Dual Opterons vs 4930K for gaming and work

[salgado18]

I'm wondering what would be best for a new PC. I do some professional work on it, and could really use the extra cores. But I also like to game, nothing too heavy (I don't need dual-Titans), but I like to keep around 60 fps in everything.

So, can two Opteron 4386 (3.1/3.4/3.8GHz, 8 cores each) handle current games at 60fps? Could a i7 4930K be faster than the Opterons in threaded things like rendering? Also, considering that the Intel can overclock and the AMDs can't, which one is worth it?

Just looked at Newegg, an Intel system would cost around $1000, and AMD around $1200. All questions assume a graphics card able to handle the games, so the question really is if there would be a bottleneck.

I also ask this question to Tom's specialists, as this is the kind of comparison I don't recall ever being tested.

 

[james77]

I'm not sure with the answer. But maybe the two Opterons are faster when it comes to applications that utilizes multiple cores because it would be like 16 cores vs 6 cores with HT. I don't have an experience with Opterons. However, I had an experience with a Xeon for gaming which is the direct competitor of Opteron. Regarding the Xeon for gaming, it's not super fast and it's not slow either. It only performs as good as its paper specs and nothing special. But what you will be paying for the Opteron is the reliability, stability, and endurance as server processors are made to run 24/7 for several years.

 

[salgado18]

Just remembered one thing, the cost for the Intel parts did not include cooling, and an entry level motherboard (for socket 2011, but still). Add in a more capable mb and good cooling, and the two prices match.

Yes, I suppose the Opterons would be faster in threaded applications, but since they are based on the Piledriver cores, I wonder if the advantage would make it worth the loss in gaming potential compared to the Ivy Bridge-E, which should perform around 40% better on per-core basis. And that excluding the possibility to overclock it.

I also wonder if they would be game-capable, just enough to enjoy games, not so much as to break fps records. I currently have an FX 8120 @ 4.0 GHz, and it is rather good despite the Bulldozer architecture, so I think an Opteron can at least be equal to it with slightly less frequency.

 

[james77]

Just remembered one thing, the cost for the Intel parts did not include cooling, and an entry level motherboard (for socket 2011, but still). Add in a more capable mb and good cooling, and the two prices match.

Yes, I suppose the Opterons would be faster in threaded applications, but since they are based on the Piledriver cores, I wonder if the advantage would make it worth the loss in gaming potential compared to the Ivy Bridge-E, which should perform around 40% better on per-core basis. And that excluding the possibility to overclock it.

I also wonder if they would be game-capable, just enough to enjoy games, not so much as to break fps records. I currently have an FX 8120 @ 4.0 GHz, and it is rather good despite the Bulldozer architecture, so I think an Opteron can at least be equal to it with slightly less frequency.

I believe that the i7-4930K will be faster for gaming. Because based from my experience with Xeon, it only performs as good as its core 2 duo counter part because the game only uses 2 cores. I'm not sure if games support 2 CPUs for a faster processing, but I don't think they do. Getting an i7-4930K is the safer bet.