Which 8 cores CPU will hold up better in gaming? 16 threads 4.4GHz or 8 threads 4.9GHz?

[Alexroyer]

In my country (Spain), AMD 3700X and i7-9700K have the same price and because I'm building the PC exclusively for gaming I don't know which CPU choose, I am really having a bad time with this doubt.

 

First of all, it's the first time I buy new CPU + motherboard + RAM in my life, and I want it for gaming on ultra the most time possible without feeling that my CPU is not enough for new games, I'm very tired of mi i5-2500 incapable of running some open-world games.

 

THE PROBLEM IS: All the benchmarks in games says that i7-9700K is clearly better because of his 4.8GHz above of the Ryzens 4.3 GHz. BUT , I don't know which one CPU will age better for gaming:

¿Ryzen 7 3700X because of his 8 extra threads or i7-9700k because of his 0.5 extra GHz?

 

I have read that future consoles will be mounted on Ryzen 3000, maybe new games will begin to do more use of threads than now... is it worth it anyway to lose these 0.5 GHz from the i7 9700K?

 

I don't want a Ryzen 3600, I want something to play at best maximum time with a 700€  (720$ +/-) budget. My hopes are that with a high-end CPU I will gaming 1-2 extra year.

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2019-amd-ryzen-7-3700x-review?page=3

 

EDIT:

A user said: what GPU will be in this build then? CPU argument means nothing if the GPU is slow.

 

But clearly the idea of buying a high-end CPU is to only upgrade GPU by time to time

[3 Lions]

For  pure gaming get the 9700K

[NumLock21]

AMD 16 threads will have a lot more advantage when it comes to running other programs besides games. I personally prefer Intel, but I'm not going to get that 8 core no HT 9700K. So out of the 2, I'll pick AMD on this one.

[Constantin]

Just now, LinusTechTipsFanFromDarlo said:

For  pure gaming get the 9700K

Yeah, i have it, it rocks in gaming!

[Jurrunio]

7 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

I don't want a Ryzen 3600, I want something to game at best maximum time with a 700€  budget.

what GPU will be in this build then? CPU argument means nothing if the GPU is slow.

[Alexroyer]

The thing is, in spanish forums there are lot of people saying that Ryzen will take the lead in gaming when developers begin to use the next gen consoles threads, that will have because of the Ryzen 3000 that PS5 is mounted.

[Alexroyer]

1 minute ago, Jurrunio said:

what GPU will be in this build then? CPU argument means nothing if the GPU is slow.

the idea of buying a high-end CPU is to only upgrade GPU by time to time

[SolarNova]

22 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

In my country (Spain), AMD 3700X and i7-9700K have the same price and because I'm building the PC exclusively for gaming I don't know which CPU choose, I am really having a bad time with this doubt.

 

First of all, it's the first time I buy new CPU + motherboard + RAM in my life, and I want it for gaming on ultra the most time possible without feeling that my CPU is not enough for new games, I'm very tired of mi i5-2500 incapable of running some open-world games.

 

THE PROBLEM IS: All the benchmarks in games says that i7-9700K is clearly better because of his 4.8GHz above of the Ryzens 4.3 GHz. BUT , I don't know which one CPU will age better for gaming:

¿Ryzen 7 3700X because of his 8 extra threads or i7-9700k because of his 0.5 extra GHz?

 

I have read that future consoles will be mounted on Ryzen 3000, maybe new games will begin to do more use of threads than now... is it worth it anyway to lose these 0.5 GHz from the i7 9700K?

 

I don't want a Ryzen 3600, I want something to play at best maximum time with a 700€  (720$ +/-) budget. My hopes are that with a high-end CPU I will gaming 1-2 extra year.

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2019-amd-ryzen-7-3700x-review?page=3

 

EDIT:

A user said: what GPU will be in this build then? CPU argument means nothing if the GPU is slow.

