Question about processor choice and gaming

[Dorkenstein]

I have to say that I don't know much at all about recent processors. If all I'm doing is gaming, would a Phenom II X4 955 BE or a Q9550 be faster?

If they're equal, does one have the advantage over the other if overclocked? I was hoping to not have to overclock, but who knows. Thanks for any ideas.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

They are basically equals. When overclocked, the Q9550 would have the advantage. But since games are primarily GPU-dependent, you're not going to notice the difference.

I'd recommend you get the Core i5 750 over the Q9550.

 

[cbn]

AMD needs to give us a better future for AM3.

 

[jvroig]

I have to say that I don't know much at all about recent processors. If all I'm doing is gaming, would a Phenom II X4 955 BE or a Q9550 be faster?

Basically equal. The short of it all is getting the Phenom II X4 955 is better. And you save a few bucks to buy coffee after you assemble your rig (just a bonus).

 

[Markfw]

AMD needs to give us a better future for AM3.

And what does that have to do with this thread ?

 

[Denithor]

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634&p=16

i5 750 hands down. Matches or beats the PhII X4 965 and the QX9650, in most cases by a solid margin. And if you look at the next page in the review it does so with significantly lower power consumption.

 

[jvroig]

i5 750 hands down. Matches or beats the PhII X4 965 and the QX9650, in most cases by a solid margin. And if you look at the next page in the review it does so with significantly lower power consumption.

Perhaps after reading the responses, the OP might be persuaded to say why the i5/i7 wasn't part of his options.

As it is now, he only wanted to know about two specific processors (no i5 or i7), and didn't so much as ask "any other alternatives for the same price or cheaper/costlier?" or something to that effect. We could guess price, availability, etc, but we should let him say it himself and save us the trouble of assuming.

 

[Rifter]

And what does that have to do with this thread ?

I was thinking the same thing.

To OP get the AMD, cheaper and just as fast for gaming.

 

[exar333]

I was thinking the same thing.

To OP get the AMD, cheaper and just as fast for gaming.

The 955 is only about $30 cheaper, i5 750 all the way. You get Turbo with the i5 and it will be faster across the board. P55 boards are pretty comperable with AM3 (for the most part). Unless $30-50 breaks your budget, the i5 us much better.

 

[Markfw]

The 955 is only about $30 cheaper, i5 750 all the way. You get HT and Turbo with the i5 and it will be faster across the board. P55 boards are pretty comperable with AM3 (for the most part). Unless $30-50 breaks your budget, the i5 us much better.

Seconded (or thirded...is that a word ??)

 

[LoneNinja]

AMD needs to give us a better future for AM3.

So Thuban in 2010 and Bulldozer in 2011 isn't a future for AM3? It's without a doubt much better than socket 775s future. Either way that comment was pointless for this thread.


To OP, don't bother with the C2Q, the Phenom II will do just as well in games and will be cheaper, but if you can afford it, you should get the I5.

 

[toyota]

The 955 is only about $30 cheaper, i5 750 all the way. You get HT and Turbo with the i5 and it will be faster across the board. P55 boards are pretty comperable with AM3 (for the most part). Unless $30-50 breaks your budget, the i5 us much better.

um the i5 doesnt have HT. still agree with everything else though.

 

[exar333]

um the i5 doesnt have HT. still agree with everything else though.

Fixed; for some reason I was thinking the 700-series had it too, but HT is only present on the 800-series 1156-chips. Doesn't change my recommendation.

 

[exar333]

So Thuban in 2010 and Bulldozer in 2011 isn't a future for AM3? It's without a doubt much better than socket 775s future. Either way that comment was pointless for this thread.


To OP, don't bother with the C2Q, the Phenom II will do just as well in games and will be cheaper, but if you can afford it, you should get the I5.

I don't believe Bulldozer or Thuban have been 100% confirmed to work on AM3; Thuban definitely has the best chance to, but Bulldozer is much less likely. I think thats what Computer Bottleneck was getting at...

