Gaming on Haswell

J

Jeff G

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 2, 2017
Messages
234
I'm piecing together a Haswell build for a buddy who wants to get in to pc gaming but doesnt have a ton of money (which is why I chose something that didnt require ddr4).
A few ram questions for you ram pros:
Is 8gb "enough"? Or should I aim for 16gb?
Is there going to be any noticeable performance difference between 2x8gb and 4x4gb sets in a dual channel setup? (Or 2x4gb vs 4x2gb if I go 8gb total)
Should I prioritize speed/timings over quantity? (8gb higher speed vs 16gb slower)
 
8g is enough for most games if the background is kept trim with bare minimum apps open
for those that go a little over 8g there will be a few loading stutters while it waits on files to come from the hdd unless texture detail is lowered a notch
at this stage games dont need much over 8g but this will get worse as more demanding games come out

ram speed affects cpu efficency so higher frequency and tighter timings can increase cpu performance around 15%
so in a cpu bound game that only needs 8g ram or less faster ram is better
while in a gpu bound game that wants over 8g ram then more ram is better
in a cpu bound game that wants over 8g ram well...

provided you have at least two sticks of ram performance doenst really change with 4 although it can reduce the max ram overclock
 
This will be going in a 1231v3 build, so it looks like I'm limited to 1600 at best. 2x4gb of 1666 c7 looks about right at my price point, would those be a good match?
 
Don't lose sleep over RAM timings - it really doesn't matter that much for Haswell.

8GB in a 2x4GB configuration will be perfectly fine for what you are doing.
 
1600 is the max supported speed by the cpu memory controller but depending on the mb it should have no problem running 2400 which is a minor overclock

with a [email protected] in arma3 which is a cpu bound game
1600c8 57.5fps
1600c9 55fps
1600c11 50.7fps

haswell will scale similar with tighter timings
but at stock clocks the scaling will be less as the cpu becomes more starved for memory speed at higher frequency

ddr3 is more expensive here than ddr4 are you buying the ram secondhand? if so its more a matter of what you can get at a good price
for a old cpu its not really worth paying much extra for higher speeds
 
Last edited:
dasa said:
1600 is the max supported speed by the cpu memory controller but depending on the mb it should have no problem running 2400 which is a minor overclock

with a [email protected] in arma3 which is a cpu bound game
1600c8 57.5fps
1600c9 55fps
1600c11 50.7fps

haswell will scale similar with tighter timings
but at stock clocks the scaling will be less as the cpu becomes more starved for memory speed at higher frequency

ddr3 is more expensive here than ddr4 are you buying the ram secondhand? if so its more a matter of what you can get at a good price
for a old cpu its not really worth paying much extra for higher speeds
Click to expand...

Most games will only see 1FPS or so difference -- it just doesn't matter enough to warrant much concern -- 1FPS is indistinguishable in play - and most of these games see 1FPS delta -- or less.
https://www.anandtech.com/show/7364/memory-scaling-on-haswell/7
 
1fps when gpu bound
ram speed only affects the cpu performance not the gpu
in those anandtech tests they could oc the cpu to 10ghz and still only see 1fps difference
 
Gpu bound? Take a look at the resolution they used. It’s low at 1360x768. (Just a hair above 720p). That serves to help eliminate GPU bottleneck.
 
in some games it may eliminate the gpu bottlneck but not all especially when using such a slow old gpu as a 6950 a lot of games would still be gpu bound
 
Jeff G said:
Is 8gb "enough"? Or should I aim for 16gb?
Click to expand...

8GB is still more than plenty for gaming.

Jeff G said:
Is there going to be any noticeable performance difference between 2x8gb and 4x4gb sets in a dual channel setup? (Or 2x4gb vs 4x2gb if I go 8gb total)
Click to expand...

None what-so-ever. You wouldn't even be able to tell if someone was using identical hardware with a 2x8GB kit or a 4x4GB kit.

Jeff G said:
Should I prioritize speed/timings over quantity? (8gb higher speed vs 16gb slower)
Click to expand...

Same as above. None what-so-ever. You wouldn't be able to tell the difference at all.

