Dual Core ("Duo") Vs. Quad Core CPU's

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Vinyl_Is_King

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Hi,

I have a question which I am very curious of - being that I'm slowly getting into building my own PC's.

I know that for Dual Core CPU's and, I'm guessing, for Quad Core CPU's, the threads they have can be bench marked individually (ex: one thread can have a score of 700) however, if you have a Quad Core CPU and its individual thread score is less than that of a Dual Core CPU's single thread, does that make that Dual Core better or worse since the Quad Core still has 2 more core than it?

Am I making any sense here? :lol:
 
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SinxarKnights


You will get situations like that. For gaming specifically, the CPU is a bit less important than the GPU in most cases. Some games especially Minecraft, is heavily dependent on the CPU over the GPU. Some RTS and games with a lot of units taking actions (imagine medieval warfare) are also CPU bound.

If you overclocked your CPU and...
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Supahos

Supahos

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Depends on the program and how it's coded... Some apps will use as many cores as you have some only use 1. Any single core app would be faster in the dual core in your scenario, a 2+ threaded app will probably favor the 4 core as Windows is using part of one core (at least) at all times
 
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Robert Cook

Robert Cook

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so you are saying is a quad core with lower per core performance as good as a dual core with better per core performance? It really depends. If the applications you are running use only two cores ( such as older games) then you will benefit from a faster dual core., but lest say you want to play an older game and web surf, then the dual core is useless as it does not have any extra power to throw at web surfing. just saying, the dual core CPU is not really worth while anymore unless you will only be web browsing and word processing. were you trying to compare any two chips? did I even answer your question?
 
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SinxarKnights

SinxarKnights

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It depends on the applications you use and how big the difference is.

For modern applications and PC builds, you generally will want a quad core minimum. Intel has Hyperthreading in the i3 lineup. It is a dual core CPU but acts as a low end quad core (check Wikipedia for information about Intel's Hyperthreading).

Some applications are highly threaded and have a distinct advantage the more cores there are, however these are almost always special cases as of right now. If you fall into this category then the more cores the better, especially if they do not share resources between them.

If you are talking about Intel i5s (4 core) vs the AMD FX series (8 core), the i5s are superior to these CPUs because there are no mainstream applications that can fully take advantage of it. Due to the much higher IPC (instructions per clock) of current Intel CPUs, a quad core will almost always be better than the AMD 8 core CPUs. Again this is mainly due to apps being developed for 2 - 4 cores and lack the ability to take advantage of more than that.
 
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Ari3l

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^It also depends if you're using AMD or Intel. Intel loves to giving their processors more performance per core (Hence why Intel kills it in gaming and productivity) while AMD just loves more cores (or modules in the FX case). :D
 
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Vinyl_Is_King

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I believe you answered it. :lol:

And I bought a Dual Core ("Core 2 Duo") processor on recommendation from someone on another website, but ever since I got it the question pertaining to this forum thread has been lingering in my mind as I can't help but to think that Quad Core's would be the way to go, despite the user whom told me they felt that older Dual Core processors have better single-thread scores than today's modern Quad Core processors.

Today, I looked up the score for the processor I bought ("Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 3.33Ghz") and compared it with another CPU that my motherboard supports which is a Quad Core.

Now, although, the Dual Core won the comparison as per, the single thread score, it lost the battle to the overall score - to which, I cannot help but to think means the Quad Core is better.
 
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Vinyl_Is_King

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I currently have an Intel processor, so I presume I'm better off.

My cousin, whose very good with computers, advised me to steer clear of AMD CPU's since I want to game and work in Photoshop.
 
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Robert Cook

Robert Cook

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well if you still have a core two duo, then AMD is still a good cheap upgrade. considering that the FX 4300 is right around 100 and probably loads cheaper on ebay, or even the FX 6300, and AMD still has good offerings, it is just a shame that those offerings are far newer than a core two duo and that is about the only reason why they win. Also there are the Phenom chips, such as the Phenom II X4 which were probably one of AMD's best CPUs.
 
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Vinyl_Is_King

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I see. I see.

Well I'm not really going to be upgrading my current computer other than its ram, after that I'm going to be investing in a $500 build I found on PCPARTPICKER.
 
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Vinyl_Is_King

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So (of my own) conjecture, having a Quad Core in a computer, especially one for gaming, is 100% necessary?

I've recently been playing some Battlefield: Bad Company 2 since my PC can handle it (more/less :lol:) and although my current CPU doesn't meet the minimum req for the game, I overclocked it and the game works quite well, despite lagging a little when too much is going on.
 
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SinxarKnights

SinxarKnights

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You will get situations like that. For gaming specifically, the CPU is a bit less important than the GPU in most cases. Some games especially Minecraft, is heavily dependent on the CPU over the GPU. Some RTS and games with a lot of units taking actions (imagine medieval warfare) are also CPU bound.

If you overclocked your CPU and performance in the game increased, that is a clear indication that your CPU is too slow for the GPU. AKA bottlenecking.

So technically a quad isn't strictly required in most titles. This is 2016 though, not 2006. Buying a dual core system would be silly unless you fall into the majority of PC users who only use a computer to check email and facebook/flash games.
 
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Vinyl_Is_King

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Alright, I got you - I understand. And yeah my CPU, I've been told on a few forums, that it's stoneage but it is what I have to work with at the moment until I get the one I bought up and working.

And I have noticed playing RuneScape (which I very infrequently play) is damn-near impossible even on the lowest settings and absolutely no view-distance; I'd sum it up to my CPU being horrible, seeing as I can play GTA IV on my machine (currently at the lowest settings) and the min FPS I get is about 15-23 (in that region), where-as RuneScape is a constant 10-15 FPS.

My current CPU:
Screen_Shot_05_18_16_at_09_29_AM.png
 
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