Guild Wars 2

So you can better help me understand and compare, I built my rig back in 2012 I think, and had:

Intel i7 950 @ 3.07 GHz/3.06 GHz
6 GB Corsair XMS3 1600 MHz RAM (Triple Channel)
2 TB Seagate Barracuda Hard Drive
Nvidia GTX 460, then (and currently) GTX 760

My 2 TB hard drive finally crashed recently, so I got a couple new parts for my rig:

2×8gb Corsair Vengeance RAM
500GB EVO SSD Hard Drive

WOW is the different the SSD makes. I am now a believer. For anyone considering whether to get an SSD for your C:/ drive, do it. I don’t think I even needed to upgrade the RAM, although I did anyways. I understand now why people say 8 GBs of RAM is plenty. The old Hard Drive was definitely the bottleneck in my rig. Now I can really start to tell what the limitations are with my graphics card, whereas before I wasn’t sure if it was the RAM or Hard Drive (or processor).

But to get to my question, before upgrading I was thinking about just building a whole new PC, and in researching, I kept seeing people recommend Intel i5 processors, sometimes for budget PCs, but sometimes even for what appears to be top-tier builds.

Is the difference between the i5 and i7 much like some graphics cards, where the difference is almost unnoticeable, like in my research, I see that the performance difference between the Geforce GTX 960M 2 GB and 860M 2 GB is only 2%, whereas the difference between the 960m and the 940m is 128% improved performance with the 960m.

http://www.game-debate.com/gpu/index.php?gid=2558&gid2=2143&compare=geforce-gtx-960m-2gb-vs-geforce-gtx-860m-2gb

http://www.game-debate.com/gpu/index.php?gid=2802&gid2=2558&compare=geforce-940m-2gb-vs-geforce-gtx-960m-2gb

Using my Intel i7 950 as comparison, I presume newer i5 processors are still better than what I have now, would I be correct? And it seems to me that the only bottleneck still remaining for my PC is my graphics card, as my processor seems to handle everything just fine.

Thank you in advance

The i5 Skylake is cheaper as a i7

Here Compare about ur i7 Cpu vs i5 Skylake Cpu
http://www.game-debate.com/cpu/index.php?pid=2324&pid2=252&compare=core-i5-6600k-3-5ghz-vs-core-i7-950-quad-3-06ghz

Bottleneck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGdo75gasaQ

Compare i5 Skylake vs i7 Skylake

http://www.game-debate.com/cpu/index.php?pid=2324&pid2=2320&compare=core-i5-6600k-3-5ghz-vs-core-i7-6700k-4-core-4-0ghz

Both the i5 and i7 desktop CPUs are quad cores (excluding the Socket 2011 V3 i7 CPUs which are 6 and 8 core). The major differences are the i7 has the ability to have two threads run on a single core (hyperthreading), additional L3 cache and a higher out of box clock speed when comparing top end i5 to top end i7 (currently the i5-6600K and i7-6700K).

Now this sounds great, the i7 can run 8 threads at the same time while the i5 can only run 4 but it’s not that simple. WARNING: TECHNOBABBLE Intel cores are overbuilt with more duplicate internal resources than needed on average when executing a single thread. However with hyperthreading, they can improve the overall utilization of all those internal resources thus squeezing a higher instruction per cycle out of the same core. Depending on the type of threads, it can a quite a bit or in some instances worse performance. The drawback HT has is the i5 and i7 has the same size L1 and L2 memory caches and running two threads at the same time will increase cache misses in the i7 which can cause the CPU to stall, which is why the L3 cache is 33% larger on the i7 trying to mitigate that. END TECHNOBABBLE

The benchmarks I’ve seen say that HT gives you an average 5-10% improved performance at the same clock speed. Games historically don’t show much of an advantage with HT, some gamers will disable it in BIOS.

Basically it’s a value call. Spend an additional $100 or so for slightly better per clock performance if both are overclocked to the same speed; or spend that money on a better video card; or pocket it.

As for the ancient i7 vs modern i5 … yes quite a bit faster, like 40-60% faster with the new i5s.

Here’s a video or two on HT.

I havent dug into CPUs lately but the argument has always been simple:
The i3 doesnt cut it and the i7 has been overly expensive.

Why you drag old mobile GPUs into the argument I dont know, performance will be all over the place since its they rebrand previous generations to look like newer generations. But there the argument is similar:
Sub-budget to budget doesnt cut it and top tier is often overly expensive.

i5 vs i7 is traditionally basicly a 1070 vs Titan X deal.

Think its worth it?

You really just don’t see any improvement from an i7 over an i5 in games. The money is better spent elsewhere or saved if gaming is your goal

Fermi.2409:

You really just don’t see any improvement from an i7 over an i5 in games. The money is better spent elsewhere or saved if gaming is your goal

Ironic, given your signature. That said, true, especially if this old clunker is not the only game you play.

Fermi.2409:

You really just don’t see any improvement from an i7 over an i5 in games. The money is better spent elsewhere or saved if gaming is your goal

You will see improvements if the game can use multiple threads or if you are multitasking on your computer. Like watching a stream, browsing with dozens of tabs, gaming, teamspeak, skype etc all at the same time.

But if you are just playing a game, other than out of the box clock speed, you’re not going to see much of a difference.

Playing with an i5 2500k 3.3GHZ, combined with a 1060 nvidia, I can tackle anything. I do drop model quality of other players down when i’m in zerk content like world bosses and wvw, but other than that it runs smoothly

Using a i3 6100 hyperthreaded CPU; with a strong GPU; this game runs like butter almost all maxed settings. Obv heavy WvW or WBs can lag some but nothing horrible. Now, OTHER games, future proofing, and multi-tasking are the reasons to go i5.

I can’t have too many browser windows, TS3, stream, etc. and expect to run full settings in a 100 zerg WvW rush and be smooth.

Ppl also overlook their monitor. 1080p vs 2k/4k is BIG. 60 frames? A lot of ppl overkill for 1080p or under for 2k/4k. It all depends on YOUR needs/other.

KyreneZA.8617:

Fermi.2409:

You really just don’t see any improvement from an i7 over an i5 in games. The money is better spent elsewhere or saved if gaming is your goal

Ironic, given your signature. That said, true, especially if this old clunker is not the only game you play.

Yeah, I suppose. I actually made money upgrading from my i5 to this i7 (had a 3570k before), though, so it’s kind of a special case.

That being said, if it’s only a few dollars between getting an i5 and an i7 it’s probably worth it to make the leap. It’s just not nearly worth $100

Amaimon.7823:

Playing with an i5 2500k 3.3GHZ, combined with a 1060 nvidia, I can tackle anything. I do drop model quality of other players down when i’m in zerk content like world bosses and wvw, but other than that it runs smoothly

Get a cooler and set that think to at least 4.5GHz, you’re missing out on loads of performance

EriskRedLemur.7153:

Ppl also overlook their monitor. 1080p vs 2k/4k is BIG. 60 frames? A lot of ppl overkill for 1080p or under for 2k/4k. It all depends on YOUR needs/other.

If you mean 1440P by 2k, please just say 1440P. 2k doesn’t make sense as a name in general, but especially when applied to 1440P. 2k is technically 2048×1080, but in “common terms” (where 4k is 2160P) it’d just be 1080P