Best Gaming CPUs For The Money: January 2012 (Archive)

[Onus]

I thought I might comment on how onerous a dual-core can be, especially with multiple programs running (including anti-virus, Steam/Origin/Whatever DRM, etc.) Then along comes Larkspur with a direct hit:

I think at the entry-level price point, the Pentium recommendation is still a good one. Why? Because the upgrade path is second to none. Build a PC with an Athlon x4 and well, that's all its ever going to be - there's no meaningful upgrade. Build with a 6300, well that's pretty much it, the upgrades are negligible. Build with a haswell pentium and you can upgrade all the way to a i7-4790k. So yeah, at the entry-level price point, a Pentium is still an excellent value due to the enormous potential of the underlying platform at such a low entry point.

Based on this, I can readily accept that the Pentium is the better budget choice, if the budget is a constraint, and the immediate requirements are not.
Maximize bang/buck, but just make sure you're getting enough bang.

 

[larkspur]

At a minimum, TH should be up on things enough to insert a large caveat behind the Pentium G recommendation.

I agree with your suggestion of Tom's throwing in a caveat on the Pentiums. They should also mention the superior upgrade path as well. With more information, the reader can make a more informed decision. And yeah, all you guys are right - it's time to update the benchmark suite.

 

[Bloud Mai]

Rofl this is final and definitive proof for the necessity for random drug testing for the Tom's hardware editorial staff.

Are you serious? I would never "ever" freaking buy a dual core Pentium for gaming, when I can purchase 8 overclocking cores for $20 more that's just a steaming pile of stupid.

Keep up the good work T.H.

 

[larkspur]

I would never "ever" freaking buy a dual core Pentium for gaming, when I can purchase 8 overclocking cores for $20 more that's just a steaming pile of stupid.

Could you please provide a link to this $90 8-core cpu you mention?

 

[highoverclock]

The success of people running games supposedly "unable" to be run on dual cores using DLL injector programs proves that it's not an issue with the chips but with the software...

Specifically, Ubisoft and EA _deliberately_ made it look as if it's not possible to run those games on dual cores. Some people accuse the companies of trying to make it look like consoles run those games "better" than dual core PCs do so they could cash in on console title sales. I wouldn't put it past those companies to do just that.

 

[pauldh]

I would never "ever" freaking buy a dual core Pentium for gaming, when I can purchase 8 overclocking cores for $20 more that's just a steaming pile of stupid.

Could you please provide a link to this $90 8-core cpu you mention?

... And where's the sub-$50 motherboard that will safely overclock that 8-core (or 4 module) chip? Lets not forget the total platform costs when comparing apples to apples budgets. By the time you beef up FX-8 cooling and the mobo, you're at the entry point to a Core-i5 gamer.

That said, I agree with the concerns and comments regarding the G3258. Yes, it deserves a few caveats. Combined with H81, it's the cheapest foundation for a mostly-capable gaming platform. It does extremely well in the majority of games, but is sure to disappoint in a growing number of titles. Out of the box, the G3258 is nothing special. But it's cheap entry price, overclocking headroom, and beefy upgrade path still make for a good recommendation in my book.

 

[ingtar33]

That said, I agree with the concerns and comments regarding the G3258. Yes, it deserves a few caveats. Combined with H81, it's the cheapest foundation for a mostly-capable gaming platform. It does extremely well in the majority of games, but is sure to disappoint in a growing number of titles. Out of the box, the G3258 is nothing special. But it's cheap entry price, overclocking headroom, and beefy upgrade path still make for a good recommendation in my book.

I think the caveats need to be highlighted more both in these builder articles and in the best gaming cpu articles. the forums here and elsewhere (more elsewhere, but it's getting common around here too) are getting flooded with n00bs who "upgraded" their phenomII x6 or x4 cpus with these stupid little Pentiums and complaining about how they no longer can play their favorite games or are only getting 20fps in crysis3.

when you tell them to overclock they ask what you mean. and most of them buy the motherboards you CANT overclock with these little Pentiums. frankly it's a little frustrating sometimes.