 

But clearly the idea of buying a high-end CPU is to only upgrade GPU by time to time

The intel 9700k strictly speaking will be best for highest possible FPS assuming ample GPU power.

 

However we are not talking by much, assuming 120fps + ur gunna see a difference of at most maybe 10FPS. E.G 130fps vs 140fps.

The only time FPS difference will go beyond that is at very very high FPS like 300+ where that difference will equate to maybe 30 FPS, but at that point is really rather meaningless.

[Zando_]

Just now, SolarNova said:

The intel 9700k strictly speaking will be best for highest possible FPS assuming ample GPU power.

 

However we are not talking by much, assuming 120fps + ur gunna see a difference of at most maybe 10FPS. E.G 130fps vs 140fps.

The only time FPS difference will go beyond that is at very very high FPS like 300+ where that difference will equate to maybe 30 FPS, but at that point is really rather meaningless.

^^^ 10-15fps differences mean pretty much nothing in actual gameplay unless you're super sensitive, only time it's an issue is when you're trying to meet 60fps. The difference between 45-50fps and 60fps is really, really noticeable. The difference between 110-120 and 140 isn't really noticeable at all. 

[Alexroyer]

9 minutes ago, SolarNova said:

The intel 9700k strictly speaking will be best for highest possible FPS assuming ample GPU power.

 

However we are not talking by much, assuming 120fps + ur gunna see a difference of at most maybe 10FPS. E.G 130fps vs 140fps.

The only time FPS difference will go beyond that is at very very high FPS like 300+ where that difference will equate to maybe 30 FPS, but at that point is really rather meaningless.

Yeah I know that I don't will notice any difference at 60-70 fps, but maybe the capability of Intel cpu (0.5GHz extra) or AMD cpu (8 threads extra) will give me more stable frame rate in next gen games. What CPU is a better bet in the future for gaming? What do you think will be more important to reach 60fps on CPU games like open worlds in the future years?

 

I know nobody can see the future, but I think maybe someone can understand how the past CPU in gaming worked and say to me what was the evolution until today

 

[G00fySmiley]

I think long run the 3700x will do better and note I have a 8700k as at the time this was an easier question to answer. (based on literally just a guess, though i have been building pcs for 30 years now) Lately as new consoles come out game engines get optimized for them we see significant new usage of our higher end PC hardware. The new PS5 is supposed to have a 8 core chip so I expect game engines to use at least 8 cores soon. But as with current consoles they have more extreme versions with better hardware. They may increase to 10 or 12 core chips (again just a hunch) in higher end console versions meaning game engines will be made with this in mind. I woudl not be surprided if in 7-10 years a 2700x or 3700x is still a relivant CPU. I just put my $ where my mouth is here as I built my son a new PC with a 2700x and think it will last through several generations of graphics card at top settings. 

[SolarNova]

11 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

Yeah I know that I don't will notice any difference at 60-70 fps, but maybe the capability of Intel cpu (0.5GHz extra) or AMD cpu (8 threads extra) will give me more stable frame rate in next gen games. What CPU is a better bet in the future for gaming? What do you think will be more important to reach 60fps on CPU games like open worlds?

At 60 FPS .. it wont matter. Honestly you'd have to have a far far worse CPU for it to get in the way of 60FPS. CPU only really makes a measurable difference at 100FPS+

 

As for future proofing, that's nearly impossible to say. Back when it was a choice between 4 core i5 and a 8 thread i7, most went with the 4core, a few went for the future proofing of the 8thread and that turned out to be the better bet. In fact i went with a 12 thread 3930k and it still holds up plenty today whilst those running 2500k's have had to upgrade.

 

Getting game devs to thoroughly multi thread optimize their game engines has been and continues to be a slow process, not to mention getting around API limitations and developing new API's is slow going. I wouldn't be surprised that if u got a 3700X u wouldn't see the benefit of the extra cores for gaming over a 9700k for many many years. It may end up being that u upgrade from a 9700k to something else for the single thread performance before the number cores/threads even becomes an issue.

