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i5 or i7 Ivybridge CPU for Gaming PC

J

julielou2

Junior Member
Hello board

I'm looking to purchase my new gaming PC within the next day or so and was happy to get an i5 3570k processor but a guildie has commented that he would go for an i7 processor as it would be better in Everquest 2, World of Warcraft and Skyrim, all of which I want to be able to play on ultra settings.

I'm now having second thoughts - I want a PC which will be future proofed for a good few years with those sorts of games, assuming 16Gb RAM and a GTX580 GPU will I be better saving my money and sticking with the i5 CPU? Is there noticeable performance improvement in games between the 2 chips?

TIA

PS I won't be doing any video editing
 
Since you won't be doing any video editing, you won't need the hyper threading. Go with 3570K so you can overclock later if you want.
 
Wow - thank you all for such quick responses. I'm happy to save the money and spend it on the 7850 if that is better.
 
ShintaiDK said:
Get a GTX 670 tomorrow 😉
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This. From my experience over the years using ATI with Intel vs Nvidia with Intel...Nvidia seems to work better. I'm especially skeptical now that AMD owns ATI...they optimize their cards to run better with their processors. Intel and Nvidia just seem to run better (to me).
 
MPiland said:
This. From my experience over the years using ATI with Intel vs Nvidia with Intel...Nvidia seems to work better. I'm especially skeptical now that AMD owns ATI...they optimize their cards to run better with their processors. Intel and Nvidia just seem to run better (to me).
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Intel works good with everything. 670 is nice but good luck getting one.
 
MPiland said:
I'm especially skeptical now that AMD owns ATI...they optimize their cards to run better with their processors.
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Where did you hear that?

I don't think AMD would intentionally cannibalize the performance of over half their users. That doesn't make much sense from a business perspective when the competition with Nvidia is so cutthroat.

The 670 looks like it'll be a great card based on early reviews, but keep in mind it will retail for $400 or so.
 
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Sorry, I should've clarified that wasn't fact, just speculation on my end. Like on my laptop, I have a 5870 mobile radeon and it's OpenGL software isn't that great. When doing my 3D apps, it throws random stuff in my scene due to a glitch so it forces me to use software acceleration instead of hardware. Just over the many years I've been using computers, I've noticed Intel and Nvidia work better together and so do AMD and ATI.
 
MPiland said:
Sorry, I should've clarified that wasn't fact, just speculation on my end. Like on my laptop, I have a 5870 mobile radeon and it's OpenGL software isn't that great. When doing my 3D apps, it throws random stuff in my scene due to a glitch so it forces me to use software acceleration instead of hardware.
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Ah ok, no worries. 🙂
 
I've had an i7 Lynnfield for two years thinking hyperthreading would be worth it, but it isn't. Stick with the i5, it is more than quick enough, and I doubt games will take advantage of more than 4 cores any time soon. Might as well save your money!!
 
MPiland said:
This. From my experience over the years using ATI with Intel vs Nvidia with Intel...Nvidia seems to work better. I'm especially skeptical now that AMD owns ATI...they optimize their cards to run better with their processors. Intel and Nvidia just seem to run better (to me).
Click to expand...

Up until I purchased my 680 all the cards I've owned have been AMD dating back to the release of the 8800GT. Every one of which has been paired with an Intel CPU on an Intel chipset. Never once have I encountered an issue. Not when they were ATI and not when they were taken over by AMD. I've also yet to read any professional reviews corroborating this conspiracy theory.
 
ValkyrAssassin said:
I've had an i7 Lynnfield for two years thinking hyperthreading would be worth it, but it isn't. Stick with the i5, it is more than quick enough, and I doubt games will take advantage of more than 4 cores any time soon. Might as well save your money!!
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Yep. I bought a Q6600 over an E8400, then an i7 860 over an i5 750, because I wanted to future proof each time. The E8400 had half the cores and I was thinking about multithreading. But it overclocked like hell and nothing I did back then needed four cores. Again, the 750 had half the threads and I was thinking about multithreading. But I don't do anything that needs eight threads and I could have saved a hundred bucks.

Future proofing is fine, as long as you're looking at the immediate future and not some far off hope.
 
2is said:
Up until I purchased my 680 all the cards I've owned have been AMD dating back to the release of the 8800GT. Every one of which has been paired with an Intel CPU on an Intel chipset. Never once have I encountered an issue. Not when they were ATI and not when they were taken over by AMD. I've also yet to read any professional reviews corroborating this conspiracy theory.
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Again, this is from my personal experience. I've heard of others having the same problem, but that could all be coincidence. And AMD didn't make the 8800GT, that was Nvidia...
 
MPiland said:
Again, this is from my personal experience. I've heard of others having the same problem, but that could all be coincidence. And AMD didn't make the 8800GT, that was Nvidia...
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Yes I know. I'm saying my last nvidia card prior to my 680 was a 8800 and everything else in between has been AMD.
 
Everquest 2, World of Warcraft and Skyrim -these games would run fine using a C2Q or Phenom II. Since you a building new PC, I vote 3570K!
 
If you want to play for a few years, get a 2500k at mc today and save the rest. Go for haswell later or even th gen after that, will give you a much better long term experience
 
aaksheytalwar said:
If you want to play for a few years, get a 2500k at mc today and save the rest. Go for haswell later or even th gen after that, will give you a much better long term experience
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The 3570K will perform better, use less power, and is roughly $10 more...why would he go with older tech?
 
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