Rig Upgrade, price/performance breaking point on CPU's?
By
Father Xmas,
Posted on: 2009-11-19 11:22 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs
If you can afford to put it off, wait 6 or so months until we know more about Going Rogue - you'll be able to get more bang for less buck, as a general rule, especially if one of the main uses for the machine will be CoH. Processing of large files means the RAM is going to be just as important as the CPU - you're going to want fast RAM, and lots of it. I'd say shoot for 4 or 8 gigs as a bit of future-proofing, since RAM isn't terribly expensive these days. If you're hunting a higher-end processor like Intel's i7 line, there's yet another reason to put off your purchase, as prices will come down over the next few months. Purchasing an i7-based system means you'll be paying quite a bit more for both the processor, motherboard, and RAM - the question is whether the extra performance is worth the extra cost, and at the moment I'd say no. Much of the i7's performance in gaming seems to be tied to the power of the GPU you're using, as well as whether you have one or two, so if you're looking for top-tier graphic performance out of an I7 you'll need to pair it with the high-end GPUs to match.
Basically, just wait six months or so and then refigure what you're looking at, as the computer market will be completely different at that point.
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"One day we all may see each other elsewhere. In Tyria, in Azeroth. We may pass each other and never know it. And that's sad. But if nothing else, we'll still have Rhode Island."
"One day we all may see each other elsewhere. In Tyria, in Azeroth. We may pass each other and never know it. And that's sad. But if nothing else, we'll still have Rhode Island."
First I use something like AnandTech's Bench to quickly compare performance between processors. The gaming benchmarks are at the bottom of the list. Note that most of the other benchmarks uses scale to number of cores so quads usually beat dual and Core i7 with it's virtual 8 cores beat everything.
Second, AMD have been pricing their CPUs to close to Intel in Price/Performance. Yes the top end Phenom II is nowhere close in performance to the top end Intel CPU but it's also nowhere near the price either. The Phenom II 965 is currently within $5 of the Intel Q9400 and the Intel i5-750. It beats out the socket 775 Q9400 in most benchmarks but falls behind the socket 1156 i5-750. All three are around $200 at NewEgg.
Third. There was an article six months or so back at Tech Report that looked at price/performance. Of course it doesn't have the Socket 1156 or Socket AM3 processors and the prices used are likely on the high side but you can get the gist of where the elbow is in the curve.
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Appreciate the input and the links both of you. Think I will hold off for a bit, see what happens with the game and info for Going Rogue. If nothing else, I could hit the after holiday sales.
thanks again for the help
Decided it's time to upgrade my current system. I'm rationalizing it to myself, by saying I can use the old one at work.
In looking at CPU's though, I notice that Intel outperforms AMD (no surprise there) but at usually a significant price difference for the middle to high-middle processors. I had hoped to stay at less than $350 for the CPU.
Just curious as to what people's opinions are between AMD and Intel in this range of processors.
Oh, uses huh, that would probably help. Two primary uses of it would be CoH, no surprise there, and image processing, such as Landsat imagery, so images of 100-500mb.