No dual core love in 2015

[escrow4]

You forget the Windows overhead. Windows doesn't just sit there twiddling its thumbs. I run my games on a separate box with nothing else installed, and Windows takes around 1.2GB RAM just for itself along with a pile of processes and threads. Running all that with a 2014 era game on a dual core is a nightmare. You will experience dips and stutters. So for a developer might as well cut you losses and gut them completely. No (preferably modern) quad, no game for you.

And yes, Crysis 3 will stutter on a dual core. There is a difference between a hexa core and quad in that in terms of smoothness - you can feel the difference on six cores.

 

[cbn]

as I mentioned earlier a video does not show the jitterness and slow feel that actually playing the game does. the game played like complete garbage with 2 cores despite being above 30 fps the whole time. even when staying above 50 fps it looked and felt terrible.

Was this tested with your 980 GTX and high graphical settings enabled?

 

[toyota]

Was this tested with your 980 GTX and high graphical settings enabled?

why did you omit the last part of my comment where I actually did mention the settings? That makes no sense because it was in the same paragraph and then you're turning around and asking me about the settings.

 

[cbn]

why did you omit the last part of my comment where I actually did mention the settings? That makes no sense because it was in the same paragraph and then you're turning around and asking me about the settings.

Sorry I did read through it too quickly and only quoted the part I read.

So what happens when you lower detail settings? Does the game smooth out and the jitteriness and stutters go away?

 

[ShintaiDK]

Just as a note, Far Cry 4 peaks around 40% on an i5 4690 with vsync on and a GTX980. Runs perfectly smooth using 2 cores only as affirmity(Not even close to full load on 2 cores.). And even run ok using a single core. Within the "cinematic" specification

So who again doubt this game could run fine on a dualcore? Just like COD AW.

 

[Flapdrol1337]

I guess it's possible for games to be stuttery on a dualcore, if the developers assumed there will always be cpu time left for the important processes due to imperfect scaling to 4 cores.

I've not noticed stuttery games yet, that said I do run my games with "max pre rendered frames" on 1 (the minimum), and the ingame fps limiter if possible, both to have lower mouse->screen latency.

Also, a thing I noticed when playing mechwarrior online, when settings are mostly low the cpu is not fully loaded, some of the essential game elements don't seem to thread that well, still cpu limited as the gpu is still at 50% or something. If I increase settings the cpu is absolutely pegged at 99%. Still runs fine though, not stuttery, more sluggish, and much better than FX8350 users are reporting, they have the cores to offload the graphics overhead, but the not so well threaded game essentials are not processed fast enough and the framerates tank to under 30 in big brawls.

 

[cantholdanymore]

So who again doubt this game could run fine on a dualcore? Just like COD AW.

The developer

Just because my roommate is an "A" student doesn't mean I'm also an "A" student.

 

[SlickR12345]

This is what tech sites made people believe. Everybody jumped into this OC the G3258 bandwagon and many of those tech sites were either paid (which is just an assumption I am making) or were not diligent enough to point out that at this price point a multi core AMD (>2 cores) might have made more sense in terms of medium term future proofing?

You are absolutely right. They were handily paid off by Intel to spread bullshit and recommend old design 2 core systems, over way better and more scaling AMD alternatives.

Unfortunately AMD just does not have the billions that Intel has to pay off various media outlets including Anandtech to spread bullshit and recommend crappy old technology dual cores when AMD had entry level 6 cores processors at roughly the same price ranges.

Inappropriate Language us not allowed in the tech forums
Markfw900

 

[tential]

Are we seriously saying "Windows Overhead" for a reason why developers are refusing to let a game boot on a dual core? What, do your systems idle with 1 core at full load?

This is anandtech.com yet we seriously believe now that Windows overhead is so drastic that it eats up a MASSIVE amount of processing power on a CPU?

Wow... and I recommend people they should come here for advice lol... guess I made a massive mistake.

