i3 vs i5 question.

hotaru251 · Dec 9, 2016

A friend is building himself a desktop for light gaming at 1080p.

(he plays stuff like WoW legion, overwatch, LoL, Diablo 3 and things like it and not games like gta v or doom which are really demanding)

He is wondering if a 3.4 ghz i3 (dual core) is better for his needs than a 2.6 ghz i5 (quad core).

He has only gotten his gpu (1050 ti), case, and psu but cant buy rest without knowing which is better.

any help to this question would be helpful please and thank you.

VincentP · Dec 9, 2016

Don't just look at the base frequency. The Core i5 will run at a higher frequency when less than 4 cores are in use.
In general, the Core i5 is much better.
If you can list the CPU models we can be more specific.

RCFProd · Dec 9, 2016

Fully depends on how well the game supports hyper threading (Modern i3's have hyper threading), and if the game actually needs more than 2 cores. If the game doesn't need more than 2 cores, then the higher clocked i3 will most likely run better. If the game supports hyper threading properly, the i3 will most likely still run better.

Geekwad · Dec 9, 2016

An i5 will usually have more cache and turbo boost, whereas i3's typically do not.

Either sounds acceptable for the games listed, but would still lean i5 (just for longevity).

VincentP · Dec 11, 2016

It occurred to me that 2.6 GHz was very low for the Core i5.
Having a look at available models, I could only find the Core i5 4200U or 4250U that run at these speeds.
These are low power models and much worse than a standard Core i3.
Intel has released 7 generations of "Core" processors, and in each of these there are models ranging from low power to performance models.
Core i5 or Core i3 simply isn't enough information.

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i3 vs i5 question.

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