Core i7 860 for gaming?

[Genralkidd]

Is the Core i7 860 good for gaming? I'm currently using one with a GTX 660. While playing games like Crysis maxed out, I tend to noticed the occasional stuttering of the screen or a bit of choppiness as well as somewhat long initial loading times. Is this because of the CPU or something else?

 

[simon12]

If its plain Crysis then its unlikely to be a CPU bottleneck, if you mean Crysis 3 maybe. See if your CPU or GPU are running at or close to 100% load.

 

[goonbar79]

Is the Core i7 860 good for gaming? I'm currently using one with a GTX 660. While playing games like Crysis maxed out, I tend to noticed the occasional stuttering of the screen or a bit of choppiness as well as somewhat long initial loading times. Is this because of the CPU or something else?

Assuming that this is Crysis3.. cpu performance won't cause stuttering just because it lacks speed. You will get lower average frame rate if it is unable to keep up with the gpu. Stuttering could be cpu, but other things as well, such as settings or configuration. Load times is mostly related to slow cpu & slow data access/transfer (which is why ssd cuts down load times hugely). 17-860 @ 2.8ghz is about 30% slower than i7-3770K @ 3.4ghz, so if you overclock 860 to about 3.5ghz, and loosen some graphics settings, you it should run perfectly fine.

You may also yield better OC if you disable HT in BIOS, if gaming is your primary goal, and you can enable it again in the future to take advantage of the extra threads.

 

[Genralkidd]

Is the Core i7 860 good for gaming? I'm currently using one with a GTX 660. While playing games like Crysis maxed out, I tend to noticed the occasional stuttering of the screen or a bit of choppiness as well as somewhat long initial loading times. Is this because of the CPU or something else?

Assuming that this is Crysis3.. cpu performance won't cause stuttering just because it lacks speed. You will get lower average frame rate if it is unable to keep up with the gpu. Stuttering could be cpu, but other things as well, such as settings or configuration. Load times is mostly related to slow cpu & slow data access/transfer (which is why ssd cuts down load times hugely). 17-860 @ 2.8ghz is about 30% slower than i7-3770K @ 3.4ghz, so if you overclock 860 to about 3.5ghz, and loosen some graphics settings, you it should run perfectly fine.

You may also yield better OC if you disable HT in BIOS, if gaming is your primary goal, and you can enable it again in the future to take advantage of the extra threads.

Does hyper-threading really hurt game performance that much?

 

[goonbar79]

Does hyper-threading really hurt game performance that much?

HT doesn't "hurt" gaming performance. It is just that gaming is not that multithreaded yet. Hyperthreading basically creates virtual cores, creating extra threads (4 vs 8) that the OS can utilize for extra chores. Usually increases upto 40% more performance, IF all 8 threads are actively used. The problem is that games are still more optimized for 4 cores/4 threads only. When overclocking, enabling HT in the BIOS generates more heat and puts more load on the cpu (more voltage too), so disabling it could result in better max overclock. Basically, if you OC to 3.4ghz with HT, you may be able to push it further without HT, say 3.5ghz, with the same thermal output.

 

[Genralkidd]

Does hyper-threading really hurt game performance that much?

HT doesn't "hurt" gaming performance. It is just that gaming is not that multithreaded yet. Hyperthreading basically creates virtual cores, creating extra threads (4 vs 8) that the OS can utilize for extra chores. Usually increases upto 40% more performance, IF all 8 threads are actively used. The problem is that games are still more optimized for 4 cores/4 threads only. When overclocking, enabling HT in the BIOS generates more heat and puts more load on the cpu (more voltage too), so disabling it could result in better max overclock. Basically, if you OC to 3.4ghz with HT, you may be able to push it further without HT, say 3.5ghz, with the same thermal output.

With the motherboard I have, I'm not sure if I can even achieve overclock increases of more than 0.1 GHz...