 

[Scotteq]

In the context of gaming, most of the stress is on the graphics card anyhow. I would opine the OP would be best served figuring out which of his choices is on sale, and putting the savings into a better graphics card than he might have otherwise purchased.

 

[toyota]

In the context of gaming, most of the stress is on the graphics card anyhow. I would opine the OP would be best served figuring out which of his choices is on sale, and putting the savings into a better graphics card than he might have otherwise purchased.

well true but if you are building from scratch it makes more sense to go with a faster cpu that will also handle future gpu upgrades with ease. saving 50 bucks now can bite you in the ass in a year or two when you cant fully utilize whatever gpu you want at that time. the i5 750 seems much more logical to me.

 

[cbn]

And what does that have to do with this thread ?

I agree with what post #2 said. LGA1156 is a better choice.

 

[cbn]

So Thuban in 2010 and Bulldozer in 2011 isn't a future for AM3?

Thuban wouldn't be any better than a Phenom II x4 for gaming and Bulldozer won't work on the current socket.

32nm shrink of Phenom II with higher clock speeds and extra L3 cache added would be a different story.

 

[evolucion8]

If you only do gaming, Phenom X4 is more than enough, if you do lots of video encoding, heavy workstation 3d rendering, F@H, Core i5 is the way to go.

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

The Phenom II X4 results were quite different to those recorded when testing with the Core i7 processors, though this was not necessarily a bad thing. When operating at lower clock speeds, the Phenom II X4 did not fair all that well, as we saw a sharp decline in performance. However when clocked at 3.0GHz and beyond, the Phenom II X4 really picked up the pace, and in many cases was able to outclass the Core i7.
In games such as Wolfenstein, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X, BattleForge and Far Cry 2 the Phenom II X4 processors were actually faster when clocked up near 4GHz! This is quite amazing as out of the 9 games tested, the Phenom II X4 series was faster than the Core i7’s in 5 of them. Although the margins were very limited, the Phenom II X4 was found to be faster, and had it just managed to match the Core i7 series with the Radeon HD 5970, we would have been impressed.

While the Phenom II X4 matched the Core i7 in Crysis Warhead, the only games where it failed was Company of Heroes Opposing Fronts, Left 4 Dead 2 and Batman Arkham Asylum. The Phenom II X4 was noticeably slower in these games, making the Core i7 the better choice here. Still, for the most part we found the Phenom II X4 to be every bit as good as the Core i7 processors when gaming with the new Radeon HD 5970.

Having said that, we recommend that AMD users looking at buying this powerful graphics card make sure that they have a Phenom II X4 processor that is clocked at 3.0GHz or greater. Most Phenom II X4 processors are capable of overclocking to 3.0GHz and beyond, while the more high-end options, such as the Phenom II X4 955 and 965 processors, come clocked at 3.2GHz and 3.4GHz respectively.

While we hardly expect there will be many users trying to pair a $600 US graphics card, such as the Radeon HD 5970, with a budget processor, it is nice to see that the sub-$200 US processors are up to the task. The Intel Core i7 920 proved to be more than powerful enough at $280 US, while the AMD Phenom II X4 955 will work just as well at $165 US, giving users plenty of great options.

 

[cbn]

While we hardly expect there will be many users trying to pair a $600 US graphics card, such as the Radeon HD 5970, with a budget processor

You would think a lot of users would pair up HD5970 with Eyefinity though (and triple monitors goes well with games that classically don't need much in the way of cpu cores)

 

[GaiaHunter]

You would think a lot of users would pair up HD5970 with Eyefinity though (and triple monitors goes well with games that classically don't need much in the way of cpu cores)

Well he was quoting the article and we all know how these articles are - even though they didn't notice any real differences they can't really say a $180 processor is enough to drive the fastest GPU at the moment, for whatever reason.