Get the cheapest set of RAM you can afford for your friend. Spend most of the money on a better GPU as that's going to be the single piece of hardware that will change the gaming experience along with a good monitor.
 
as you can see the difference can be a lot more than 1fps with haswell and very noticeable but fallout4 1333 vs 2400 for is a extreme example being a horribly optimized game
https://www.techspot.com/review/1089-fallout-4-benchmarks/page6.html
RAM.png


here is some of the more recent tests i have run
http://www.overclock.net/t/1611359/...3-1600c11-2133c9-ddr4-2133c15-3000c12-4000c17
LL


open world games tend to see larger gains from ram speed than narrow corridor games
i guess this is because they are more random in nature its harder to predict what the cpu will need preloaded into the cache when it goes looking for it so it then has to wait on the data to come from the ram
this is why the 5775c with 128m l4 cache is faster than the 7700k in some games despite being clocked significantly lower and what should be a lower ipc
 
So can the 1231v3 run higher than 1600? Sorry, Im a ram noob. Overclocling cpu/gpu are no problem for me, but I've never messed with ram. Willing to learn though, so don't hold back. The mobo is a Gigabyte B85 if that matters.
 
yes the mb matters
b85 cant be overclocked so 1600 is the max
aim for c9 but if c7\8 is the same price go for it
try to avoid c10\c11 unless there half the price

what gpu and monitor are you looking to pair with it?
 
Nice way to cherry pick synthetic benchmarks to back up your claims.

Gaming and RAM speed hasn't mattered with Intel since Sandy Bridge. Period.
 
dasa said:
yes the mb matters
b85 cant be overclocked so 1600 is the max
aim for c9 but if c7\8 is the same price go for it
try to avoid c10\c11 unless there half the price

what gpu and monitor are you looking to pair with it?
Click to expand...

Gtx 970 and a 27" 1080p monitor.
 
Haswell and that 970 will be a nice balanced system and just fine. Suggest at least 8gb of ddr3 1600 cas9 and roll with it. My last build, which I still run some, has a xeon 1275L v3 Haswell and a 980 with 16gb of ddr3 2133 and it still rips. The Asus z97i mobo its on has no issue running the ram at 2133 despite the Xeon 'supporting' 1600 officially. Ram speed is more mobo/ram specific in my experience. The CPU memory controller plays a part also but for the money grab some 1600 cas9 ddr3 which is super common and don't sweat it.

GL with the build!
 
+1 to what TheHig said

Skillz said:
Nice way to cherry pick synthetic benchmarks to back up your claims.

Gaming and RAM speed hasn't mattered with Intel since Sandy Bridge. Period.
Click to expand...
There gameplay not synthetic you cant even run a time demo in fallout.

As for cherry picking sure but the same could be said for anyone using anandtech cpu\ram benchmark results as a example https://www.anandtech.com/bench/CPU/1106
Sure there testing one of the games from there ram review at 1080p not 1360x768 but the gpu there using is also twice as powerful and they still have a G3420 beating the 4930K simply due to margin of error with a gpu bottlneck

RAM speed has always mattered to games that need a faster CPU Period!
Sure it matters less in some games than others but usually slow vs fast ram makes more difference than overclocking the cpu
The only game i have found so far that sees larger gains from overclocking the cpu than the ram is crysis 3

Fine you want a few more examples
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/d...it-finally-time-to-upgrade-your-core-i5-2500k
https://www.hardocp.com/article/201...76700k_ipc_overclocking_review/6#.VkkDoeJrsUl
https://www.techspot.com/article/1171-ddr4-4000-mhz-performance/page3.
http://www.overclock.net/t/1487162/...affect-fps-during-high-cpu-overhead-scenarios

If you would like to take the time to run some tests on your system to see for yourself or if you would like me to do the same im more than happy to
 
Last edited:
Dude in the vast majority of games there is very little difference. I'd agree you cherry picked 2 games where it is probably the biggest delta. Even in one of your links the difference is 1-6 fps between 1600 and 2400 for like 6 different games.
 
No just the vast majority of reviews are badly done not giving any indication of how badly gpu limited the section of gameplay they tested is or what timings were used

Keep in mind just because a game is gpu limited in the part benchmarked doesn't mean it is for all the game
Battlefield for example often benchmarked in sp ether on a jet flight or tram ride where a dual core is capable of ~150fps while in a large mp map a quad core can struggle to maintain 60fps and the dual core will stutter to around 30fps

That last link I take it your referring to with 1-6fps is using quad channel memory and 1600c8 vs 2400c11 not 1600c11 vs 2400c10 but most the tests are still about a 10% gain which stacks with whatever % increase you get from overclocking the cpu so say 20% total
ether one on there own may not be that noticeable but together they are

Dual channel systems typically see ~10-20% gain from faster ram when they hit a cpu limited section of the game as shown in the eurogamer article where they tested 5 of the most graphically advanced games available
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top