Intel i5 vs i7 for my needs?

[enzyme]

Basically i want to know what will offer me best value for money against the i5's dual core range or the i7's quad core.

I use programmes daily such as Photoshop, after effects whilst using chrome quite a lot at the same time ...and i also want a good CPU for gaming to fuel a graphics card which could possibly be the GT 650m or one of the GTX's from GeForce.

I just want to know whether I should spend the extra money on a quad core processor or whether an i5 will do the job comfortably.

Thanks a lot.

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

Ok first of all you are looking for this for a laptop and not a desktop, right?

In looking for a laptop you are going to want to get an Intel® Core™ i7 because you are going to find that Photoshop is one of those applications that take advantage of as many cores/threads as you can throw at it. Now since your main use of this computer will take advantage of both the extra cores and the hyper-threading you should follow that path. Heck even most main stream games can use up to 4 cores/threads.

 

[enzyme]

Yea sorry i forgot to mention it was for a laptop. I just want my general computer use like internet browsing, photoshopping whilst playing music etc to be smooth and quick, with a supportive 4GB or 8GB behind the CPU. the CPU's i been looking at most are i5-3210m at 2.5ghz or the i7-3610qm at 2.3ghz. Obviously the only barrier for me here is the price as im guessing the i7 would be the logical option...but will the i5 do everything i wish for in a CPU just as well?

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

Yes it will do everything as a dual core with hyper-threading but you will get the best performance out of the quad core with hyper-threading.