Phenom ii vs i3

[stackz]

hey guys, i wanna upgrade my old athlon 7750 but i dunno which processor is better for gaming, i saw some reviews and the i3 is better in most things... but i think the addicional phycal core will be better when games can take advantage of more cores.

 

[randomizer]

Unless you can get i3 pretty cheap there's basically no reason to buy it. Both will serve you well regardless, but I'd definitely be leaning towards the Phenom II.

 

[jimmysmitty]

Unless you can get i3 pretty cheap there's basically no reason to buy it. Both will serve you well regardless, but I'd definitely be leaning towards the Phenom II.

IDK. I priced an i3 system out for the hell of it and with a Asus mobo, i3 530, 4GB of G.Skill DDR3, 2 320GB HDDs and a HD4850 it came to $480. Not too bad.

But for the OP, check your mobo. If you can get a Phenom II then go for it because that would be the cheapest route to go since it would only be a CPU upgrade and not a mobo, CPU and RAM upgrade.

 

[loneninja]

Get a Phenom II if your motherboard supports it.

 

[mfarrukh]

If you are tight on budget and cannot afford a new motherboard, go for a Phenom II.
Otherwise i3 is an excellent choice for gamers and overclocking.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3724

Read it and decide.



GooD LucK

 

[mfarrukh]

Agreed with the others. If your mobo supports a P2 i say go with it but it takes 10 seconds to overclock an I3 to 4Ghz and beyond on simple air coolers.

Do you have a i3?

 

[AMW1011]

Do you have a i3?

Core I3 540 @ 4.8Ghz | Prolimatech Mega Shadow | EVGA P55 FTW | G.SKILL Trident 4GB DDR3 2000 | WD 500GB Black | 2 X PNY 9600GT's | OCZ Fatal1ty 550W | CM Stacker 830 | Gateway FHD2401

His sig...

As for the i3, Don't both OP, get an Athlon II X4 620 or Phenom II X4 925 for the same price or less and get much more performance. No reason to worry about dualcores at this point.

 

[mrcmark]

PhenomII X3 720 vs Core I3 530

http://en.inpai.com.cn/doc/enshowcont.asp?id=7488

 

[warmon6]

Do you have a i3?

 

[stackz]

PhenomII X3 720 vs Core I3 530

http://en.inpai.com.cn/doc/enshowcont.asp?id=7488

that web says that phenom ii owns i3 but anandtech not xD

 

[AMW1011]

that web says that phenom ii owns i3 but anandtech not xD

You need to read more than one article, there are too many variables not to.

All articles show the Athlon II X4 620 keeping up with or defeating the i3s at lower clock speeds.

 

[AMW1011]

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=118&p2=122

IMO If i had to decide between an I3 530 and a 630 i'd easily pick the 530 because of it's better overclockability. The X4 beats it down at stock clocks but there's no way in hell it'll go over 4Ghz and the Clarkdale has proven itself to easily hit 4.6Ghz+ with excellent air.[/url]

Don't be misleading Psycho, clock speed will stop mattering before 4 GHz let alone above 4 GHz. Clock speed is nice and all, but it wont make up for cores in real multi-threaded applications which we will see far more of soon, and games as well thanks to DX11.

 

[randomizer]

You're also assuming the OP knows how to get a chip to 4.6GHz on air.

 

[jennyh]

Maybe you should apply for a job here on THG then Psycho. Check my signature for details.

 

[AMW1011]

It takes 3-4 bios changes and a reboot. It's not hard at all

That is nice, but it will net him less performance so why does it matter?

 

[AMW1011]

Again How? A 4+Ghz 530 is going to be faster then a 4Ghz 620.

How...?

No, it wont. In games anything over 3.6-3.8 GHz is useless, an Athlon II X4 620 can do that. Almost all CPU bound apps are multi-threaded and will utilize all 4 cores if needed, the Athlon II X4 620 will be far faster here. It wont matter whether you have the i3 at 5 GHz, because games wont use it and multi-threaded apps will get more performance from the twice as many cores, 3.8 GHZ X 4 = 15.2 GHz 5GHz X 2 = 10 GHz, now that scaling wont be perfect but it wont make up for half again as much potential, especially when you take into account that a 4.5 GHz overclock is much more reasonable on the i3.

I'm glad your happy with your CPU, just don't make it out to be something it isn't.

 

[werxen]

I would personally get the i3 because it uses a HELL of a lot less power and overclocks MUCH further than the phenom 2. I also game a lot more and dual cores still destroy quads in most games. Combine the architecture of Nehelam and 32nm... win.

 

[werxen]

Maybe you should apply for a job here on THG then Psycho. Check my signature for details.