 

[frozentundra123456]

You are absolutely right. They were handily paid off by Intel to spread bullshit and recommend old design 2 core systems, over way better and more scaling AMD alternatives.

Unfortunately AMD just does not have the billions that Intel has to pay off various media outlets including Anandtech to spread bullshit and recommend crappy old technology dual cores when AMD had entry level 6 cores processors at roughly the same price ranges.

Care to document this accusation?

 

[Morbus]

OH, man, just tell me that you also think that Planscape Torment is junk and that you couldn't stand neither the witcher 2 nor any of the fallouts, not to mention the elder scroll games.

Lol, I'm a big fan of Torment and am expecting Tides of Numenera anxiously.

I'm also a big fan of The Witcher, more the original than the second.

Also, my favorite game of all time is Fallout, then Fallout 2. The newer Fallouts are crap though.

I'm also a big fan of Morrowind (am playing it currently, actually), but not so much of Oblivion or Skyrim.

But that's beside the point. The original Bethesda team that did Daggerfall and Morrowind is almost gone (if not gone completely), the original Fallout developers are scattered to the wind (and making some awesome games in the process, more often than not - I'm actually friends with Boyarsky on Facebook, can you imagine it? lol), Chris Avellone is now at Obsidian, and the Baldur's Gate team, a game that is much overrated but still better than most - is also very much dead.

Did you know that Baldur's Gate was originally meant to be a normal strategy game? It was relatively late in the development cycle that they added in the dialog elements of the game and, apparently, turned it into "one of the greatest RPGs of all time". It's not one of the greatest. It's barely anything more than a strategy game. Not unless you count Silent Storm (one of my favorite games as well) as an RPG. And, to be fair, the real time aspect of the game (Baldur's Gate, that it), only makes the combat clunky and needlessly unbalanced. I understand people may not readily agree with me on this, and most likely they probably won't even know what I'm talking about, but Baldur's Gate is a bastard game, and that's about as badly as I'll talk about it here.

:EDIT:
I just realized, this is seriously off-topic.

 

[NTMBK]

You are absolutely right. They were handily paid off by Intel to spread bullshit and recommend old design 2 core systems, over way better and more scaling AMD alternatives.

Unfortunately AMD just does not have the billions that Intel has to pay off various media outlets including Anandtech to spread bullshit and recommend crappy old technology dual cores when AMD had entry level 6 cores processors at roughly the same price ranges.

Wow. Seriously, you're just going to openly claim that Anandtech is bought off by Intel? Based on absolutely no evidence whatsoever? On the free forums provided by Anandtech?

Stop slandering or GTFO.

 

[Flapdrol1337]

Wow. Seriously, you're just going to openly claim that Anandtech is bought off by Intel? Based on absolutely no evidence whatsoever? On the free forums provided by Anandtech?

Stop slandering or GTFO.

I thought he was being sarcastic, he wasn't?

 

[ShintaiDK]

Are we seriously saying "Windows Overhead" for a reason why developers are refusing to let a game boot on a dual core? What, do your systems idle with 1 core at full load?

This is anandtech.com yet we seriously believe now that Windows overhead is so drastic that it eats up a MASSIVE amount of processing power on a CPU?

Wow... and I recommend people they should come here for advice lol... guess I made a massive mistake.

It does seem the effect of telling the moon is a big cheese enough times is taking effect. Its quite sad :/

Its a shame people dont actually try it themselves and isolate it like I did. And they would know the quadcore requirement is nothing but complete BS. 2x3.4-3.8Ghz Haswell cores at 80% load can keep 60FPS with everything maxed on a GTX980.

 

[ShintaiDK]

I thought he was being sarcastic, he wasn't?

If thats the case, then he does it quite often.

 

[tential]

If thats the case, then he does it quite often.

Doesn't look remotely sarcastic to me.

I used /sarcasm though to get my meaning across, or quotations, or italicizes.

 

[Headfoot]

With the shocking requirements of recent games like Far Cry 4 and Dragon Age Inquisition and them requiring a quad core processor or a dual core with hyperthreading (i3) do you guys think this might be a continuing trend in new major releases?

