Pentium VS i3 Gaming

[Jesse Donovan]

Hey guys! so in the past I have bought a computer with and got a pentium G3260 with the intention of upgrading to an i5. but i've been finding it hard to to get the money to upgrade to an i5 and have been noticing some stuttering while playing games (my cpu usage has been at a constant 100%) Due to it being a dual core. I was wondering if it would be worth getting an i3 processor (an i3 4170 to be exact) instead of an i5. I know the i3 is still a dual core but will I get better performance and less stuttering in games like GTA V and bf4?

Thanks in advance and sorry if I took a while to explain I do that alot..

 

[Cryio]

Grand Theft Auto V is both one of the best optimized games ever released AND the most CPU intensive game on the planet at this time. It can even get an i7 at 80% usage across all 8 threads.

So yes, I think any GPU bar the low-end ones will be CPU bottlenecked by that Pentium, even if heavily overclocked.

Both GTA V and Battlefiend 4 (and in MP especially in BF4) will benefit massively from a jump to an i3, i5 or even an AMD FX 63x0/83x0 compared to your Pentium.

 

[Jesse Donovan]

So how massive of a jump are we talking if I got an i3?

 

[Cryio]

Performance improvements depend on what GPU you have. If your GPU is giving it 100%, using a faster CPU won't make any difference.

So what's your GPU ?

 

[Jesse Donovan]

I have the HD 5770 but I am planning to upgrade to either a 750 ti, 960 or a R9 380 in the future. Playing dirty bomb on min settings and 1366x768 the gpu sits at around 75-80% while the cpu sits on 100% constantly..

 

[Jesse Donovan]

sometimes the gpu even stays around 50%

 

[Cryio]

A 5770 and you are still CPU limited, haha, interesting.

That low level of a GPU should be GPU bound if you try pushing settings in most games nowadays, but it seems not.

Getting an i3 or an FX 6300 (overclocked) for a 960 or a 380 should suffice in most cases. There's really no need for an i5.

 

[Jesse Donovan]

I wanted to get something like an i3 because i didn't want to buy a new motherboard but wasn't really sure if it was worth upgrading because it is also a dual core like my pentium and the only real difference is clock speeds and HyperThreading. I wanted to get an i5 also but it's another $100 more than the i3 in australia then I wouldn't have much money to get the GPU I wanted 🙁 Thanks for your help 😀

 

[Cryio]

The hyperthreading really helps the i3 pull forward compared to the Pentium. And you really don't need an i5.

Up to 960/380 levels, an i3 is perfectly sufficient to allow these GPUs to give all they've got.

Buy the cheapest i3 Haswell you can find and you'll be plenty happy.