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Whats with pricing on the i3 stuff?

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PaperclipGod

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 31, 2011
Messages
368
The 2130 looks like it could be a great budget chip, but its priced ridiculously: $140 at newegg, when the 2500k is just $60 more.
 
PaperclipGod said:
The 2130 looks like it could be a great budget chip, but its priced ridiculously: $140 at newegg, when the 2500k is just $60 more.
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That price competitive with the high end AMD quad core chips (955 to 980). And yes I mean quad core. The i3 will win in most game benchmarks while the AMD quad core Phenom X4s will win when the application uses more than 3 threads.
 
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drescherjm said:
That price competitive with the high end AMD quad core chips (955 to 980). And yes I mean quad core. The i3 will win in most game benchmarks while the AMD quad core Phenom X4s will win when the application uses more than 3 threads.
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more than 3 threads or 3 or more threads? just to be clear lol
 
I've been running an i3 2100 in my lan machine for a few months and i'll tell you it was worth the $100 I paid for it. I came from a i5 2500k on my main machine and for the extra money I can't even tell a difference in gaming. You just dont get the fun of overclocking and all that jazz.

All in all the i3 series serves a purpose. Low budget, lower power, low heat. Honestly I had a hard time breaking 50c with the stock cooler. I idle at around 20c with water. I really would recommend the i3's over any AMD chip except maybe some of the higher then hex core chips. But if you're spending that kind of money might as well get an i5-i7. Just my 2c.
 
DeathPrincess said:
Probably not. Why would they release a "enthusiast" unlocked "budget" chip? They want people to buy at least the 2500k for that.
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And if they did, the price difference between an i3 K and an i5 K would so narrow, that probably 99% of shoppers would just end up getting the i5 K, anyway.
 
EQWoody said:
I've been running an i3 2100 in my lan machine for a few months and i'll tell you it was worth the $100 I paid for it. I came from a i5 2500k on my main machine and for the extra money I can't even tell a difference in gaming. You just dont get the fun of overclocking and all that jazz.

All in all the i3 series serves a purpose. Low budget, lower power, low heat. Honestly I had a hard time breaking 50c with the stock cooler. I idle at around 20c with water. I really would recommend the i3's over any AMD chip except maybe some of the higher then hex core chips. But if you're spending that kind of money might as well get an i5-i7. Just my 2c.
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Using the 212+ here (decided to back down to the 2105 until Ivy Bridge), and when I'm running IntelBurnTest, temps only increase by like 6-9 c. Totally, I'm 12 degrees above room temperature, and the HSF is always cold to the touch.

Granted, I don't have a GPU in this computer yet, and when it is in I don't doubt it will increase temps by a bit. But I'm impressed by how cool this thing runs.
 
been using an i3-2100 as my first comp build in years since the old Pentium 3's. Budget gaming build to mirror TomsHardware last summer.
i3-2100 (Stock Heatsink/fan)
2x4GB DDR 1333 Patrior Gamer G2 RAM
H61 ASRock iCafe board
500gb 7200rpm Sata3 drive.
HEC BLitz Mid Tower Case

All for $389 after MIR's from NEWEGG. I added a 5750 XFX card and I load/install and perform just as well as my friends $700 build with his Z68/i7-2600k and 16GB ram.

For gaming..budget, and lower heat/power consumtion , i find the i3's are excellent. No regrets on this setup at all!
 
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pelo said:
Intel's releasing graphic-less Sandy chips soon. I'd wager they cost less than their current stock as well, but how much less, idunno ;)

http://vr-zone.com/articles/intel-to-launch-graphics-less-sandy-bridge-cpus/14387.html
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Intel pricing is purely value driven i.e. they will price it at what the market bears.
Even now they have chips which has the internal graphics disabled.
The new cores will just reduce their costs but I very much doubt the pricing will be different from the cores which have do not have the graphics enabled.
 
DejaWiz said:
And if they did, the price difference between an i3 K and an i5 K would so narrow, that probably 99% of shoppers would just end up getting the i5 K, anyway.
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Until the current i3-focussed offer at MicroCenter, the i5-K-based bundles have definitely NOT done i3 any favors at all. (In fact, the i5-K bundleage chased *me* away from i3 - and I'm an admitted cheapskate.)

Absent bundleage, prices between i3 and i5-K have an $80 spread (that spread doesn't even differ much, regardless of whether the r/etailer has a retail presence or not). Bundles based around a particular CPU (and let's face it - it's usually been a K-series CPU, if not i5-K exclusively) have cut it by at least half, if not erased it altogether. Unless your budget is that tight, even if you're a cheapskate, why wouldn't you buy a quad-core CPU for basically a dual-core price?
 
^ Exactly. Therefore, it makes very little sense for Intel to introduce an i3 K that would narrow the price spread between it and the i5 K. Smart marketing, Intel. Smart marketing.
 
The new cores will just reduce their costs but I very much doubt the pricing will be different from the cores which have do not have the graphics enabled.
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Well since you will not be able to do Intel's quick sync thing, I'm sure they will be cheaper, otherwise no one would buy one.

I personally am pretty satisfied with Intel's pricing, I'm sure they have nice margin's, but I paid $205 for my 2500k from Newegg, and there there really is no faster processor for 98% of games out. Ivy bridge sounds like it will be just as reasonable, doesn't feel like price gouging to me at least. Really and i3 will handle any game out on reasonable settings and is probably more than most users really need.

Of course ARM cpu's don't look like they are too far out from handling the majority of common tasks well, and they are 1/10th the price.
 