It makes me wish these were never suggested ever again. mostly because an enthusiast will see the problems inherent in the very concept of these pentiums, so most of them are not really the audience, and the people who might get one typically aren't the people who will overclock. Throw in the fact you can get x3 the cores for $30 more on a fx6300, it will overclock well, you don't need to buy expensive cpu coolers or super expensive motherboards to overclock them, and when overclocked they'll pace a stock i5 in multithreaded games pretty well (seriously what's the chance someone spending $600 on a pc will have a monitor that can game over 60fps anyway?)

simply put the actual market for these chips is pretty freaking small, yet with them suggested and advised to be purchased on every site they're hitting the wrong market, and it's turning into a sea of bad purchases.

 

[pauldh]

At a minimum, TH should be up on things enough to insert a large caveat behind the Pentium G recommendation.

I agree with your suggestion of Tom's throwing in a caveat on the Pentiums. They should also mention the superior upgrade path as well. With more information, the reader can make a more informed decision. And yeah, all you guys are right - it's time to update the benchmark suite.

Keep in mind... Don dabbles within a huge number of games, as many titles as time allows, so his recommendations here are not based on this trio of games. BUT, suggest some alternatives of concern. Likely he's tried them, even if they don't amount to a consistent, bench-worthy title.

 

[pauldh]

That said, I agree with the concerns and comments regarding the G3258. Yes, it deserves a few caveats. Combined with H81, it's the cheapest foundation for a mostly-capable gaming platform. It does extremely well in the majority of games, but is sure to disappoint in a growing number of titles. Out of the box, the G3258 is nothing special. But it's cheap entry price, overclocking headroom, and beefy upgrade path still make for a good recommendation in my book.

I think the caveats need to be highlighted more both in these builder articles and in the best gaming cpu articles. the forums here and elsewhere (more elsewhere, but it's getting common around here too) are getting flooded with n00bs who "upgraded" their phenomII x6 or x4 cpus with these stupid little Pentiums and complaining about how they no longer can play their favorite games or are only getting 20fps in crysis3.

when you tell them to overclock they ask what you mean. and most of them buy the motherboards you CANT overclock with these little Pentiums. frankly it's a little frustrating sometimes.

It makes me wish these were never suggested ever again. mostly because an enthusiast will see the problems inherent in the very concept of these pentiums, so most of them are not really the audience, and the people who might get one typically aren't the people who will overclock. Throw in the fact you can get x3 the cores for $30 more on a fx6300, it will overclock well, you don't need to buy expensive cpu coolers or super expensive motherboards to overclock them, and when overclocked they'll pace a stock i5 in multithreaded games pretty well (seriously what's the chance someone spending $600 on a pc will have a monitor that can game over 60fps anyway?)

simply put the actual market for these chips is pretty freaking small, yet with them suggested and advised to be purchased on every site they're hitting the wrong market, and it's turning into a sea of bad purchases.

I get what you are saying. Hype over the G3258 can be misinterpreted.

But isn't this addressed by tiers? Phenom II X4/X6 to G3258 is a poor upgrade, as you're simply trading in performance in threaded titles and tasks for bolstered performance in others (Arma 3, Star Craft 2). ... Actually, I'd like to compare G3258 with X4 965BE @ 4.0 GHz, as I suspect there is currently very little difference in Crysis 3. The G3258 survives medium details pretty well.

You'll have to agree overclocking FX-6300 is more expensive than G3258, right? I've long wanted to do a Best Gaming Platforms for the Money list, but also packed with data for our regulars. But it's a lofty, time consuming endeavor, and instead I try to dig into it as possibly during SBM's.

 

[ingtar33]

You'll have to agree overclocking FX-6300 is more expensive than G3258, right? I've long wanted to do a Best Gaming Platforms for the Money list, but also packed with data for our regulars. But it's a lofty, time consuming endeavor, and instead I try to dig into it as possibly during SBM's.

ABSOLUTELY more expensive. I don't think that's in doubt at all. Listen, i own a fx8 core, but i'm no amd fanboy. It was a confluence of events that lead me to another amd chip when i upgraded from my phII. I have every intention of buying an extreme edition based off the skylake archetecure when it comes out (I run vmware, so more cores is a must).

