I3 4160 vs. i5 4430

[doctordeath528]

I'm going to build a gaming pc to run games like Battlefield 4 and GTA 5 at 1080p at 60 fps with a GTX 960 for a gpu, I was wondering if it was worth it to get a I5 4430 over a I3 4160?

[Sam Z Man]

Quad Core anyday everyday. 

[doctordeath528]

Quad Core anyday everyday. 

Thanks

[Sintezza]

For some certain games it will be definitely worth it.

[brokencross]

Go for a quad, and get a 280X instead.

[Faceman]

i5 + R9 280X.

 

Currently there is the Sapphire Vapor-X R9 280X for just $190.  Absolutely unbeatable value, I would buy it today if I were you before the sale ends.  You also get a free game with purchase.

[SteveGrabowski0]

I'm going to build a gaming pc to run games like Battlefield 4 and GTA 5 at 1080p at 60 fps with a GTX 960 for a gpu, I was wondering if it was worth it to get a I5 4430 over a I3 4160?

 

i5 all the way. What type of board are you using? If it's H97, get the i5-4460, as it's usually a little cheaper and slightly faster than the i5-4430. If you're getting an H81 or B85 board, look at the i5-4440 for the same reasons. Don't buy a Z97 or Z87 board though, what a waste of money if you aren't using an unlocked chip and/or doing an SLI/Crossfire build.

[JaZoN_XD]

Go for the i5, lots of games, especially AAA games such as BF4 will appreciate the 4 cores instead of the dual core hyperthread setup.

[doctordeath528]

Thanks everyone

[SteveGrabowski0]

i5 + R9 280X.

 

Currently there is the Sapphire Vapor-X R9 280X for just $190.  Absolutely unbeatable value, I would buy it today if I were you before the sale ends.  You also get a free game with purchase.

 

Even better is the Sapphire Tri-X R9 290 + 8GB DDR3 1866 RAM at newegg today for $250 after a $20 rebate.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202143

 

To the op, jump on this deal fast. An R9 290 murders a GTX 960 (see Linus' review of the GTX 960 where he says the R9 290 stomps it if you don't believe me) and with the 8GB RAM thrown in it's essentially $200 after rebate for anyone building a new system, since a decent 8GB stick of DDR3 is $50+ usually. And this is one of the two or three best R9 290 on the market. An absolute top quality killer GPU. If I was building my system today instead of a few months ago I would jump all over this combo.

 

Deals this good usually only come on Black Friday.

[Faceman]

Even better is the Sapphire Tri-X R9 290 + 8GB DDR3 1866 RAM at newegg today for $250 after rebate.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202143

 

To the op, jump on this deal fast. An R9 290 murders a GTX 960 (see Linus' review of the GTX 960 where he says the R9 290 stomps it if you don't believe me) and with the 8GB RAM thrown in it's essentially $200 after rebate for anyone building a new system. And this is one of the two or three best R9 290 on the market.

Oh wow, that is an amazing deal!  Heck yea, get that.

[Agent181]

quad over dual core anyday

[Agent181]

Oh wow, that is an amazing deal!  Heck yea, get that.

^second that too bad its not black friday  

got my 280x for $100

[doctordeath528]

Even better is the Sapphire Tri-X R9 290 + 8GB DDR3 1866 RAM at newegg today for $250 after rebate.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202143

 

To the op, jump on this deal fast. An R9 290 murders a GTX 960 (see Linus' review of the GTX 960 where he says the R9 290 stomps it if you don't believe me) and with the 8GB RAM thrown in it's essentially $200 after rebate for anyone building a new system. And this is one of the two or three best R9 290 on the market. An absolute top quality killer GPU. If I was building my system today instead of a few months ago I would jump all over this combo.

That sounds like a great deal I'll look into getting it

[DimasRMDO]

To be safe, it's better to have quad core. Because some games can't be played with dual cores CPU, even the hyper-threaded one (some can be played with hyper-threaded CPU). So I'd say i5-4430, although in some games the i3-4160 can compete with the i5.

[SteveGrabowski0]

That sounds like a great deal I'll look into getting it

 

The only downside of the R9 290 over the GTX 960 is you will need a better power supply. If you don't mind doing a $20 rebate, this is a great unit for powering an R9 290, and it's modular:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371059

[DarkBlade2117]

To be safe, it's better to have quad core. Because some games can't be played with dual cores CPU, even the hyper-threaded one (some can be played with hyper-threaded CPU). So I'd say i5-4430, although in some games the i3-4160 can compete with the i5.

Any game can play on a dual core, a Pentium g3258 for example can play Crysis 3 maxxed out with a GTX 970 andnot be bottlenecked.

[Sam Z Man]

Any game can play on a dual core, a Pentium g3258 for example can play Crysis 3 maxxed out with a GTX 970 andnot be bottlenecked.

 

Yes but with only 2 cores you can get some real bad frame dips in games.

[SteveGrabowski0]

Any game can play on a dual core, a Pentium g3258 for example can play Crysis 3 maxxed out with a GTX 970 andnot be bottlenecked.

 

[doctordeath528]

lol

[SteveGrabowski0]

XFX has great PSUs for solid prices too. Any 600W or better XFX will be able to push an R9 290. Even their 550W units should be enough with a locked i5, but I'd still aim for a 600W-650W since they don't cost much more.

[DarkBlade2117]

Someone and maybe a few other people on the forumns have G3258's and GTX 970s.

[Sam Z Man]

Someone and maybe a few other people on the forumns have G3258's and GTX 970s.

 

Doesn't mean they are not bottlenecked in some games.

[SteveGrabowski0]

lol

 

I actually have a G3258 I paired with my GTX 970 for a while, and the bottleneck was enormous even at 4.4 GHz on anything made the last 2-3 years except Bioshock Infinite. Meanwhile my Xeon E3-1231v3 is amazing for gaming. If I turn off the hyperthreading to simulate an i5 it's still a killer even a 800 MHHz lower clock than the Pentium I had. Core i5s are really outstanding CPUs, anything below them is a real compromise and anything above them gives diminishing returns.

[SteveGrabowski0]

Someone and maybe a few other people on the forumns have G3258's and GTX 970s.

 

I had that setup. It sucked horribly.