CPU generations and its effect on gaming

[El Metronome]

I read somewhere that computing processing power doubles every something like 1 and a half years? But these few years seems to have slowed considerably? Is it worthwhile then, to stick or even buy previous generation Intel CPUs until the next major advancement eg. Skylake? I seem to see a considerable number of people buying the i5-2500k or i7-2700k, these old processors still represent a value buy as compared to current generation offerings?

Also, how important is CPU performance in gaming? Understand it varies from game to game, but GPU should be the overwhelming major factor affecting gaming performance? If so, why do almost all custom gaming rigs or gaming motherboards 'suggest' (through their choice of chipsets Z97) a requirement for CPU overclocking? I want to build a micro ATX gaming rig, but I literally cannot find any motherboard with a 'gaming' advertising tag on anything other than a Z chipset.

 

[zenniz]

To answer your second question, simple.

Its all about the money money money. They just want your money money money.

Due to the popular misconception by many newbies " YOU MUST GET MOST EXPENSIVE i7 IN ORDER TO PLAY THE MOST BAD ASS GAME!!! ". Many company are trying to take advantage of it and milk newbies dry.

You don't need a i7 for gaming or an overclocked cpu for gaming. The performance gain from what you are paying is not worth it.

"Gaming" is just a gimmick. It is the extra features that they includes in the motherboard.

For example, take look at the your MSI B85-G43 Gaming ATX and MSI B85-G41 PC MATE. They are almost identical in features with the exception of MSI B85-G43 Gaming ATX having extra features like "Killer net", "Audio boost" and extra crap that they advertised that makes you think that buying this will give you extra boost in gaming performance.
A premium/gaming $500 mobo will not give you extra gaming performance when compared to an $100 average consumer motherboard.

 

[FinalTidus]

I read somewhere that computing processing power doubles every something like 1 and a half years? But these few years seems to have slowed considerably? Is it worthwhile then, to stick or even buy previous generation Intel CPUs until the next major advancement eg. Skylake? I seem to see a considerable number of people buying the i5-2500k or i7-2700k, these old processors still represent a value buy as compared to current generation offerings?

Also, how important is CPU performance in gaming? Understand it varies from game to game, but GPU should be the overwhelming major factor affecting gaming performance? If so, why do almost all custom gaming rigs or gaming motherboards 'suggest' (through their choice of chipsets Z97) a requirement for CPU overclocking? I want to build a micro ATX gaming rig, but I literally cannot find any motherboard with a 'gaming' advertising tag on anything other than a Z chipset.

People are buying i5-2500K is because this processors are the last processors by Intel to use the fluxless solder instead of the poor quality TIM paste used from Ivy Bridge onwards.

And Sandy Bridge processors are still very capable processors. Their successors aka Ivy Bridge, has well and Broadwell offer very little improvements in performance other than lower power consumptions.

Skylake is the next quantum leap(Hopefully) in performance. Thats why everybody is waiting for Skylake.

 

[Jian19]

Msi h97 gaming 3 ~

 

[wkweewee]

People are buying i5-2500K is because this processors are the last processors by Intel to use the fluxless solder instead of the poor quality TIM paste used from Ivy Bridge onwards.

And Sandy Bridge processors are still very capable processors. Their successors aka Ivy Bridge, has well and Broadwell offer very little improvements in performance other than lower power consumptions.

Skylake is the next quantum leap(Hopefully) in performance. Thats why everybody is waiting for Skylake.

This is so true man. i5/i7 k processors, be it sandy, ivy or haswell are all capable of hitting >4ghz when overclocked. That being said, you can barely see any difference when gaming with them. i7 comes in especially handy only when you are doing productivity work (which requires the utilization of as many cores and threads the cpu can provide), but not in gaming (which does not utilize all the cores and threads at full load, similar to a waste in cpu resource).

That is why if one's on a budget, the impact of a better base clocked cpu might not be that substantial as compared to a better gpu in gaming. With that being said, it comes down to how you place your priorities: productivity/gaming, enthusiast with $/a more budget-oriented gamer.