The spread in performance from intel to amd is getting pretty extreme. back when the fx8350 came out you could almost make an argument it was as good as a i5... that's no longer the case with haswell. So the market for an AMD is pretty niche as well. That said I do make AMD recomendations when...

1) someone is on a 60hz monitor (or multiple 60hz monitors). In pretty much any game you bench, even cpu limited titles, an AMD chip will get you to 60fps. I usually laugh when i see a $1200 core i5/i7 build get suggested to someone on a 60hz monitor, and all they want to do is game with it. seems like a waste of money unless they're gaming with certain titles, which leads me to the next question i ask
2) they don't plan to play ARMA3, DayZ, Rome Total War, MS Flight Sim, or WoW (or any other single cored mmo). For the most part i just listed the only titles an amd cpu might struggle to hit 60fps in even with an overclock
3) they plan to make use of virtualization, OR plan to do CPU powered 3d animation/rendering

there does exist a weird in between price point hovering around 600-700 for a system where an AMD recommendation might make more sense in a general way as well... but it depends what the person wants to do... as i'll never suggest an AMD to someone with no intention to overclock and who wants to game. at that point, even if it means building them a pc with two cores, i'll recommend an i3 build over an AMD (they generally fit in the same pricepoint)

Still, though i do talk down about AMD, my fx8320 (4.8ghz) has yet to find a title "I" play that i can't get 60fps on (which includes shogun II: total war). So my update to that intel will wait till i upgrade my monitors (the largest unspoken bottleneck in a gaming build is the monitor), so i can make use of all that power.

-sidenote: in my work i work on all types of intels, modern to old. and there are two points i'd like to make
1) outside of a gaming environment if you don't have an ssd, you might as well be playing around on a single cored p4. hard drives are THAT slow, so SSDs are always part of a build recommendation from me.
2) you can tell when you're on a dual cored cpu, i3 or Pentium. While the gaming performance and the SINGLE BIG TASK performance of a haswell i3 is exceptional, when you use it in a REAL desktop work environment on a windows 7/8 pc with a hundred services running and 15 active programs running in the notification area, the dual core cpus take it on the chin, and badly. so badly i am extremely reluctant to recommend dual core or dual core with hyperthreading or quad core AMD chips to ANYONE for ANY REASON. I will make a dual core cpu recommendation if the budget is too low for a quad intel, and the person has no intention to overclock, but i usually make it crystal clear it is a reluctant recommendation.

I don't know why benching and testing fails to identify this REAL WORLD issue with dual core cpus, but it's very noticeable, especially when you work on quad core intels or overclocked 8 core amds. i3's will choke even on simple windows tasks if you have enough stuff running; which is why i dislike suggesting them.

 

[vertexx]

All good conversation here.... To me, the "Best of" lists short change the real-value of a well balanced system. We do get some of that in the quarterly SBMs.

I also agree with the broader PC experience of a dual core vs. single-threaded performance in games. But I also think the I3 is noticeably faster in every-day use than the Pentium G's. IMHO, an I3 feels closer to an I5 than a Pentium G. I run all of those in various PC configs in my household and can definitely tell the difference.

Another story I think is relevant is the experience I had with my Nephew over Christmas Break. He is stuck with a 2-year old IBuyPower from Walmart that originally had an FX-4100, AMD HD7770, and the lowest quality 350W PSU I've seen in a gaming build in a long time. I worked with him on 4 different upgrade scenarios, from a CPU upgrade, to GPU upgrade, to an outright platform replacement. I took a page out of THG and we calculated price/performance for each upgrade.

In the end, we spent $230. We bought an R9-270, which is the fastest GPU comfortably supported with the 350W single PCIE power connector PSU. We bought a $100 Crucial MX100 256GB SSD, and we got him a mild overclock on the FX-4100 to 4.2Ghz without having to bump up the voltage (still using the stock heat sink). We also did a fresh install of Windows (makes a big difference for a 13 year-old who spent the last two years installing and uninstalling all the garbage available).