LOL. Jenny cmon... You cannot use some guys unsuccessful overclock to project a negative image of the new 32nm chips. We have all seen a common pattern: smaller chips = less voltage. The fact that this guy was using 1.4+ volts on a 32nm chip when 45nm duals were limited to 1.36 just shows stupidity on behalf of the overclocker. Yes.... Toms can make mistakes believe it or not - just like AMD (phenom 1 anyone...? wait for it...............)

 

[AMW1011]

I would personally get the i3 because it uses a HELL of a lot less power and overclocks MUCH further than the phenom 2. I also game a lot more and dual cores still destroy quads in most games. Combine the architecture of Nehelam and 32nm... win.

Any decent Dual, Quad, or Hexacore will play a dual thread optimized game the same at 3.8 GHz+. How can a dualcore destroy a quad when the quad produces the same performance with 2 cores at idle? You are wrong, plain wrong.

Power consumption isn't very important on a desktop and if the OP was worried about power consumption he would have mentioned it.

 

[AMW1011]

LOL. Jenny cmon... You cannot use some guys unsuccessful overclock to project a negative image of the new 32nm chips. We have all seen a common pattern: smaller chips = less voltage. The fact that this guy was using 1.4+ volts on a 32nm chip when 45nm duals were limited to 1.36 just shows stupidity on behalf of the overclocker. Yes.... Toms can make mistakes believe it or not - just like AMD (phenom 1 anyone...? wait for it...............)

The chip he got was likely faulty, 1.4v is rated as safe and is the maximum spec. voltage of the chip:

http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SLBLR

It should have been fine. But you are right, you can't point to a faulty chip to generalize them all.

 

[werxen]

Any decent Dual, Quad, or Hexacore will play a dual thread optimized game the same at 3.8 GHz+. How can a dualcore destroy a quad when the quad produces the same performance with 2 cores at idle? You are wrong, plain wrong.

Power consumption isn't very important on a desktop and if the OP was worried about power consumption he would have mentioned it.

If quad cores can play it just as well as dual cores why does my E8500 get better FPS than a p2 does? Find me a benchmark where it has a p2 @ 3.8 and an E8500 @ 3.8 on a dual core or single core designed game and show me where the p2 can keep up.

Dual > Quad in gaming. I'm not even going to get into the architecture of p2 vs. Nehalem. Give me an overclocked i3 over an overclocked p2 for gaming any day of the week.

edit: and the overclocker used 1.47 vcore - almost 1.5 when the maximum should be 1.4. Faulty chip or not - he should have known better -> smaller chip = less vcore STILL applies.

 

[Stardude82]

This whole conversation is pretty moot until we find out about your video card/mobo situation/money situtation/proximity to a Fry's or Microcenter.

Personally, I wouldn't upgrade a 7750 for anything less than a i5 750 or a PII 955 if I had to change the mobo.

Luckily following the suggestions here, three tiers up from your current CPU yields some very tasty inexpensive options.

Your video card is the #1 thing which determines your gaming performance after all.

 

[AMW1011]

If quad cores can play it just as well as dual cores why does my E8500 get better FPS than a p2 does? Find me a benchmark where it has a p2 @ 3.8 and an E8500 @ 3.8 on a dual core or single core designed game and show me where the p2 can keep up.

Dual > Quad in gaming. I'm not even going to get into the architecture of p2 vs. Nehalem. Give me an overclocked i3 over an overclocked p2 for gaming any day of the week.

edit: and the overclocker used 1.47 vcore - almost 1.5 when the maximum should be 1.4. Faulty chip or not - he should have known better -> smaller chip = less vcore STILL applies.

You have to know this makes no sense. Dualcores are not magical. The E8500 is likely slightly faster clock for clock than a Phenom II using only two cores. However at 3.8 GHz the difference wont be noticeable because you will have eliminated the CPU bottleneck. However, in the growing number of multi-threaded games the Phenom II will be noticeably faster because of the extra cores. A dualcore is half of a quadcore, nothing else. Your argument is false, I'm not sure why you are under impression that half of a Phenom II would be faster.

 

[mfarrukh]

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=118&p2=122

You can say that....

http://i725.photobucket.com/albums/ww252/2MCHBoost/46ghz-1.jpg

How's your experience?

 

[werxen]

You have to know this makes no sense. Dualcores are not magical. The E8500 is likely slightly faster clock for clock than a Phenom II using only two cores. However at 3.8 GHz the difference wont be noticeable because you will have eliminated the CPU bottleneck. However, in the growing number of multi-threaded games the Phenom II will be noticeably faster because of the extra cores. A dualcore is half of a quadcore, nothing else. Your argument is false, I'm not sure why you are under impression that half of a Phenom II would be faster.

You need to seriously go lookup benchmarks if you think that is the case. Dual cores are not friggin quad cores that have been cut in half. Your argument is failed based on one simple premise: benchmarks. Look em up, fool.