 

[Gymrat76]

My i7-920 is going strong for gaming even 4 years after I first got it (thereabouts). The only thing which really improves my gaming performance is to upgrade:

1. GPU
2. HDD to SSD (for quicker load times)
3. To a lesser extent, increasing RAM

I don't intend to upgrade my CPU for the next year or two more as there's no reason to, unless there's a quantum leap in performance in the next gen of chips

 

[FinalTidus]

This is so true man. i5/i7 k processors, be it sandy, ivy or haswell are all capable of hitting >4ghz when overclocked. That being said, you can barely see any difference when gaming with them. i7 comes in especially handy only when you are doing productivity work (which requires the utilization of as many cores and threads the cpu can provide), but not in gaming (which does not utilize all the cores and threads at full load, similar to a waste in cpu resource).

That is why if one's on a budget, the impact of a better base clocked cpu might not be that substantial as compared to a better gpu in gaming. With that being said, it comes down to how you place your priorities: productivity/gaming, enthusiast with $/a more budget-oriented gamer.

Haha yup. And Intel is actually intentionally crippling performance on their desktop processors and selling them at high prices is because AMD has no answer to them.

If AMD does offer a real competition like the AMD64 era, trust me Intel will go all out bringing consumers better processors with stunning performance gains like the Core 2 era. We might have been already using Skylake processors years ago.

But having said that, also because market trends have shifted to mobile where ARM is still the market leader for phones and tablets, Intel is focusing less on desktops and more on mobile. Which is also why processors since Sandy Bridge have been focused on energy efficiency instead of sheer brute processing performance.

 

[damienloh]

I look at ark.intel.com, i5-4690K, i5-4690, i5-4590, i5-4460. They are almost identical (4 cores, 4 threads) only slightly different base clock.Even my work PC's i5-2400 is 4 core 4 threads at 3.1GHz. So what really make those cpu different?

ARK | Compare Intel® Products

 

[Jian19]

Power consumption and inbuilt gpu is the diff

 

[kingcarlos]

perhaps motherboard is crucial in gaming performance too

Low Fps with GTX 970 [Solved] - Gtx - Graphics & Displays

 

[damienloh]

Power consumption and inbuilt gpu is the diff

So power consumption is more relevant since most people will buy a good graphic card.

 

[wkweewee]

I look at ark.intel.com, i5-4690K, i5-4690, i5-4590, i5-4460. They are almost identical (4 cores, 4 threads) only slightly different base clock.Even my work PC's i5-2400 is 4 core 4 threads at 3.1GHz. So what really make those cpu different?

ARK | Compare Intel® Products

+ pricing to milk consumers lol. If you think that the 100mhz-200mhz difference would make a lot changes/impact in gaming, Intel would say 'kum sia' to you and their marketing team. As for the k chip, you shouldn't compare it with its non-k variant because it's unlocked capability can range from +200mhz-1000mhz depending on your luck. That being said, it can boost your in game fps by a fair bit (depending on the titles you are playing). This though would not improve the 'smoothness' in your games if you have already gotten high and stable fps in the first place with a solid gpu.

 

[ykrap1]

If you are getting a rig just for gaming, there is no need to go for high end $5000 X-99 specs cos to be honest computer tech changes every year.
Basically a $1500 computer can run all kinds of games for the next 3 to 4 years. Rather spend the money on a PS4 together with a 55" LED TV and can play together with girlfriend, than buying a $5000 X-99 rig. Of course if one is earning $8k monthly then it a different story.

Below config is suffice for gaming
I7 processor series (behind without K and X)
H97 series motherboards
RAM 16G enough
HDD 1TB
SSD 240G
Graphics GTX970 (CP value is good enough)
500 ~ 650W power supply

 

[El Metronome]

From all your responses I gather that most of you guys are in agreement that the past few generations of intel CPUs has had little to no improvement in performance, except maybe in power consumption? Even the power consumption can't differ by too much? But I guess for desktop users like ourselves the reduced power consumption of a CPU is really not very significant at all.

