Is Intel's Core i3-530 Fast Enough For Performance Gaming?

Benchmark Results: S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

Our latest S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat benchmark gives AMD a little love, and we also find a title where the Core i7-870 beats the lowly Core i3-530.

By now it should be obvious to everyone that the Radeon HD 5850 is both a great performer and the biggest bottleneck in game performance at resolutions mid-range games want to play their games at. Despite the fact that Steam's hardware survey reports lower resolutions to be even more popular, they're certainly not where we'd want to be gaming after spending hundreds of dollars on hardware.

Thomas Soderstrom
Thomas Soderstrom is a Senior Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware US. He tests and reviews cases, cooling, memory and motherboards.