Looking for a cpu for gaming

deceit

Between the e8400-8500 or the q9300-q9450. Which would be the best cpu for games and which would be the best value one? Havent upgraded my computer in awhile so not sure anymore which is the best way to spend my cash. The rest of the system so far is.
p5e3 ws x38 motherboard ddr3
4gb ddr pc10666 ram
8800gt 512mb (will be a 4870 soon)
150gb raptors * 2
780watt psu
Gaming would be the main thing i use the pc for but as have two monitors always on, on it i usually have 1 or more programs on the other screen while playing games.
At the moment am only really playing games like conan, unreal tournament 3 and supreme commander but would really like to try out Crysis.

Tails142

The general consensus is that currently dual core is better for gaming.

The majority of games out now are programmed to operate on a single core. So when comparing a dual core to a quad core on these games the dual core will come out ahead of the single core due to the higher clock speed. I.e. at similarly priced dual core running at 3.16ghz is better than a quad core running at 2.6ghz.

HOWEVER!

It really depends on how soon you're going to replace your CPU. I think in the next two years we'll see more games coming out that are multithreaded and by three year the majority of games will be multithreaded. So if you're not planning on upgrading your CPU after 3 years a quad core now might be the way to go.

It depends really though on the games that come out, currently CPU's are not the bottlenecks that are holding things back, its always GFX cards, I would say get an economical dual core now for 180 quid like the E8400/8500 and then in a couple of years you can always upgrade to a quad core if the games of the future demand them.

PogMoThoin

I've found with a dual core under windows You have to monitor what launches itself at startup to maintain full speed of your pc. With a quad, like i got now, there is absolutely no need to monitor startup items, You never feel it slow at all. I've then overclocked the quad to 3.2Ghz to have the best of both worlds, 4 cores and a high clockspeed

zonEEE

e8400

Nforce

The E8400/8500 will clock much higher and with lower temps than quads. I've managed 4.4GHZ with an E8500, or 4.2GHZ for 24/7 use.:)

PogMoThoin

Nforce wrote: »

The E8400/8500 will clock much higher and with lower temps than quads. I've managed 4.4GHZ with an E8500, or 4.2GHZ for 24/7 use.:)

No game requires 4.4Ghz, all games will run fine on anything greater than 2.4Ghz. Needing 4.4Ghz is just for e-penis points. My advise is to get a quad and clock it to 3.0-3.2Ghz and have the best of both worlds.

Sqaull20

PogMoThoin wrote: »

No game requires 4.4Ghz, all games will run fine on anything greater than 2.4Ghz. Needing 4.4Ghz is just for e-penis points. My advise is to get a quad and clock it to 3.0-3.2Ghz and have the best of both worlds.

Agree I have went through some pretty fast dual core cpu's ( E8400, x6800, e6850 etc ) and have went above 4ghz on two of them, they still cant touch a quad @ 3.40ghz imo.

You can burn a dvd, do a virus scan, play a game all at the same time without slowdown or no bottleneck with an overclocked Quad.Same can not be said for Dual.Video encoding is a breeze as well.

If your going for a dual go for a cheap one like e2180 or e7200 and overclock the **** out of it, they are only you do need for games, as 1920 x 1200+ is all about the gpu anyway, cpu doesnt even come in to it.

Getting a e8400 for the same price as Q6600 doesnt make much sense to me.

Nforce

PogMoThoin wrote: »

No game requires 4.4Ghz, all games will run fine on anything greater than 2.4Ghz. Needing 4.4Ghz is just for e-penis points. My advise is to get a quad and clock it to 3.0-3.2Ghz and have the best of both worlds.

Try running Flight Sim X...or almost any other sim. All of these are bottle necked by the CPU:rolleyes:

PogMoThoin

Nforce wrote: »

Try running Flight Sim X...or almost any other sim. All of these are bottle necked by the CPU:rolleyes:

Bad example, Flight sim X is multi-threaded, runs better on a quad than a dual core actually. Runs fine on my rig with a quad at 3.2Ghz, much better than it did on my old dual core at 3.6Ghz

Nforce

FSX is predominately a single core application...since SP1/2 it can utilise multicore processors to a small degree (eg for terrain ,textures etc). Check your CPU usage in Task Manager.