 

So cant really give a definitive answer im afraid.

 

[Alexroyer]

1 minute ago, G00fySmiley said:

I think long run the 3700x will do better and note I have a 8700k as at the time this was an easier question to answer. (based on literally just a guess, though i have been building pcs for 30 years now) Lately as new consoles come out game engines get optimized for them we see significant new usage of our higher end PC hardware. The new PS5 is supposed to have a 8 core chip so I expect game engines to use at least 8 cores soon. But as with current consoles they have more extreme versions with better hardware. They may increase to 10 or 12 core chips (again just a hunch) in higher end console versions meaning game engines will be made with this in mind. I woudl not be surprided if in 7-10 years a 2700x or 3700x is still a relivant CPU. I just put my $ where my mouth is here as I built my son a new PC with a 2700x and think it will last through several generations of graphics card at top settings. 

This makes sense. New consoles not only will have 8 cores, but they will also mount Ryzen CPU too, presumably with more than 8 threads (I don't know if threads info is known yet)

 

Maybe a PS5 Pro will have 10 cores (I think 12 cores is absolutely nuts). And it's very probable that 1 or 2 cores will be reserved for the console system like PS4 do.

 

But who knows.. all these things are too news for me

[G00fySmiley]

2 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

This makes sense. New consoles not only will have 8 cores, but they will also mount Ryzen CPU too, presumably with more than 8 threads (I don't know if threads info is known yet)

 

Maybe a PS5 Pro will have 10 cores (I think 12 cores is absolutely nuts). And it's very probable that 1 or 2 cores will be reserved for the console system like PS4 do.

 

But who knows.. all these things are too news for me

 sort of, i mean the Ryzen part is the CPU but it will be an APU so likely given AMD's trend now we will have 4 cores on 2 chiplets and a gpu all on the same die. I would be surprised if consoles ever make the move to a dedicated gpu board or even separated to a CPU and a GPU die on the saem board as it woudl increase complexity for cooling and they need to be able to make the console for $3-400 including profit  

[Alexroyer]

2 minutes ago, SolarNova said:

It may end up being that u upgrade from a 9700k to something else for the single thread performance before the number cores/threads even becomes an issue.

2

Yes that was one of my first thoughts, but later I read about next gen consoles. Wearing they Ryzen 3000 CPUs mean that developers will have guaranteed minimum 8 threads and who knows how important they will be for next gen games.

 

i7-9700K have only 8 / 8 and 3700X 8 / 16

 

I know that for best gaming experience the most important is GPU, but I can say to you that playing open wold games with very low distance draw and objects is like playing a PS3 game. I want to play next gen games comfortably

[Alexroyer]

I was doing research about this problem of choosing CPU in mid 2019 looking forward to future games. And found this very accurate answer from  @AngryBeaver

 

Someone can explain if the case of ryzen 1600x vs i7-7700k is similar to the Ryzen 3700X and i7-9700K?

I'm really getting a headache with this

[Ravendarat]

Now if im wrong here please correct me because im definitely still a novice compared to many on here but the OP talked about open world games. Do open world games not benefit greatly from multiple cores as opposed to single core? If so than AMD would be the leader here, although in reality Im pretty sure with EITHER choice you are gonna have a real good system

[G00fySmiley]

7 minutes ago, Ravendarat said:

Now if im wrong here please correct me because im definitely still a novice compared to many on here but the OP talked about open world games. Do open world games not benefit greatly from multiple cores as opposed to single core? If so than AMD would be the leader here, although in reality Im pretty sure with EITHER choice you are gonna have a real good system

 

hard to answer that. different engines handle open worlds differently. you kind of have to look by game title to see. 

[melete]

@Alexroyer the 7700k comparison is completely irrelevant here. Zen 2 CPUs have higher IPC than Intel Coffee Lake, so that’s now actually a slight advantage for AMD. Intel still has the frequency advantage. The multithreaded performance between R7 3700X and i7-9700k is heavily slanted in 3700X’s favor thanks to improved IPC and faster clocks, so i7-9700k’s advantage rests solely on poorly threaded applications such as video games. 