Essentially, we extended the life of his platform for another 1-2 years, it is very well balanced, and it feels like a completely new PC to him. He is playing Dragon Age: Inquisitions, BF4, and an entire library of other games, not all at "Ultra", but enough where he's very happy with the result.

Lesson for me was that sometimes the best CPU for the $$ is the one you already have. A little $$ can go a long way when you focus on overall system balance instead of getting the best of a single component. I agree there is still a place for the AMD CPUs - my holiday build was a A8-7600 (45W mode) based super-compact HTPC/Light gamer in a Streacom F1C Evo (Black) case. I'm experimenting with Steam OS on that one, and that's been one of the funnest builds in a long time.

Bottom line is I am recommending I3s as the entry-level gaming CPU, not the Pentium G. I will still recommend AMD for budgets lower than that, but admittedly that use case has been steadily diminishing.

 

[silverblue]

For those unwilling to recommend dual module AMD CPUs, is the 860K included in this? Its wider decoder should make for better multithreaded performance at comparable clocks to Trinity/Richland based Athlons, with the added bonus of being cheaper (the 860k is £60 on Amazon, the 760 is £80, and the 750K is £65). Only the overclocking headroom remains a question.

 

[GObonzo]

Best budget CPU should be the Athlon x4 750K/760K/860K and the following in the budget line would be FX 6300.

this is about best CPU for the money for gaming correct? and after talking crap about recommendations you try to add Athlons to the list? nothing new is going to run with any decent resolution or effects with that old crap running it.

 

[ern88]

Guess my i5 2500K still holds its own. O/C 4.6. I was going to upgrade it.

 

[NightAntilli]

Best budget CPU should be the Athlon x4 750K/760K/860K and the following in the budget line would be FX 6300.

this is about best CPU for the money for gaming correct? and after talking crap about recommendations you try to add Athlons to the list? nothing new is going to run with any decent resolution or effects with that old crap running it.

What do you mean old crap? The 860K is basically an A10 7850K without the GPU. It's a quad core, and it's a very decent overclocker. It will run games that will not run on 2 cores, and that alone should already make it a better recommendation than the Pentium, even if it's slower. Speed becomes mute when the faster one can not run certain games and the slower one can run everything.

 

[Eggz]

For the top i7 chips, the 49xx-series seems to be missing. There's the 39xx and 59xx, but that's all unless I'm just not seeing them, but I looked a few times.

 

[Sarvn]

MasterMace, the Athlon x4 series does not use the module system, it is a genuine quad-core. Built a budget gaming rig for my cousin with a 750k, oc'd it to 4.5ghz and it plays MGS V: Ground Zeros just fine which is a game whose minimum requirements for a cpu are an i5-4460 or better. The idea that in 2014 and going into 2015 -anyone- would recommend a dual-core is just plain absurd. As mentioned before Far Cry 4 and Dragon Age: Inquisition require quad-cores. And that trend is only going to grow. Just specced a build for my roommate with a 760k, am going to try for a 5ghz oc. It is a stopgap cpu until intels skylake. For $78 I would absolutely love to see that dual core pentium chip outpreform it in the first mp game we play, which will be Far Cry 4. Any takers on that bet?

 

[Coolblock]

I'm playing games on Linux, and if you have a duo core CPU you will quickly get disappointed, when running Windowz games with Wine-CSMT (CSMT is offloading OpenGL/DX10 to a second core, effectively making single games multi threaded)

If you plan to use Linux as a game platform, duo core CPU's are a no go area.
I race out any duo core Intel with my Phenom II x4 @3.517Ghz on Linux with Wine-CSMT.

What is happening ?
As an example I will take World of Tanks, which in Windowz roughly uses 1.25 cores (Official statement from War Gaming)
So in Windowz the game might use something like 1.25 to 2 cores, with background tasks etc running, like playing a music stream.
Going to Linux, WoT will use roughly 3 cores (2 cores 100% loaded and 2 cores at roughly 50%), while also streaming some music.
You will need a duo core Intel at over 5 Ghz to effectively do the same as my Phenom, asuming the Intel CPU's have roughly 20% extra IPC over the Phenom.

