System Builder Marathon, Q2 2013: $650 Gaming PC

Results: Productivity

Productivity

The 29% loss in productivity is exactly why I chose the Core i5 last quarter. If you want to compete in the overall performance category, you need more than two cores. Unfortunately for our $650 PC, the situation only gets worse once we take overclocking into consideration. 

We can't help but think that, in a marketplace where AMD was more competitive, Intel wouldn't dare wreck overclocking in the value-oriented space the way it currently does.