i5 vs i7 - Why is i5 better? + Water Cooling.

[TheDiscPriest]

Hey, im looking over some parts for my computer and i was doing a bit of research on the CPU.
Now people are saying the intel core i5 is better then the i7 for gaming. Why is this?

Also; i will be looking to overclock my system, would water cooling be better advised?

PS: this is my first time building a PC and im not overly smart in this area, but do have some knowledge, so please dont use to many high tech terms

[Deleted]

Wow dosn't support hyperthreading, which the i7 use.

[Deleted]

i5 and i7 are merely the names on the CPUs. It's not so black and white as i7 is always > to i5, as there are plenty of i5 CPUs out there that outperform i7s.

In terms on i7 2600k vs i5 2500k, you will not see a noticeable difference in current generation of games, because very few of these support the i7s hyper-threading technique (which basically, at least to my understanding, means that there are two lines in/out to each core resulting in 4 additional, virtual cores).

[Deleted]

-The difference between i5 2500k and i7 2600k in applications that do not support HT is close to non-existent. If you plan on video rendering and similar, then you'll notice a difference.
-as for overclocking, you are totally fine with a high-end air cooling solution (Noctua NH-D14 or similar). That one cools better than a corsair h70 (closed loop water cooling system).

[Deleted]

Also; i will be looking to overclock my system, would water cooling be better advised?

If it is your first build ever, and you don't feel that knowledgeable about computers, I wouldn't recommend going for a custom loop, as that can be pretty expensive and well, a bit tricky to set up (however, if you really want to do this there are great guides on the internet as well as great people on this forum with experience that I think will be happy to assist you).

Check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6qpkigby5w

A nice middle-ground is to get a cooler from Corsairs hydro series. I believe the H70 has had some nice reviews and praise.

[vesseblah]

Now people are saying the intel core i5 is better then the i7 for gaming. Why is this?

i7 does not offer anything that benefit games, therefore the extra money spent on it is wasted. It's mostly a cost/benefit thing instead of i5's being better. Also in some few games the Hyperthreading which separates i5 and i7 lines will actually make games run slower, WoW should be fixed now but it can in some cases slow down on i7.

Also; i will be looking to overclock my system, would water cooling be better advised?

PS: this is my first time building a PC and

For regular overclocking you should get good quality air cooler instead. Real water cooling systems can cost well over $500 and if you buy some kit like the Corsair H70 it does not have any benefits over regular air cooler except that it leaves more room on motherboard for easier memory installation later, but requires more room around the motherboard to fit properly into some cases.

[Deleted]

I believe the H70 has had some nice reviews and praise.

In terms of cooling performance and price, it is outdone by high-end air cooling solutions.

[Dexiefy]

Hey, im looking over some parts for my computer and i was doing a bit of research on the CPU.
Now people are saying the intel core i5 is better then the i7 for gaming. Why is this?

Also; i will be looking to overclock my system, would water cooling be better advised?

PS: this is my first time building a PC and im not overly smart in this area, but do have some knowledge, so please dont use to many high tech terms

as ppl mentioned. Difference between i5 and i7 usually is hyper threading, higher clocks on i7 and cache.
Im assuming you are looking at i7-2600k and i5-2500k as no other processors are worth buying atm. If your rig is to be mostly for gaming then i5 is the way to go cause 100mhz and hyper threading arent worth the money for You.
Hyper threading basicly illuminates cores. 4 core processor this way has 8 cores. 4 physical and 4 virtual, which helps alot in 3d rendering enviorment and such but not in gaming. We barely entered era where games take advantage of 4 cores and will take a while before they start using more to their full potential.

When it comes to cooling go for noctua nh-d14. EAsily the best air cooler out there that matches entry lvl custom loop systems. However there is no hassle with assembling whole kit or maintaining it. Especially as You say You aint really pc geek ;]

A nice middle-ground is to get a cooler from Corsairs hydro series. I believe the H70 has had some nice reviews and praise.

h70 is more expensive than noctua nh-d14 while providing worse temperatures. Also fans on h70 are epic crap and are loud as leaf blowers.
NH-D14 is basicly THE BEST cooler out there you can get before custom water loop

[Deleted]

In terms of cooling performance and price, it is outdone by high-end air cooling solutions.

Well, if the guy wants to try out watercooling the H70 is a great place to start. Judging by his post however I'd probably too recommend him to go for air where he will get better price/performance.

---------- Post added 2011-07-17 at 09:26 AM ----------

Im assuming you are looking at i7-2600k and i5-2500k as no other processors are worth buying atm.

That is completely false.

[Shinryu]

Random question, any plausible estimates on when this hyper threading thing would end up being used en mass for videogames?

[Deleted]

Random question, any plausible estimates on when this hyper threading thing would end up being used en mass for videogames?

Impossible to say really. Probably never, as HT is all about virtual cores and I don't think games in their current nature would benefit much even if optimized (I'm no game dev though). Wild guess? About the same time we see 8 core processors being as much "the norm" as dual cores are today - then cheap alternatives would maybe be 4 cores with HT enabled.