I was shocked when I realized I would not be able to play either game with a dual core processor. G3258 owners must be disappointed as a lot of gamers actually purchased one on the basis of it being a cheap performance killer when it came to gaming. I understand the need to advance gaming by using more cores, but with these two games especially I feel as if us dual core users have been shafted. Its even come to attention that some gamers have disabled 2 cores on their processors and managed to play the game flawlessly. Which may lead us to believe that they run a true or false check on the processor itself before launch.

Anyone else think dual core may be on its way to the graveyard when it comes to gaming?

The G3258 was definitely NOT reviewed as a cheap performance killer.... what reviews are you reading? Most places said it doesn't hold up in modern games...

 

[exar333]

I find it interesting that that Cinebench MT Benchmark has the Pentium G3258 more than 4x the speed vs. the E-350 (which is roughly 0.2x performance of the PS4 Jaguar 8C).

I doubt the 'overhead' advantage of a closed system would change this substantially.

The Pentium 2C/2T CPU is plenty for 95% of games. Even in the 5% where it's not, it probably still 'gets the job done'.

It has nothing about propaganda or anything. Restricting any application from using the hardware you have is silly.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/328?vs=1265

 

[NTMBK]

I find it interesting that that Cinebench MT Benchmark has the Pentium G3258 more than 4x the speed vs. the E-350 (which is roughly 0.5x performance of the PS4 Jaguar 8C).

The E-350 is only dual core, not quad core- it's more like 0.2X the PS4 performance. (Quarter of the cores, lower IPC.)

 

[exar333]

The E-350 is only dual core, not quad core- it's more like 0.2X the PS4 performance. (Quarter of the cores, lower IPC.)

Point taken. So they would be on relative parity. Post has been edited.

 

[skipsneeky2]

Dual cores certainly are dead, my back up x4 9150e with its 1.8Ghz clockspeed ripped the old e8200@ 3GHz i used to have apart in BF3. First generation phenoms are garbage compared to C2D on a clock for clock basis.Older games ran miles ahead on the e8200 obviously

Multi-threading is here for good, i am sure my experience can be carried over to something like a Amd x4 965 blasting a G3220 or similar chip in anything multi-threaded despite the much slower ipc of of the Phenom 2.

What i would love is actually a couple pc exclusive games that honestly can use something pass 4 threads with true benefits,been seeing games using 4 threads for 7 years which is just a eternity i think.

 

[piasabird]

I don't game but the new i3's with the 4meg cache and the 4600 IGP seem pretty good to me. Mostly I just watch video and surf the net. They clock higher naturally because they are dual core and use less power. Maybe they don't have turbo boost, but they do alright for what I want them to do.

 

[Gikaseixas]

I don't game

And that's why you find it ok for your uses. I have a Dell at work, it's a dual core cpu and it runs trough every application i use but i would never consider buying a similar processor for gaming.

 

[2is]

I don't game but the new i3's with the 4meg cache and the 4600 IGP seem pretty good to me. Mostly I just watch video and surf the net. They clock higher naturally because they are dual core and use less power. Maybe they don't have turbo boost, but they do alright for what I want them to do.

Different processors have their place. For your uses, an i3 is more than enough, and even the Pentiums will easily handle those tasks. It's when people by a low end Pentium and complain that they can't play the newest games that doesn't really make much sense.

 

[exar333]

Different processors have their place. For your uses, an i3 is more than enough, and even the Pentiums will easily handle those tasks. It's when people by a low end Pentium and complain that they can't play the newest games that doesn't really make much sense.

That is true.

15 years ago the average (on the low end) for a CPU was ~$400-500, which translated to ~10 AAA game purchases.

Now, a REALLY good CPU like the i5 4670K or 8xxx AMD CPU will run ~$200-250, or 4-5 AAA game purchases.

There are actually a decent number of new game titles (limited ed., etc) that cost MORE than a cheap CPU itself (<$70). LOL