snapshot" of the voting progress.

 

[cbn]

I wonder what would have happened if I had a decent 4C/8T as one of the options?

Decent = Overclockable so everybody would have picked that.

Does the 4C/8T processor really need to be overclockable to be decent though?

For example, Xeon X5687 (4C/8T Westemere) has a clockspeed of 3.6Ghz/3.86 Ghz. That is pretty quick for a vintage stock speed part. According to CPU world it will turbo to 3.73 Ghz across four cores.

That is not bad especially when factoring in the memory bandwidth of triple channel @ DDR3 1333 (which is equal to dual channel @ DDR3 2000......but with much tighter timings than dual channel DDR3 2000 would have).

 

[FrostigerFinger]

Given that AAA titles scale increasingly better with more cores, the xeon seems to be the obvious choice.

 

[crashtech]

It's a seven year old CPU with much poorer ST performance than the others, this makes the choice decidedly more difficult and not at all obvious, hence the split in the results. I'd hazard a guess that a gaming benchmark shootout between the three would show results as mixed as the poll. Moving forward, the old hexacore will be at an increasing disadvantage unless overclocked.

 

[unseenmorbidity]

It's a seven year old CPU with much poorer ST performance than the others, this makes the choice decidedly more difficult and not at all obvious, hence the split in the results. I'd hazard a guess that a gaming benchmark shootout between the three would show results as mixed as the poll. Moving forward, the old hexacore will be at an increasing disadvantage unless overclocked.

Not imo. I play a game to enjoy it. Dual cores will end up a stutterfest, especially when paired with slow DDR4.

A smooth 60 fps is a lot better than an extremely spiky 70 fps.

 

[crashtech]

It's all speculation. I think it's hard to get around the no overclocking part of the equation. The hexacore on an X58 OCed to 4GHz would be a winner for sure.