Also like some people mentioned the multi threaded game titles, are suprisingly missing from the Tomhardware Intel Fanboi article. (Yes Tom I have followed you for many years and you are Intel Fanboiz), It's funny how the I7 gets still a mention that it might help in multi threaded games, where no such mention is made with the Hexa core from AMD ....

It is true that the socket 1150 platform from Intel has more choice, and if you plan to upgrade the CPU in the next year orso, you could argue that you get a cheap Intel first and buy something better later, you have to realize though that this better Intel CPU will mostly be better due to having more cores, as there is not much more in Ghz to gain.
Intel CPU's are also a bit more power friendly, but not all that much, and you pay with that by having less cores mostly.

At the moment of writing this, the,
(6 Cores) AMD FX 6350 Black Edition - 3,9GHz - Socket AM3+ ,costs 113 Euro in my local shop, the
(2 Cores) Intel Core i3-4160 - 3,6GHz - Socket 1150 , costs 113 Euro also.

If i was building a game PC on a budget I would take the AMD FX 6350, and stick my midle finger up (2 fingers for the brits 😉 to the Core i3, while playing Battlefield or games in Linux, as it can't cope.

 

[vertexx]

MasterMace, the Athlon x4 series does not use the module system, it is a genuine quad-core.

Actually, they do. Your Athlon 750k, 760k, and now the 860k are merely the equivalent Trinity, Richland, and now Kaveri APU part with the on-board graphics disabled. They're Piledriver/Steamroller cores with two modules.

 

[logainofhades]

Still no honorable mention for the 1231v3, that is so rightly deserves. I7 4770 performance for just a little more than a 4690k.

 

[iam2thecrowe]

Best budget CPU should be the Athlon x4 750K/760K/860K and the following in the budget line would be FX 6300.

this is about best CPU for the money for gaming correct? and after talking crap about recommendations you try to add Athlons to the list? nothing new is going to run with any decent resolution or effects with that old crap running it.

The way i think about it, none of the 7xx/8xx K or pentium G cpus are "gaming cpu's" period and shouldn't be recommended as such, even if they are all you can get on a low budget. Most modern games will have poor framerates at times with any of these cpu's. If your going to reduce your budget to the cost of a console, then just get a console, you will have a better gaming experience. I3 or fx6300 is the minimum "Gaming" cpu for modern games, i wouldn't bother to build with anything less. I think in the recommendation you should note something like "while *pentium G* is the best gaming cpu under $xx, it may not even play some modern games smoothly, but is ok for older, less damanding titles."

 

[Onus]

...
The way i think about it, none of the 7xx/8xx K or pentium G cpus are "gaming cpu's" period and shouldn't be recommended as such, even if they are all you can get on a low budget. Most modern games will have poor framerates at times with any of these cpu's. If your going to reduce your budget to the cost of a console, then just get a console, you will have a better gaming experience. I3 or fx6300 is the minimum "Gaming" cpu for modern games, i wouldn't bother to build with anything less. I think in the recommendation you should note something like "while *pentium G* is the best gaming cpu under $xx, it may not even play some modern games smoothly, but is ok for older, less damanding titles."

This makes sense to me, especially that last sentence.

 

[ceh4702]

I think in the i3 processor category you should consider the CPU's with the 4600 graphics and 4 meg cache. I have a 4330 i3 that I purchased on sale at $125 on sale in January of 2014. Do you think the 4 meg cache would make it faster?

 

[seanpatrick]

I'm currently running 2 x 280x crossfire with an 8320 OC'd to 4.2 (I had it at 4.4 but brought it back a bit). It's running of a 990fx Sabertooth MB.

My ram is only 1333 (2 x8) but seem to have had trouble when running it at 1600.

Is there any point to upgrading to a i5 4690k w/ perhaps a z97 intel board? or should I wait it out and just upgrade the ram. I typically run games on ultra / high @ 1080p (on a Epson 2030 projector screen / or a 1080p Benq LCD (2ms response time) for FPS).

 

[Onus]

If games are performing well, why upgrade?