Can anyone help me with choosing a cpu for tf2? (look if you play tf2)

[tornados2111]

I currently have a 9800gt and an E5400 dual core at 2.7Ghz. My gpu is only being used for about 20% for the entire time I play tf2 because I have chris' fps config(which turns down all fancy settings off to increase performance). However, my cpu is a serious bottleneck, always running at about 90-100%. I get around 150-250 fps when doing nothing but can go down to 20-25 on 32 man servers. I can't find benchmarks ANYWHERE and I was thinking of getting an i5-3570K but now I am thinking it is a bit overkill, maybe I should consider an i3. Can some of you guys please post what cpu you have and what is your average fps and then your very minimum fps? That would be hugely helpful in figuring out what cpu I will get, thanks guys!

 

[TehNinjaCat]

Have A Look At Something Like An AMD Phenom x4, That Might Be What You're Looking For

 

[ChilledGrease]

I currently have a 9800gt and an E5400 dual core at 2.7Ghz. My gpu is only being used for about 20% for the entire time I play tf2 because I have chris' fps config(which turns down all fancy settings off to increase performance). However, my cpu is a serious bottleneck, always running at about 90-100%. I get around 150-250 fps when doing nothing but can go down to 20-25 on 32 man servers. I can't find benchmarks ANYWHERE and I was thinking of getting an i5-3570K but now I am thinking it is a bit overkill, maybe I should consider an i3. Can some of you guys please post what cpu you have and what is your average fps and then your very minimum fps? That would be hugely helpful in figuring out what cpu I will get, thanks guys!

TF2 is not a very demanding game as far as processing power goes. If that's all you plan to play, even an i3 is overkill. I would recommend going with one of Intel's sandy bridge-based pentium dual cores, like the pentium g860. Pair that with a bare-bones 1155 motherboard like this one, and you will be k to play. Considering the g680 has no problem running battlefield 3 and skyrim (much more demanding than tf2), you shouldn't have any problem with bottlenecking, especially with a videocard that old. Tomshardware even used a g850 (same thing as g860, but 100mHz slower) in their budget gaming rig in the most recent system builder marathon.

 

[iam2thecrowe]

a modern i3-2xxx or i3 3-xxx should be all you need, and performs well on all new games. I was playing this game fine on a 3ghz core 2 duo (overclocked e6600) with an 8800gts, i wouldnt have thought you would have had any problems with your system. Is there not something else chewing up your CPU? some other program running? when was the last time you did a complete hdd format windows re-install, that may be all you need to do. Add to that basic internet security like microsoft security essentials and run spybot S&D to pick up the scraps, dont have anything else loaded at startup. that should have things running slick.. Also check your ram useage, how much ram do you have?