April is relatively quiet on the processing front. However, we know AMD recently started shipping its new Fusion-based Llano CPUs to customers, so we may be on the cusp of significant changes to the market. Learn more in this month's review!
If you don’t have the time to research the benchmarks, or if you don’t feel confident enough in your ability to pick the right processor for your next gaming machine, fear not. We at Tom’s Hardware have come to your aid with a simple list of the best gaming CPUs offered for the money.
What's New?
Pricing remains surprisingly stable since our last update. That's fair enough; there really isn't any reason we'd expect movement, since Intel's Sandy Bridge architecture is still pretty new, and AMD has little to compete with it above the $130 mark. Frankly, Intel will probably stay pretty quiet without compelling competition, and we may not see any significant new products from the company until its LGA 2011 interface arrives in Q4 2011.
Llano Now Shipping (Not For Sale)
AMD has some interesting products in the pipeline, however. On April 6th it announced that new quad-core Llano CPUs are being shipped out to OEM system providers. This means we should see Llano available for purchase sometime this quarter, by the end of June.
For those of you unfamiliar with what Llano will bring to the table, it's AMD's Fusion-based product aimed at the notebook and desktop markets, combining both CPU and graphics hardware on the same 32 nm die. While the Brazos platform brought Fusion to low-power nettops and netbooks, Llano is far more powerful. It sports Phenom II-class dual- and quad-core processors (sans L3 cache), combined with capable graphics hardware. Initial speculation suggests that the most powerful of these integrated GPUs may be comparable to a Radeon HD 6570.
The impact that Llano will have on the market is difficult to predict. Sandy Bridge should have little trouble outpacing AMD's aging Stars architecture when it comes to CPU processing power. But AMD's integrated GPU promises to be worlds ahead of HD Graphics 3000 (and even more so versus HD Graphics 2000). Enthusiasts will continue favoring Intel's processors paired up to discrete graphics cards. But Llano may offer something we've never seen before: a budget-oriented solution capable of handling a taxing graphics load.
Only time will tell how this will affect the market, and we'll be sure to keep our readers appraised of developments as they happen.
Some Notes About Our Recommendations
This list is for gamers who want to get the most for their money. If you don’t play games, then the CPUs on this list may not be suitable for your particular needs.
The criteria to get on this list are strictly price/performance. We acknowledge that there are other factors that come into play, such as platform price or CPU overclockability, but we're not going to complicate things by factoring in motherboard costs. We may add honorable mentions for outstanding products in the future, though. For now, our recommendations are based on stock clock speeds and performance at that price.
Cost and availability change on a daily basis. We can’t offer up-to-the-minute accurate pricing information in the text, but we can list some good chips that you probably won’t regret buying at the price ranges we suggest (and our PriceGrabber-based engine will help track down some of the best prices for you).
The list is based on some of the best US prices from online retailers. In other countries or at retail stores, your mileage will most certainly vary. Of course, these are retail CPU prices. We do not list used or OEM CPUs available at retail.
That may very well be the case. Remember these recommendations are based purely on gaming performance, and in many cases the additional threads found in the Lynnfield i7's go unused. This compounded with the increased performance per clock of Sandy Bridge, as well as the increased performance per core, and it isn't difficult to see how the Sandy Bridge based i3's perform so well in an area that tends to be poorly threaded.
Aren't these called simply Athlon II ?
"combined with capable graphics hardware"
Compared to Intel's current offerings everything AMD puts out is capable. However based on your GPU reviews, I have a distinct feeling that you guys would draw the line where "capable" begins somewhere above the rather mediocre combination of 400 SP clocked at under 700 MHz, coupled to DDR3 memory through a shared memory interface which allows 2x 64-bit (= 128 bit) path at best, assuming CPU isn't doing any memory accesses at the same time.
APUs sound like a great concept and I'm sure lower TDP versions of Llano will do wonders in the portable world while higher TDP versions will clinch the desktop market with large manufacturers such as HP etc., but this review is about gaming CPUs and AMD has a different breed of CPU scheduled to come out for the gaming segment which wasn't even mentioned today.
Eventually, when APUs become more potent (lower clocked version of Athlon II x4 + HD6570 + slow and low bandwidth memory doesn't sound very potent, does it ?) they will surely become gamers' choice in bottom segment, provided that the pricing makes sense, but I don't think it's going to be the first incarnation of Llano. Perhaps if AMD waived one or two CPU cores and instead go for 50-100% more GPU execution units to create a more balanced gaming APU which would compete with its current Athlon II x2 which you recommended, paired with 5670/5750-type graphics ?
Can you guys (readers and tomshardware.com staff) post your opinions on what a tue gaming APU should look like (within reason, of course, keep in mind technological constraints) ?
Though, with Llano's shipping, the stage is set.
I was thinking the same thing.. If they spaced them out correctly though the first Phenom would be half was down the list and not be in the same bracket as i7..
I'd take the 2400K over the 950, personally.
If you are strictly buying a CPU for games then any of these recommendations will work but if you plan to run any SLI or Crossfire configurations then you may want to look at the top tier or $200+ including Core i7/X58 combo or NF200/P67 Sandy Bridge.
Also X58 boards are showing up on craigslist cheap and i7 9XX chips are dropping in price as well since people are now upgrading to Sandy Bridge.
I think I will wait for Z67.
Also amazingly, I cannot find the same processor on the Gaming CPU Hierarchy Chart (last page).
either way a athlon x4 is real powerful in my pc (with a Amd 6850 OC) i can do video compressing well and i can play crysis 2 max out and i can play GTA4 fine...
I'm easily going amd, as there usually best for the money.
my prediction about bulldozer is it will be 5-10% slower per/clock and per/core but they will sell more cores then intel and OC them higher(over the SB Competition)and bulldozer will be available to be clock as high or higher then sandy bridge
I'd take the 950 over the 2400 for three reasons: the 2400 doesn't overclock, which the 950 can, the PCIe capabilities on the 950's platform are far better, and the 950 has 8MB of cache, where the 2400 only has 6MB. (The cache makes a big difference on many games, but has the biggest impact on WoW.)
Note: there is no 2400k. the closest is the 2500k, and that is considerably more expensive.
You just can't go wrong with a 2500K.