Thoughts on my next gaming rig?

[dave1029]

 

 

Power is not power. Optimization is everything. Look at X Rebirth. Secondly Intel "is more powerful" is not necessarily true. They are better at single threaded applications and games. AMD ties or beats Intel in multithreading- which is what next gen games are going to utilize.

 

 

I'm not so sure about that. Granted, I have a weak CPU (Phenom II 955 x4 at 3.2Ghz), but even multithreaded it doesn't compete with Intel equivalents at the price range. For reference, I suggest looking at Dragon Age: Origins. It uses three cores and receives a 40% performance increase with three cores compared against two. In other words, it's the most dependent on CPU power and multithreading of any game I've seen. An i3 at 2.5Ghz can outperform my Phenom II even in a game as reliant on multithreading as DAO, according to the benchmarks.

 

Furthermore, a great many AMD octa-core processors are really just quad-cores with the AMD equivalent of hyperthreading. I'm doubtful that they're going to hold up very well next-gen. (The XBone is already running some games at 720p again, simply abysmal). The PS4 and Xbone are clearly budget platforms this time around, it's more likely Microsoft and Sony went AMD solely to cut costs.

 

I'm actually much more impressed with AMD's new video cards compared to their CPUs.

 

You're mostly right, but when we say multithreading, it's more than just using all the cores. The new consoles are using weaker versions of my processor. So, hopefully, this specific architecture will work very well with the newer games as those games must be designed for that architecture. Intel's architecture has been favored in the past because it wasn't hard to code for. A lot of games were single threaded... including DAO. Go look at the benchmarks for crysis 3- the only game I know of today that is truly multithreaded.

[hector530]

 

 

Power is not power. Optimization is everything. Look at X Rebirth. Secondly Intel "is more powerful" is not necessarily true. They are better at single threaded applications and games. AMD ties or beats Intel in multithreading- which is what next gen games are going to utilize.

 

 

I'm not so sure about that. Granted, I have a weak CPU (Phenom II 955 x4 at 3.2Ghz), but even multithreaded it doesn't compete with Intel equivalents at the price range. For reference, I suggest looking at Dragon Age: Origins. It uses three cores and receives a 40% performance increase with three cores compared against two. In other words, it's the most dependent on CPU power and multithreading of any game I've seen. An i3 at 2.5Ghz can outperform my Phenom II even in a game as reliant on multithreading as DAO, according to the benchmarks.

 

Furthermore, a great many AMD octa-core processors are really just quad-cores with the AMD equivalent of hyperthreading. I'm doubtful that they're going to hold up very well next-gen. (The XBone is already running some games at 720p again, simply abysmal). The PS4 and Xbone are clearly budget platforms this time around, it's more likely Microsoft and Sony went AMD solely to cut costs.

 

I'm actually much more impressed with AMD's new video cards compared to their CPUs.

 

 

the Xbox One was going to have Nvidia hardware but they were turned down because Nvidia didnt like the price they offered.

 

 

and about the X1 was running in 720p. the common story this gen is gonna be X1 running at lower resolution but higher/smooth frame rate and PS4 running at higher resolutions with slower/choppier frame rate.

[Werne]

An i3 at 2.5Ghz can outperform my Phenom II even in a game as reliant on multithreading as DAO, according to the benchmarks.

DA:O uses only a few threads and a fairly modern engine, it would be a miracle to perform well on a stock Phenom. It would run smooth as butter on an overclocked BE though, a lot of guys buy AMD CPUs with an intention to overclock them which is why AMD is still in the CPU business.

 

Furthermore, a great many AMD octa-core processors are really just quad-cores with the AMD equivalent of hyperthreading.

Incorrect. Hyper-threading is using two threads on a single physical core to distribute the load, it's a single core that juggles two processes on two simultaneous threads. Performance gain in 8-threaded applications as opposed to 4-threaded is 25-35%.

 

AMD's Bulldozer/Piledriver architecture is using 8 physical cores with certain shared resources to reduce power consumption and heat emission, in order to stay competitive in terms of performance on an older manufacturing process. Performance gain in 8-threaded applications as opposed to 4-threaded is 60-75%.

 

While the FX 8350 has about 50-60% lower per-core performance which gives it a disadvantage over Intel in older games, it boasts excellent multi-threading results and is capable of rivaling the Ivy Bridge i7-3770 and Haswell i7-4770 when it comes to multi-threaded performance, being only 10-18% behind and 100$ cheaper.

 

Once the games utilize all eight Piledriver cores, the difference between the FX 8350 and i7 3770/4770 will be marginal, which is easily evened through overclocking. Proof? Here, Crysis 3, the only game able to utilize all 8 threads:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIVGwj1_Qno

Crapped out a bit with Crossfire, but they are basically performing the same with a single card. How about that. :smile:

 

I'm doubtful that they're going to hold up very well next-gen. (The XBone is already running some games at 720p again, simply abysmal). The PS4 and Xbone are clearly budget platforms this time around, it's more likely Microsoft and Sony went AMD solely to cut costs.

The Kaveri SoC (System on Chip) used in Xbone and PS4 is an equivalent of a mobile APU. Comparing a mobile Steamroller to a desktop CPU like Piledriver FX 8350 is like comparing a mobile Haswell i7 to a desktop Ivy Bridge i7, the desktop CPU will outperform the mobile one regardless of the newer technology.

 

Furthermore, the actual drop in resolution (like on Xbone) puts a larger strain on the CPU itself, meaning the CPU can withstand more than what it's been used for so far. The thing that's crapping out on PS4 is the unoptimized, rushed game coupled with graphics that have a rather low memory bandwidth compared to dedicated desktop graphics. While PS4 can run at ~60% higher number of pixels than Xbone at the same framerate due to the larger memory bandwidth of GDDR5, COD Ghosts is running at 1080p (a 125% larger number of pixels) while being optimized for 780p, something was bound to crap out.

Edited November 22, 2013 by Werne

[Thor.]

 

 

That's normal working temperatures of the 7970's. That's what sets amd apart, at least when it came to the 7900 series, they ran really cool.

Really? I always heard they ran hot.

 

 

They do run hot, at least compared to Nvidia cards. I'm not totally sure what Thor was getting at. AMD cards are meant to operate under a bit higher temperatures though.

 

I was refering to affter market coolers, amd is really good under those conditions. Especially the 7900's. gigabyte is especially good with amd they never go above 60c, unless you crossfire them then they max out at 70c.

Edited November 23, 2013 by Thor.