i3 8100 for gaming vs ?

[Ady20]

I wanna make a cheap gaming PC. I afford this stuff:
- i3-8100
- 8gb ddr4 memory
- motherboard
- 700W PSU
- a cheap water cooler for the CPU
- 120GB SSD (I already have a HDD)
- GTX 1050ti 4GB

My question is. Will my GPU bottleneck the CPU? If yes what should I buy? A used 760 GTX would be fine? Also is there any better CPU than i3-8100 in that price range? I want to say that I want to play TERA and that games optimization is really bad for AMD, and it relies mostly on single-core performance.

Thank you.

 

[Math Geek]

cpu and gpu would make a fin pair. no worry there. but a 700w psu is WAY overkill. you could easily get away with 450w if the price is better. this does assume quality psu though as even a 700w junk unit (you did not give a model so no clue) would likely not provide the power it claims by a long shot.

finally, the 8100 comes with a stock cooler which is plenty enough for the cpu to stay running cool. watercooling such a low end cpu is throwing money away that could go elsewhere.perhaps more ram or a better/larger ssd would be a better way to spend that money.

 

[geofelt]

For fast single thread performance, the G5600 is hard to beat.
It costs less than the i3-8100
Single thread passmark rating for the G5600 is 2292 compared to 2101 for the i3-8100.

On the gpu, I like the GTX1050ti. It is a tad more powerful than the GTX760.
Plus, it runs on 320w compared to 500 for the GTX760.



Buy a quality psu. extra wattage can not compensate for cheap components.
Seasonic is always good.

Either cpu comes with a stock cooler that does the job.
Liquid cooling is entirely inappropriate.

Use the cooler funds to buy a 240gb ssd. 120gb gets filled up quickly.

From what I can tell, G5600 and GTX1050ti well exceed the recommended TERA requirements.
Enjoy.

 

[Karadjgne]

Best cpu cooler for your needs would be the Cryorig m9i. At just $20 it's an unbeatable value, and is small enough to fit almost any case. It also ties the CM hyper212 in performance, so is more than capable of i3 or pentium cooling at any usage.

Corsair CXM 450 would be more than enough for a gtx1050ti and is probably far better quality than any 700w psu on the market today.

Geofelt would be the first to tell you, we have gone many rounds on the aio vrs air cooler trip, but this is one instance where I'm just as vehement as he is about a decent aircooler being a far superior path than liquid cooling.

 

[mdd1963]

Fight hard for the 8400 instead (sell blood/plasma if required!), I'd not be buying what is essentially a 4 core/4 thread 7600 which has been rebadged as a 'new' i3-8100....

 

[jc102090]

I like the setup that you have come up with, just a couple of recommendations. I recently purchased the i3 8100 and I really enjoy it as a budget build cpu. I've seen online that the i5 8400 would be better but I was looking for something slightly cheaper. The i3 8100 an the 1050ti will be perfect together. The CPU is locked so no need for water cooling, you could get away with the stock cooler or upgrade to a Coolermaster evo 212 or cryorig equivalent. If you are planning to just use the ssd as a boot drive then you can go for the 120gb ssd but like some other posts have stated 700w is a little much for the setup you are looking at. I would do 500w psu with 240gb ssd. I think the i3 8100 paired with the 1050ti is a solid chice for TERA.

 

[AniChatt]

Check this out,
PCPartPicker part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/7YHZJ8
Price breakdown by merchant: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/7YHZJ8/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel - Core i3-8100 3.6GHz Quad-Core Processor ($118.69 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Asus - TUF B360M-E GAMING Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($82.49 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Patriot - Viper Elite 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($84.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Kingston - A400 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($39.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Asus - GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4GB Phoenix Video Card ($184.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - FOCUS Gold 450W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($53.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $565.13
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-05-29 03:57 EDT-0400

8100+1050ti is good no issues as such. Any better cpu will cost you more and as per your use case avoid Ryzen.

 

[Karadjgne]

You'll probably need to read and use this.
https://www.essentialmana.com/forums/#/discussion/7269/bernkastels-tera-optimization-guide

 

[ElectrO_90]

You should give people what your budget is, and people can help you decide what you can get for your money.

 

[mdd1963]

i5-8400 for the win!

