How exactly does having a CPU that doesn't meet the minimum requirements affect performance?

[MyTeaIsMighty]

With most games that come out lately my CPU is near enough ALWAYS below the minimum requirements so it got me to wondering what negative effects having a less than optimal CPU does for a game's performance. If this question is really simplistic and no one feels like writing out an answer a link to a website explaining it would be cool as well.

 

[Gam3r01]

Essentially what the minimum specs are supposed to do is tell you what you need for a baseline "playable" experience (low settings, lower res, acceptable framerate, etc).
Now that being said, minimum specs are generally very poorly made, and dont reflect the actual minimum specs to play a game. Its hit and miss.

 

[sizzling]

CPU can be just as important as GPU especially if your cpu is weak. This means the fps could be capped by your CPU and not GPU so you won't get the full potential from your GPU. A low CPU can also cause big drops in fps, so let's say your gaming at 60fps and then a bit of the game stresses your cpu and your fps drops to 20 for a second. This variance gives a very choppy experience, much worse than if you had a constant 30fps.

Let's say your CPU is dual core and only has 2 threads, a few games won't even run as they need 4 threads.

A weak cpu can give multiple problems.

 

[Supernova1138]

The big problems with having a weak CPU are lower average framerates compared to what you should be getting with a given GPU and stuttering and big framerate dips as the CPU struggles to keep up when things get really busy on screen. Some titles like Far Cry 4 also won't run without a third party mod on CPUs with less than 4 threads.

That said, CPU requirements listed by developers are often overstated, particularly for Intel CPUs, where they might say you need an i5 or even i7 Sandy Bridge or newer as a minimum when lesser CPUs can run the game reasonably well. It gets especially weird when you see CPUs like the FX 6300 sitting next to the i5 2500k on minimum spec sheets when the i5 is considerably better than the FX 6300, even if the game could perfectly scale across 6 cores. Bottom line is you're probably best off looking for a CPU benchmark for the game with your CPU or something close to it and seeing how the game performs that way rather than looking at the System Requirements.