Is An I3 Enough For Gaming?

[Tank36]

Do you think a high quality I3 could preform well enough for high demand games? Like Battlefield, Need For Speed?

 

[MarkW]

For the best Battlefield 4 PC experience, we recommend having a system equal to or better than than the following specifications:
Operating System: Windows 8 64-bit
Processor: AMD Six-Core CPU; Intel Quad-Core CPU
RAM: 8GB
Free Hard Drive Space: 30GB
Graphics Card: AMD Radeon 7870 or higher; NVIDIA GeForce GT 660 or higher
Graphics Memory: 3GB

 

[Cons29]

for battlefield, no, quad will serve you better. for other games that does not take advantage of quads, maybe, just remember that the gpu is also important

 

[audie-tron25]

Although the recommended specs for Battlefield 4 include a Intel Quad Core CPU, I personally find that the i3-4160 can handle it well. Even on 64 Player maps, it doesn't max out the CPU and can still have a few webpages open without much difficulty. I think as long as the CPU can support 4 cores (even if two are virtual), you should be alright.

As far as Need For Speed goes, I don't play it but I imagine that it should still be alright.

 

[Speedstang]

Should be perfectly fine, i game on the i3 3220, i have yet to actually lag it, the thing has power. The hyper threading really speeds the thing up on CPU intensive games.

 

[RCFProd]

An i3-4xxx series is quite good for most games, although I would prefer a G3258 clocked at 4.4 Ghz.

 

[unreal9400]

The games you mention will run just fine on an i3.
Just get the best graphics card to pair with it.

 

[Speedstang]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

 

[Flared]

Hi mate, check out this website! It is amazing and can let you know whether any of your components fall into the minimum or the recommended specifications! http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri

I hope this helps!

 

[RCFProd]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

 

[Flared]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

How's this an inaccurate statement? I gave a website which I thought would help, seeing as this guy was wanting to see whether his components were good enough...?

I'm just interested! Haha.

 

[jaguarskx]

Generally speaking, a Core i3 is still good enough to play most games. You can click the following link for games that have been becnhmarked with various CPUs. Most games have CPU benchmarks, but not all. Keep in mind that the lower the resolution and graphic settings the larger the difference you will see between different CPUs. But when using high resolution and max graphic settings performance becomes more limited by the GPU, but a weak CPU can hold back a powerful GPU. Below is an example for the Witcher 3, but performance will vary from game to game.

http://www.techspot.com/features/gaming/gaming-benchmarks/


However, to get back to your question... A Core i3 is fine for playing Battlefield 4 in single player campaign, but when it comes to multi-player, a Core i5 CPU will give you much better performance. As as for Need For Speed, I cannot say. However, if you look at the CPU benchmarks for Project Cars a Core i5 CPU will provide better performance than a Core i3. It could be different for NFS since it depends on the game engine.

 

[RCFProd]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

How's this an inaccurate statement? I gave a website which I thought would help, seeing as this guy was wanting to see whether his components were good enough...?

I'm just interested! Haha.

I see I downvoted the wrong post. Was meant to be the one above. You can see I didn't quote you aswell btw.

However not sure about that website though. It's quite an outdated way of finding out. That website has been there for a while.

 

[Speedstang]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

How's this an inaccurate statement? I gave a website which I thought would help, seeing as this guy was wanting to see whether his components were good enough...?

I'm just interested! Haha.

I see I downvoted the wrong post. Was meant to be the one above. You can see I didn't quote you aswell btw.

However not sure about that website though. It's quite an outdated way of finding out. That website has been there for a while.

The i3 4160 is more powerful per core, has Hyperthreading (Meaning it can play things that would otherwise strain the G3258), and has more memory bandwidth. Any overclock made to the G3258 with a standard cooler will not be enough to beat out the 4160. Theoretically it could do better at some crazy overclock, but that'd require a CPU cooler, not to mention it still lacks hyper threading. So it would seem I'm not the one with the bad post......