So overclocking CPU does not yield improved gaming performance too. So I wonder why people all over the world (pcpartpicker) use K processors and overclock their CPU for 'gaming' rigs. My guess is that its just an interest or hobby, and maybe to look more satki? Haha.

This got me thinking too, how important are the 'gaming' features on gaming motherboards. The most important ones to me are probably the Killer LAN and the 'gaming' USB ports for faster polling rate. I don't use the audio drivers on the mobo, and I believe all mobo sound solutions, no matter how advertised, cannot compare to a decent external DAC+AMP? Even the Killer LAN and the 'special' USB ports on my mobo, I don't know if they are really improving my PC performance?

Now I am thinking of selling off my mobo+CPU, for a 2nd hand Z-chipset mATX mobo with a previous generation CPU and try my hand at CPU overclocking (for curiousity's sake more than anything), or even a lower spec mATX board, then put the savings into something else.

 

[bermudas]

This thread got me interested.

I am on a 7-yr-old processor (C2D E6600), 4GB DDR2 RAM and GTX560Ti 2GB.

Past 2 weeks, i have been reading up on the new 4th Gen i5 and i7 processors. I am thinking of upgrading my old PC, but still unsure if i should get such new processors, or just grab a 2nd-hand 2nd Gen processor from the garage sale.

I do not play game at all. Only browsing using FF with multiple tabs, very light video editing and photo editing during the rare occasions. I dont watch movie also. Purely surfing.

To what processor should i upgrade to? I still think SSD is expensive at this stage. I am on Win 8.1.

 

[Jian19]

i3 + 8gb ram + 128gb ssd

Reuse ur hdd, gfx, DVD drive

 

[wkweewee]

Now I am thinking of selling off my mobo+CPU, for a 2nd hand Z-chipset mATX mobo with a previous generation CPU and try my hand at CPU overclocking (for curiousity's sake more than anything), or even a lower spec mATX board, then put the savings into something else.

Lol you don't do anything rash la. Your current mobo+cpu are okay for your usage and their resale price is not that high and don't forget that you cannot really use air cooling if you intend to oc. So in the end you will need to pump in the extra money for an aio liquid cooler or custom wc to satisfy your curiosity @.@

 

[damienloh]

This thread got me interested.

I am on a 7-yr-old processor (C2D E6600), 4GB DDR2 RAM and GTX560Ti 2GB.

Past 2 weeks, i have been reading up on the new 4th Gen i5 and i7 processors. I am thinking of upgrading my old PC, but still unsure if i should get such new processors, or just grab a 2nd-hand 2nd Gen processor from the garage sale.

I do not play game at all. Only browsing using FF with multiple tabs, very light video editing and photo editing during the rare occasions. I dont watch movie also. Purely surfing.

To what processor should i upgrade to? I still think SSD is expensive at this stage. I am on Win 8.1.

I don't think you need to upgrade at all just for surfing the web.

 

[FinalTidus]

This thread got me interested.

I am on a 7-yr-old processor (C2D E6600), 4GB DDR2 RAM and GTX560Ti 2GB.

Past 2 weeks, i have been reading up on the new 4th Gen i5 and i7 processors. I am thinking of upgrading my old PC, but still unsure if i should get such new processors, or just grab a 2nd-hand 2nd Gen processor from the garage sale.

I do not play game at all. Only browsing using FF with multiple tabs, very light video editing and photo editing during the rare occasions. I dont watch movie also. Purely surfing.

To what processor should i upgrade to? I still think SSD is expensive at this stage. I am on Win 8.1.

My advice.

Just stick to your rig.

Your rig is already capable of decent 1080p gaming. WHats more u only surf the web. More than sufficient for your needs.

Just save up for SSD. And with Win 8.1 its more than fast enough. Any upgrading of other components you will definitely not feel much difference.

 

[raysusan]

Indeed. If my 2600k was not spoiled due to a trip. I wouldn't have upgraded