Intel Core i7 and Gaming @ [H]

I'm hoping to pick up a 980x and have it last 3 years as having top grunt in gaming/encoding.
 
clay17dog said:
The 980x looks awesome, too bad I will never afford one till it goes lower than $1000. Hopefully AMDs 6 core will be cheap as their flagship processor.

I can't believe we already have 6 cores, I would like to see how many cores processors have 20 years from now.
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I believe Intel has like already developed a 80 core cpu that it donated to universities and government for testing. So six cores is nothing. In a few years time I bet they'll have 100 - 200 cores on a cpu!

They just hold out until like AMD comes out with an eight core they'll be ready with a twelve core, and so on...
 
I just purchased an i7-965 from him and dropped a gigabyte board in my machine. ALready have the cpu at 3.6GHz. Damn I love those unlocked multiplier's :)
 
moshpit said:
Dawn of War 2 loves Core i7, yet ANOTHER RTS game showing difference in favor of quads over duals and i7 over all. This is exactly what I said would happen. Notice the i7 920 at stock matches the average FPS of a E8500 at 3.6Ghz and beats the minimum frame rate by a fair amount. HAHAHAHAHAHA! I love that :D
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I wouldn't get too happy in your happy pants just yet. Evidently, the performance gains from a quad core CPU in Dawn of War 2 can be attributed to the architecture, cache and clock speed of the processor(s) rather than the use of the extra cores.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010/07/05/how-many-cpu-cores-do-games-need/8

CPU usage of this game is not evenly distributed across all 4 units. It taps out 1 core then burdens a second with the remaining 2 cores are pretty much twiddling their thumbs.

Don't worry, I laughed too. CPU's :rolleyes:
 
Seriously.

These CPU's are so awesome. :D

I've test-overclocked my 920 and it hits 4.1Ghz on my diminuative Shuttle XPC air cooler, though not stably, so I know there is room in there if I need it.

The thing is, I don't.

I don't have a single application or game that shows a noticable improvement from overclocking the i7-920.

On my overclocked GTX470 (752mhz, cant remember RAM right now) Metro 2033, Just Cause 2, Half Life 2 Episodes, Resident Evil 5 (and plenty of less demanding titles) show no differece in framerate overclocked at 3.6Ghz, vs. stock at 2.667...

Since I don't really care about the bragging rights (I'm a functional overclocker) I've ust left it at stock for now, as the fan is quieter.
 
pcgamer420 said:
All I know is I have seen a massive boost in gaming performance with my 2 gtx 260c216 cards after going i7 920 @ 3.8 with megahalems cooling. All this stable at 2.16vcore. This is coming from the same two cards in sli with a q6600 before. Everything about my gaming experience is better, from load times to big battle number crunching fps finales. Yeah it's true that supcom and wic saw the best gains but you're shitting me if you say there's no difference in fps games!
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sold. i have a similar system - q6600 and single 460gtx. i planned on getting another 460gtx but knew lurking underneath that i would eventually have to boost the cpu. thanks for your post :)
 
OC is more for benching with this quad core chips once you get over a certain clock rate gaming has no effect
 
man cant wait to get my build finally finished!

btw are all extreme i7s unlocked?

965
975
980x
 
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Zarathustra[H];1036260922 said:
Civilization II ran just fine on my 486 sx25 with 8 megs of ram and Windows 3.1, thank you :p
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Haha... too many sequels in that list... thumb got stuck typing 'II' :p

Edited. ;)
 
What kind of temps are fairly normal for a stock i7 950? I'm running a Zalman cooler (the older 92mm fan style) with AS5 but with all stock speeds/voltages. Seeing like 54-56c in demanding games.. seems a little high, but everything runs OK. Haven't tried overclocking at all yet. Also my case cooling is definitely subpar, just one 80mm exhaust fan.
 
Colonel Sanders said:
What kind of temps are fairly normal for a stock i7 950? I'm running a Zalman cooler (the older 92mm fan style) with AS5 but with all stock speeds/voltages. Seeing like 54-56c in demanding games.. seems a little high, but everything runs OK. Haven't tried overclocking at all yet. Also my case cooling is definitely subpar, just one 80mm exhaust fan.
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I have higher temps at load, but I also have a compact SFF case with built in small, silent cooler.

The i7's are better at withstanding heat than previous CPU's though. They don't start thermal throttling until they hit ~100C (the exact number is an Intel trade secret)
 
I'm running a q9550 at 4.1ghz, 6gb of RAM and don't plan on moving up to Sandy Bridge right away...probably not for a year after release. Would a i5/i7 870 be a wise upgrade if I'm looking to get another 2 years out of my rig? I do a lot of gaming and desktop use...crossfire and all that jazz....I can have my rig sold right now for close to retail prices as well, so upgrade would be a minimal investment.
 
thanks for all the input about the clock speed not effecting game play with a i7 920, maybe I will down clock mine back to 3.2 ghz.
 
raveux said:
I'm running a q9550 at 4.1ghz, 6gb of RAM and don't plan on moving up to Sandy Bridge right away...probably not for a year after release. Would a i5/i7 870 be a wise upgrade if I'm looking to get another 2 years out of my rig? I do a lot of gaming and desktop use...crossfire and all that jazz....I can have my rig sold right now for close to retail prices as well, so upgrade would be a minimal investment.
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Since your also looking at a mobo and ram purchase (Socket change from 775 to 1156) I would wait and see the reviews and pricing after SB releases. The current 1156 series would probably be a minimal performance gain to your surrent system.
 
I would go with the Core i7 950, microcenter has a great price on these right now..
 
nice to see the i7 920 hold its own after so long. Only reason Im thinking of SB2011 is for folding, as games dont even stress my cpu
 
SpeedyVV said:
u need a 2nd 460 as much as I need a 920.v:(
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a gtx460 is fine for my 1080p monitor, maybe when seasonic finally releases their x1000+ psus I can get another gtx460 and then get 2 more monitors haha
 
Would love to see one of the new 6 core extremes.
But with the cost, I'll prob. have to wait 3-4 years till a few new
cpu's have been out to buy one, got my last EE edition (p4 3.7)
for $199 a few years after the core 2 duo's came out.
 
SSimmons05 said:
Would love to see one of the new 6 core extremes.
But with the cost, I'll prob. have to wait 3-4 years till a few new
cpu's have been out to buy one, got my last EE edition (p4 3.7)
for $199 a few years after the core 2 duo's came out.
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The C2D would of rocked the P4EE@6GHz even.
 
Interesting SC2 results up there. I'm getting 33FPS out of my [email protected] and a flashed 6950, almost identical to what he's getting.Glad to see SB will help out a bunch there, Amazing how CPU intensive that game is!

I was also surprised at Black Ops, which will run all 4 cores at max throughout gaming. I'm keen to see what SB does for me there, too.
 
It would appear that the Q6600's time is close at hand. I think there's still just enough time to wait for a good motherboard to come along for a new build, though, no need to rush in just yet.
 
i had a C2D system and up graded the cpu to a Q9550.it improved game play some.then i thought why not build my X58 system so i got the asus rampage extreme III and a I7 950 and it is amazing how much better everything works and plays..i plan on a sandy bridge build this winter or next spring.
 
patchesanook said:
i had a C2D system and up graded the cpu to a Q9550.it improved game play some.then i thought why not build my X58 system so i got the asus rampage extreme III and a I7 950 and it is amazing how much better everything works and plays..i plan on a sandy bridge build this winter or next spring.
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Might as well wait for ivy bridge if you are going to upgrade from a x58, that way you get the extra pci-e lanes.
 
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