 

[jaguarskx]

See following link for some more Core i3 game benchmarks.... The Core i3-4130 provides the best performance in Batman: Arkham Origin, beating out the Core i5-4430???

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i3-4340-4330-4130_5.html#sect0


Also, according to the following review of Battlefield 4 multiplayer comparison between Windows 7 and Windows 8, the Core i3-4340 can compete very well against the FX-8350 in many different resolutions and graphic settings.

http://www.hardwarepal.com/battlefield-4-benchmark-mp-cpu-gpu-w7-vs-w8-1/

Here's one example:

 

[James Mason]

yes, an i3-4130 (and above) handles BF4 just fine:

(gtx750ti and 4gbs of ram for below)
Battlefield 4 (x86): Settings: Low (x86 forces lowest settings it seems) Avg:115 Min:70 Max:201

Battlefield 4 (x64): Settings:Medium , no AA Avg: 94 Min: 49 Max: 168

Battlefield 4 (x64): Settings:Ultra Preset Avg: 40 Min: 19 Max: 66

 

[RCFProd]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

How's this an inaccurate statement? I gave a website which I thought would help, seeing as this guy was wanting to see whether his components were good enough...?

I'm just interested! Haha.

I see I downvoted the wrong post. Was meant to be the one above. You can see I didn't quote you aswell btw.

However not sure about that website though. It's quite an outdated way of finding out. That website has been there for a while.

The i3 4160 is more powerful per core, has Hyperthreading (Meaning it can play things that would otherwise strain the G3258), and has more memory bandwidth. Any overclock made to the G3258 with a standard cooler will not be enough to beat out the 4160. Theoretically it could do better at some crazy overclock, but that'd require a CPU cooler, not to mention it still lacks hyper threading. So it would seem I'm not the one with the bad post......

My reasoning here:
Most games on the market today still don't use more than 2 cores.
The G3258 at 4.4 Ghz, even on games that use more than 2 threads/cores shows higher performance than the i3-4160. The inconsistency however of the frames achieved are potentially higher than an Intel CPU with atleast 4 threads.

I've done tests with the G3258 and it performed better than I expected on average. The CPU heavy games showed high fps but with plenty of dips.

In my opinion the G3258 with an improved Z97 motherboard and cooler is better value than an i3-4160 processor with a weaker H81/B85 motherboard.

 

[audie-tron25]

An i3 4160 far outperforms an overclocked G3258.

Great statement bro. However it is not an accurate statement. Which makes it a bad post really.

How's this an inaccurate statement? I gave a website which I thought would help, seeing as this guy was wanting to see whether his components were good enough...?

I'm just interested! Haha.

I see I downvoted the wrong post. Was meant to be the one above. You can see I didn't quote you aswell btw.

However not sure about that website though. It's quite an outdated way of finding out. That website has been there for a while.

The i3 4160 is more powerful per core, has Hyperthreading (Meaning it can play things that would otherwise strain the G3258), and has more memory bandwidth. Any overclock made to the G3258 with a standard cooler will not be enough to beat out the 4160. Theoretically it could do better at some crazy overclock, but that'd require a CPU cooler, not to mention it still lacks hyper threading. So it would seem I'm not the one with the bad post......

My reasoning here:
Most games on the market today still don't use more than 2 cores.
The G3258 at 4.4 Ghz, even on games that use more than 2 threads/cores shows higher performance than the i3-4160. The inconsistency however of the frames achieved are potentially higher than an Intel CPU with atleast 4 threads.

I've done tests with the G3258 and it performed better than I expected on average. The CPU heavy games showed high fps but with plenty of dips.

In my opinion the G3258 with an improved Z97 motherboard and cooler is better value than an i3-4160 processor with a weaker H81/B85 motherboard.

Although it may be cheaper in the short term, by overclocking the G3258, your voiding your warrenty out of the box which could be very costly if you get a bad unit.

 

[RCFProd]

Wouldn't worry about that at all. If you boot and everything works normally, then you are basically already safe to OC it.