Phenom II vs Core i7: Gaming Value Comparison

[Hefemeister]

http://www.pureoverclock.com/article794.html

We've decided to tackle the debate head-on, and specifically a hot topic that sets off the passion: is AMD or Intel better for gaming? Specifically, the Phenom II and Core i7 respectively. There are pros and cons to each, and we've seen some people attempt to tackle that debate, but to date we believe the comparisons are fundamentally flawed, such as using different graphics cards or dual/quad cores to compare. That's about as good as comparing apples to horseshoes. No, today, we'll attack the big question straight up by using the exact same setups except for the AMD/Intel core components. And we're going to chart the performance differences in many different scenarios, at stock and overclocked CPU speeds, in single and dual graphics card configurations, and at different resolutions. And as an added bonus, we're also going to compare prices and evaluate gaming value; does that money on a Core i7 give you better framerates? If so, how much is that extra worth? Will the Phenom II framerates tank in Crysis? Yes, those are exactly the things we're going to show you.

While in no way unexpected it was nice to see it all laid out. I especially liked the fact that you could get a PII system with xfire or sli for the same price as an i7 and crush it.

I still love my i7 no matter what.

 

[Druid]

Yeah, I'm thinking about getting that ArmA II, but I'm worried I won't be able to play at high/very high detail @ 1920x1200. I think I'm going to get the demo. Exactly how much would OCing help with it?

Anyway, yeah, i7 definitely expected to win.

 

[Nubbleet]

You should be able to play at pretty good settings with your 285. And OC'ing to maybe low-mid 3's would probably give you a slightly noticeable performance increase.

 

[Apokalipse]

Conclusion: if you are building a PC for games, the performance increase you get from an i7 isn't anything to write home about, especially considering the Phenom II's can be had for significantly less money.

If money is no issue, the i7 is the CPU to get. Though for most people, money is an issue. And in that case, the Phenom II provides the best performance per dollar for gaming PC's.

 

[Hefemeister]

Well the way I look at it for gaming, With the money saved with a PII system you could spend that on a second or better first gpu. With that in mind a PII gaming rig sounds very exciting. I do a lot of number crunching so for that I like my i7, but my opinion had been slightly altered for a $1,200 build.

 

[Slaymate]

The numbers just don't look consistant to me. And what resolutions and settings are they using.

While I have no doubt that the PII makes a fine gaming rig, the overclocked results shown above makes me question the integrity of the data.

 

[zmatt]

In several places the Core i7 won by double digits. That's about the percentage break between two processor generations, which sounds about right when you consider the capabilities of both chips. The Phenom tended to win in games that were a bit older, that leads me to believe that some of the improvements that are present in the core i7 are not being taken advantage of here. Where it won in double digits were in newer/ higher budget engines. Vantage also paints an interesting picture. It tells us that as parallelism is better embraced by the developers the i7 will only get faster. I think this showed us exactly what we have known all along.

 

[Druid]

Yeah, I dled the demo. I can get everything maxed except AA and AF. I have AA at high and AF at normal with a draw distance of over 4000 m. My fps is in the upper 30's. I'm only in the training part, so I'm not going to turn anything else up until I know how this runs with a bunch of AI and bullets everywhere. Yeah, I need to stop being lazy and learn how to OC.

What is this parallelism you speak of?