[SOLVED] I knew it maybe repetitive boring question .. But does hyperthreading matter for gaming or not ??

[Paulasami]

And don't get me wrong, i have seen so many benchmarks .. Intel's 6c/6t cpus easily beat the ryzen 1st and 2nd gen 6c/12t cpus and the only difference i see is cpu usage which is lower in the ryzen cpus .However, does mean it the hyperthreaded cpus have a headroom or more futureproof ? Or rather the games don't use them

 

[Newtonius]

Games don't use them, hyper-threading is how Intel CPU's utilize more cores in multi-threaded applications, which is what AMD CPU's are oriented by default through SMT (simultaneous mult-threading). However, most games are single core based so they don't require hyper threading to improve performance. In fact it might cause the opposite effect. Almost everything else besides gaming though will be much better with an AMD CPU, if they're multi-core based.

As far as 'future-proofing', more games might start shifting over to multi-threaded performance based so AMD could become more 'future proof' if you want to think about it that way. But for the time being Single core runs the gaming industry.

 

[drea.drechsler]

And don't get me wrong, i have seen so many benchmarks .. Intel's 6c/6t cpus easily beat the ryzen 1st and 2nd gen 6c/12t cpus and the only difference i see is cpu usage which is lower in the ryzen cpus .However, does mean it the hyperthreaded cpus have a headroom or more futureproof ? Or rather the games don't use them

I think it's very 'game dependent'... meaning some games benefit from virtual threads, some do not. On those that do not benefit disabling them can actually improve performance. But those games are very few and most new-release triple-A games want not only virtual threads, but physical threads (cores).

It's true that even multi-threaded games depend on one thread for performance. But moving as many support processes as possible off that main thread lessen it's workload and let it perform better. That's why more cores/threads is the way to future proof.

 

[Paulasami]

Games don't use them, hyper-threading is how Intel CPU's utilize more cores in multi-threaded applications, which is what AMD CPU's are oriented by default through SMT (simultaneous mult-threading). However, most games are single core based so they don't require hyper threading to improve performance. In fact it might cause the opposite effect. Almost everything else besides gaming though will be much better with an AMD CPU, if they're multi-core based.

As far as 'future-proofing', more games might start shifting over to multi-threaded performance based so AMD could become more 'future proof' if you want to think about it that way. But for the time being Single core runs the gaming industry.

 

[Paulasami]

Yeah even intel unlocked hyperthreading across all CPUs in the upcoming 10th gen .. It's becoming a matter of time when games -somehow- benefit from the extra logical threads .. at least that's what i wish for so that we don't pay for a feature we don't benefit from

 

[drea.drechsler]

.... at least that's what i wish for so that we don't pay for a feature we don't benefit from

I wouldn't want to suggest buying one of AMD's HEDT processors is a cost effective way to future proof for gaming as I can't imagine getting to a point where even 16 cores/32 threads is needed anytime soon.

But with the price of 3700X's where they are, opting for 8/16 over even 6/12 is a good idea even now. Why? well, another thing to consider is your CPU is needed for anything else you're doing alongside the game. People increasingly share the action by streaming, capture and encode videos of their gaming action, chat with friends on a Discord session during the game. Doing any of those things will demand CPU resources so having the cores and threads available mean the game won't be affected.

 

[Paulasami]

I wouldn't want to suggest buying one of AMD's HEDT processors is a cost effective way to future proof for gaming as I can't imagine getting to a point where even 16 cores/32 threads is needed anytime soon.

But with the price of 3700X's where they are, opting for 8/16 over even 6/12 is a good idea even now. Why? well, another thing to consider is your CPU is needed for anything else you're doing alongside the game. People increasingly share the action by streaming, capture and encode videos of their gaming action, chat with friends on a Discord session during the game. Doing any of those things will demand CPU resources so having the cores and threads available mean the game won't be affected.

 

[Paulasami]

Nah i don't care about streaming, multitasking or what soever .. I am taking in pure gaming, will the gaming see 12 cores to utilize instead of 6 or not ?
Will it be more futureproof or games still purely affected by the count of physical cores not logical ones ??

 

[boju]

Only game i know of (and I've played many) that performs better without HT is CSGO. Example of others, GTA5, Farcry 4/5/ND, Ghost Recon WL, Dying Light, Doom 2016 all perform a lot better when i have HT on. HT off, i lose a good 20fps because some of these games (especially FC5, Doom 2016 and GRWL) my ancient cpu is maxed out. Doom was the only game to stutter though as a result of no HT because fps is a lot higher in this game than the rest, pegging my cpu at 100%. HT on, my cpu usage was around mid 80s, no stutters.

Straight 6 core cpus are quickly becoming core challenged so wouldn't bother with them. These days, it's either 6/12 or 8 if going for high frame rates in modern games with everything else going on in these games.

Cpu frame pre-rendering;

 

[Paulasami]

Only game i know of (and I've played many) that performs better without HT is CSGO. Example of others, GTA5, Farcry 4/5/ND, Ghost Recon WL, Dying Light, Doom 2016 all perform a lot better when i have HT on. HT off, i lose a good 20fps because some of these games (especially FC5, Doom 2016 and GRWL) my ancient cpu is maxed out. Doom was the only game to stutter though as a result of no HT because fps is a lot higher in this game than the rest, pegging my cpu at 100%. HT on, my cpu usage was around mid 80s, no stutters.

Straight 6 core cpus are quickly becoming core challenged so wouldn't bother with them. These days, it's either 6/12 or 8 if going for high frame rates in modern games with everything else going on in these games.

Cpu frame pre-rendering;

 

[Paulasami]

Most informative answer i have got so far .. thanks dude .. btw this means that utilizing the extra logical threads is considered a game optimization factor, which most if not all big games developers should consider and work to achieve

 

[boju]

Yep, logical threads are more effective in today's games than a decade ago and is why older i7s are still hanging in there compared to quads of the same era and could argue older i7's relevance to modern quads too.

HT/SMT can also aid in quicker command scheduling especially for the primary core. Since the primary core does a lot of work running initial game code, also running Windows and app processes, not having the whole core possibly waiting on the next process to start can help entire cpu efficiency and avoid that stutter here or there.