 

[nikoli707]

you really should be aiming for at least an i5 8400 or r5 1600(2600). but compared to the i3 8100... ive recently seen deals on the r5 2400g with motherboard for less than $200. its basically an r5 1500x with an rx540/gt1030 built into it. that is about the same price you will pay for an i3 8100+mobo.
https://www.frys.com/product/9574812?clickid=3KhxRhyrhWpZWHX1x7Qnd0thUkjRk7SNLVwm1w0

2400g vs 8100 single core are nearly identical while the r5 with its hyperthreads is slightly faster in multicore. i highly doubt most users would ever notice the performance differences between the two in real world usage.

you dont need a cpu cooler for your build unless it is purely for aesthetics. both packaged coolers will handle the cpus. the 2400g can be overclocked slightly on the cpu side or gpu side if you choose.

any quality 450w power supply will work, the newer corsair cx450 or even the evga 450w will work just fine and both can be found for around $35 or less pretty often.

 

[ElectrO_90]

I vote on getting the AMD because AMD will support your motherboard for future upgrades for another 2.5 years, where as if you buy Intel, your motherboard has less than 1 year before they change the chipset. That means, you won't be able to upgrade with new CPU's later on, only second hand ones on ebay.
Intel's last chipset lasted 9 months, which means people who bought the 7 Series Intel chip can only upgrade now by buying a New Motherboard and CPU.

 

[Tinstaafl]

Don't be afraid of the i3.

It is not a crippled CPU. It is all about the MHz, not the number of cores. I am running a 3rd gen Core i3 with a GTX950, and I can play any of the recent (2011-2015) older games (such as Skyrim, Fallout 4, Bioshock Infinite, etc) at HD 1920 with the highest graphics settings.

Clearly I would want to have a more current gen CPU, more RAM, and a newer GPU if I wanted to play the latest, most demanding games. And the trend to run at 4K resolution brings a new set of challenges. But if everything else was up to it, I do not see why a current Core i3 would hold you back.

 

[Karadjgne]

A note on Skyrim. That's Vanilla. Mods are scripted, they take cpu power, and threads, an enb will soak up a thread by itself. I have 2x pc's, one i5-3570k and the other an i7-3770K. The i7 runs 130+ 2k/4k/8k mods and an enb and clears 60fps at ultra, using 6 threads at 55% usage. The i5 maxes its 4 threads at over 90% usage with the same mods but without the enb and struggles to get 50+ fps. To bring the % down and get 60+ fps I had to dump close to half the mods.

Fallout 4 uses the same game engine as skyrim, mods affect it the same way.

If the game generally uses 2-3 threads, then yes, the i3 is quite capable with its higher MHz, as shown by the i3-6100 vrs i5-6400, the i3 ties or beats the i5 in almost everything tested. Upto @80% cpu usage, then it tanks hard vrs the much larger bandwidth ability of the i5.

And thats the downfall of the i3 in general for the 2c/4t i3's, anything extremely cpu intensive that needs cores bandwidth, like modded skyrim, gta:V, Witcher 3, WoW on heavy server drops etc is going to kill that new Pentium, the 8100's 4c/4t being quite superior in that aspect. The 8400 being better still with the added power of the extra 2 cores if needed.

 

[AniChatt]

The advantage with AMD is future upgrade path and more core count. A budget user not going to put a 1080/ti with i3. Since he is asking for i3-8100 what can be suggested for similar level of GAMING performance is 1600 R5 which is 50USD more. Then you have to buy a faster ram to justify the Ryzen. Forget about the board and it will cost more. And yes you can not buy a stupid cheap mobo or it will not support the fast ram.
At a lower price i3-8100 is significantly faster to yield more fps (I mean exclusively fps not the headroom available for future) than ryzen for sure right now. Now for core heavy games like AC Origin what can be expected from a 1050ti or a budget card? It will choke first. Now If someone has money to get fast ram, a good b350 mobo, r5 2600 for now (much better than 1600) then yes it will be much better than the intel spes even for future proofing.
Since it seems like he is in budget and like to play some games with minimal effort so I believe intel is better right now for him becs it has less issues with ram compatibility and will give him more fps for now.
For future proofing yes Ryzen is better value for sure.