The 2100s are disappointing in price. It was the reason I chose an older $90 i3 540 over a $125+ i3 2100 chip. I got 4.2ghz out of the 540 at 1.34v load, which I'm sure is quicker than the 2100s at stock. Plus I also get HT and onboard graphics (though not as good as SB graphics, I don't care). If there was an unlocked SB dual with HT for around $150, I would have really considered. But nope. :(

But I can understand why Intel is doing this. (Thanks AMD)
 
Intels CPU's are sweet (thanks Intel). I had to go AMD this time around, and get 4 cores for 80 bucks, really wish I had a Dual Core i3 that doesn't OC for the Game of The Year BF3.

Oh well just have to enjoy my OC'd X4, but I sure wish I would have spent more in hindsight on the i3 sense it has 2 cores and I only have 4 cores with AMD. I could be rocking minimum settings with the i3, but recommended settings with my X4 is good too! And sense I had money leftover I got a 2GB 560Ti instead of a 1GB 560Ti...really wish I had the 1GB card now also. (thanks Intel)
 
blade52x said:
But I can understand why Intel is doing this. (Thanks AMD)
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If you think that price point is an indication of lack of competition... take a look at the 3930k; a mere $400 from the Extreme Edition 3960X. If I decide to go for an X79 build, I won't bother shelling out the $600 for the 3930K, I would go striaght for the 3960X; specially since some forum users are letting them go for like $800-900.


PS: Sorry if I thread jacked.
 
teletran8 said:
Intels CPU's are sweet (thanks Intel). I had to go AMD this time around, and get 4 cores for 80 bucks, really wish I had a Dual Core i3 that doesn't OC for the Game of The Year BF3.

Oh well just have to enjoy my OC'd X4, but I sure wish I would have spent more in hindsight on the i3 sense it has 2 cores and I only have 4 cores with AMD. I could be rocking minimum settings with the i3, but recommended settings with my X4 is good too! And sense I had money leftover I got a 2GB 560Ti instead of a 1GB 560Ti...really wish I had the 1GB card now also. (thanks Intel)
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Wow!
You do get a "Troll of the month" award for this one....:rolleyes:
 
blade52x said:
The 2100s are disappointing in price. It was the reason I chose an older $90 i3 540 over a $125+ i3 2100 chip. I got 4.2ghz out of the 540 at 1.34v load, which I'm sure is quicker than the 2100s at stock. Plus I also get HT and onboard graphics (though not as good as SB graphics, I don't care). If there was an unlocked SB dual with HT for around $150, I would have really considered. But nope. :(

But I can understand why Intel is doing this. (Thanks AMD)
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Your situation is plausible. My situation is different: I paid $100 for my particular i3-2100 chip, only to get caught flat-footed by the auxiliary system running Premiere Pro CS5.5 itch. In that instance, at MC, paying the extra $50 for a true quad-core i5-2400 or the extra $80 for the 2500K would make a lot more sense.
 
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teletran8 said:
Intels CPU's are sweet (thanks Intel). I had to go AMD this time around, and get 4 cores for 80 bucks, really wish I had a Dual Core i3 that doesn't OC for the Game of The Year BF3.

Oh well just have to enjoy my OC'd X4, but I sure wish I would have spent more in hindsight on the i3 sense it has 2 cores and I only have 4 cores with AMD. I could be rocking minimum settings with the i3, but recommended settings with my X4 is good too! And sense I had money leftover I got a 2GB 560Ti instead of a 1GB 560Ti...really wish I had the 1GB card now also. (thanks Intel)
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You know what's also sweet? Having a job and being able to afford an Intel quad AND a 2gb video card... :p

No but seriously, I needed a setup that was very similar to my e3-1230 live server. I considered an AMD X4 but I wanted the setup and performance to be as similar as possible. I didn't want any surprises. Plus I only needed a dual since I only run a single VM for testing on the i3.

As far as GOTY BF3 goes, I have my 2500k for that. ;)
 
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blade52x said:
The 2100s are disappointing in price. It was the reason I chose an older $90 i3 540 over a $125+ i3 2100 chip. I got 4.2ghz out of the 540 at 1.34v load, which I'm sure is quicker than the 2100s at stock. Plus I also get HT and onboard graphics (though not as good as SB graphics, I don't care). If there was an unlocked SB dual with HT for around $150, I would have really considered. But nope. :(

But I can understand why Intel is doing this. (Thanks AMD)
Click to expand...

you can get the i3-2100 now for $99 at Microcenter online and other sites, plus Newegg has put it on for $109 after rebate and promo code. Either way its great for budget. I still stand neck and neck with my friends i7-2600k and he has no perfomance gain over his setup then mine. I choose the savings on the cpu so i can be able to put the higher end videocard. Integrated graphics held me over for about 3 weeks then i had to get something.

But all in all. its a $100 chip, can the AMD sub $125 chips perform as well? Prolly not at the moment, the first gen i3 processors are great to OC, but not worrying about the OCaspect due to it being a budget gaming pc. I would only think about getting an 1156 chip and mobo if i could get it for dirt cheap. Just previous gen stuff shouldn't cost the same as the current...IMO.
 
blade52x said:
You know what's also sweet? Having a job and being able to afford an Intel quad AND a 2gb video card... :p

No but seriously, I needed a setup that was very similar to my e3-1230 live server. I considered an AMD X4 but I wanted the setup and performance to be as similar as possible. I didn't want any surprises. Plus I only needed a dual since I only run a single VM for testing on the i3.

As far as GOTY BF3 goes, I have my 2500k for that. ;)
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Keep telling yourself that.
 
i3 pricing is kind of high but whatever. Intel made up for it with great pricing on the 2500K. I'm probably even going to buy the IB replacement because of the high resale value of Intel chips and that I'm close to a Microcenter.


and teletran, sense and since mean two different things.
 
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