killer14321 :
I dont want to know that they dont beat the i5s i know this intel performence is better but amd is more bang for the buck. what i want to know are they ok for gaming. not for anything else can they run bf3 at 1080 ultra setttings with decent fps?? or should i wait tell piledriver comes out?
on BF3 i did some testing. I have my 8120 running at 4.7 ghz without any issues. BF3 loves the 8120 without a doubt. 6970 crossfire im at 120+ fps, with few drops to high 80s in heavy multiplayer action. I cut the thing in half for fun in the bios (41xx) fps dropped to high 80s with dips to 50s. fx61xx (3 modules) was back to 120, but dropped to the 60s quite often. This is all at 1900x1200 ultra maxed settings.
while the 41xx would be fine for a single card, I would not recommend it, I place it equivalent to the I3s in terms of actual cpu, its a dual module with cmt, use those cmt cores and performance drops.
Toms heirchy chart is flawed because they tested dual-core only games. Throw something multi-core friendly into the mix and you get this instead.
*note that these aren't stock settings but all 3.0 ghz instead, but the picture is clear enough, the 41xx is the second worst cpu there.
the problem with benchmarks is 90% just show fps, while amd does suffer slightly, its not necessarily due to just the cpu's raw power. I don't have game that puts my cpu at 100% usage, only one or 2 that do 100% on a single core, in fact diablo III was at ~40% cpu usage. so why does AMD benchmark slower?
SB has the pci-e controller on-die, therefore latency is shorter, and performance is up. check the performance between I7 920 and the I5 750. the 920 is a stronger core, but in games the 750 wins due to the pci-e controller being on the cpu.
AMD hasn't made that move yet, and won't until steamroller. most people don't care why, they just want to see numbers.