[TheDiscPriest]

Thanks for the reply guys.
I guess i will go with the i5, as it is cheaper and if the extra functionality is not used, then not point me wasting the extra money on it.
and yeah, as you guessed i was talking about i7-2600k and i5-2500k.

If Noctua NH-D14 does the job, then i will stick with air cooling.
thanks for the reply's

[Deleted]

If Noctua NH-D14 does the job, then i will stick with air cooling.

It will do the job just fine - and then some. Just make sure you got enough space for it as it is one of the larger heatsinks/fans you can get.

[TheDiscPriest]

It will do the job just fine - and then some. Just make sure you got enough space for it as it is one of the larger heatsinks/fans you can get.

im looking to get this;
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B001EPUQAE

[Deleted]

im looking to get this;
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B001EPUQAE

Fairly certain there will be enough headroom in that case (http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/280165-10-will-case). The NH D14 has a height of 160mm with the fans in place.

If not, a nice alternative (if you want to stick to Noctua) would be the NH-C14.

Edit: also, have a look here: http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=compatibility_ram_gen&products_id=34&lng=en#DDR3

[TheDiscPriest]

Fairly certain there will be enough headroom in that case. If not, a nice alternative (if you want to stick to Noctua) would be the NH-C14.

Yeah im thinking it should fit, but if not i will try out the C14.
thanks for that.

[Djinni]

Random question, any plausible estimates on when this hyper threading thing would end up being used en mass for videogames?

When we stop producing dual cores "en mass".

There's little point investing time and money optimising a game for the small portion of the population that doesn't use Dual-Core. So most games will only be optimised to run on 2 cores rather than 4 or 8.

(In other words there are many many more dual core machines out there than quad or hex etc...)

[Dexiefy]

That is completely false.

Hardly. No processor gives you such power for similar price.
For 3d rendering sure you could go with 1090t/1100t from AMD but you might aswell go for i7-2600k that is similarry priced iirc and have similar results(i belive 1100t would be slightly ahead) while providing you with TONS of performance in gaming compared to AMD offer. That might change with bulldozer release... but guess what? seeing what AMD is doing atm i think we will rather see LGA 2011 out than this freaking bulldozer...

For gaming, i5-2500k is more than enough for any game that exist (hell, most graphics cards on the market will be bottleneck for that processor) and lga 1366 processors arent worth buying...
No 4 core i7 of previous gen beats i7 sandy. 6 core ones are INCREDIBLY overpriced. So unless you are ultra performance geek and you want 980x/990x/970 for best performance available then no, there is no other processors to be considered other than i7-2600k and i5-2500k.
Im not saying that lga 1156 or lga 1366 or AM3 processors are crap. But with release of sandy bridge they are simply not worth buying... Especially for non geeks who want to overclock their cpu. Lets face it, Sandy can be overclocked by any1 ;o
When it comes to AMD, well, AMD sucks in gaming atm, period. AMD is like a cheap alternative for gamers. Might change with bulldozer, might not. We will see.

However as i said sandy bridge processors give you the most power for the buck ofc from gaming perspective, from multithreaded operations 1100t might still hold the crown.(unless again you prefer to spend 4 times more cash to get 15% mroe performence or w/e and buy 980x or w/e)

There's little point investing time and money optimising a game for the small portion of the population that doesn't use Dual-Core. So most games will only be optimised to run on 2 cores rather than 4 or 8.

Actually more and more games support quad cores now and probably every title that comes out will do so. It was first seen in crysis1 if im not wrong. Same technology, same clocks, quad was having more fps than dual core, there was nothing else that changed in the rig. However dont ask me for the source cause there is no way in hell i will find something i read about over a year ago ;o

[Djinni]

Actually more and more games support quad cores now and probably every title that comes out will do so. It was first seen in crysis1 if im not wrong. Same technology, same clocks, quad was having more fps than dual core, there was nothing else that changed in the rig. However dont ask me for the source cause there is no way in hell i will find something i read about over a year ago ;o

There's a difference between optimised and support...

WoW has "supported" using 4+ cores since Burning Crusade, only recently did it actually get "optimised" to use more than 2 core's though. And even this is a "party trick".

And Crysis isn't exactly what I would call the "norm" for gaming.... It pushed the hardware available to it's limits, unlike most games. So yes while your quite right more and more games "support" quad core or more very few are actually "optimised" to use more than 2 efficiently.

[Deleted]

'Supported' is generally provided by the operating system. Its not WoW/program that determines what processor(s) it uses, thats the job of the Operating System's Kernel (NT, Darwin, Linux). How effectively a program can use multiple processors however is determined by how much and effectively it was branched when programmed.

Branching is a very complicated and difficult programming methodology - and for latency sensitive jobs, such as games, it may not be possible to perform due to bugs and errors that may occur due to the program becoming out-of-sync with itself. Rendering is easy to branch because its comparably easy to set up jobs that don't depend or affect each other. That doesn't hold true in games, which tend to require linear progression.

Actually more and more games support quad cores now and probably every title that comes out will do so. It was first seen in crysis1 if im not wrong.

Crysis 1 I believe heavily favors dual-cores. At least the 2100 gets results leagues ahead of all AMD processors, even the expensive quad and hexa cores. (And is only slightly behind the 2500)