 

To answer your original question, 9700k is a better purely gaming CPU right now, by a margin around 10% on average at 1080p. If you aren’t using a high refresh rate monitor, you won’t be able to observe any difference. Additionally, it’s completely impossible to know if games will start using many CPU threads heavily enough that the additional 8 threads on R7 3700X will make it a better performer on most games in the next few years. That did happen with comparisons between R5 1600 (6C/12T) and i5-7600k (4C/4T) but that was a comparison between CPUs with different numbers of cores, and at lower core counts overall. 

[Alexroyer]

@melete

It's confirmed that next gen consoles will be built on Zen 2, so I think is a pretty solid predict that next gen games will use multi-threads. I think i'm walking to AMDs side... (for now, I have to wait 3 days to decide anything)

 

 

[Alexroyer]

What the hell...

 

@Mira Yurizaki and @Stefan Payne

 

Can you give me some thoughts about the future on CPU gaming? You seem to know what you are talking about!

 

 

[Mira Yurizaki]

10 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

What the hell...

 

@Mira Yurizaki and @Stefan Payne

 

Can you give me some thoughts about the future on CPU gaming? You seem to know what you are talking about!

Just FYI in the future, it's probably better to link the actual post than to make a screenshot of it. You can get a link to the actual post by clicking on the timestamp on the top left of post.

 

Anyway, PC game developers are always going to target what gives them the biggest market. Even though the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have 8-core processors, presumably much better than what the PS4 and XB1 had relative to what was available in their time, that won't mean that PC games will start requiring 8-core processors anytime soon. If anything, they'll still be targeting quad core processors as the minimum requirement for a while because that's going to be the largest pool of users.

 

And even then, core count doesn't really matter if the processor is fast enough. If someone were to ask you what's faster: a quad core processor running at 2.0 GHz or a single core processor running at 8.0 GHz, assuming both are using the same exact microarchitecture? The answer is the faster single core processor will almost always perform better than the slower quad core. There are times where the slower quad core can equal the performance of the faster single core processor, but the quad core will never perform better.

 

If you're trying to "future proof" your machine, my advice is to pick a platform (that being chipset) that's relatively young. This will give you the maximum chance of having something to upgrade to in the future. Otherwise, focus on what you want to accomplish now, not what you want to accomplish in 4 years.

[Alexroyer]

23 minutes ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

Just FYI in the future, it's probably better to link the actual post than to make a screenshot of it. You can get a link to the actual post by clicking on the timestamp on the top left of post.

 

Anyway, PC game developers are always going to target what gives them the biggest market. Even though the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have 8-core processors, presumably much better than what the PS4 and XB1 had relative to what was available in their time, that won't mean that PC games will start requiring 8-core processors anytime soon. If anything, they'll still be targeting quad core processors as the minimum requirement for a while because that's going to be the largest pool of users.

 

And even then, core count doesn't really matter if the processor is fast enough. If someone were to ask you what's faster: a quad core processor running at 2.0 GHz or a single core processor running at 8.0 GHz, assuming both are using the same exact microarchitecture? The answer is the faster single core processor will almost always perform better than the slower quad core. There are times where the slower quad core can equal the performance of the faster single core processor, but the quad core will never perform better.

 

If you're trying to "future proof" your machine, my advice is to pick a platform (that being chipset) that's relatively young. This will give you the maximum chance of having something to upgrade to in the future. Otherwise, focus on what you want to accomplish now, not what you want to accomplish in 4 years.

Ok I will link posts better than to make a screenshot now that I know how to do it, thanks!

 

Sure, whether I buy new AMD or last Intel CPU I will build it on the newest chipset, and of course that means X570 for the Ryzen 3700X choice. But I don't know if only that can solve my problem of building a gaming PC that is CPU future-proofed.

 

I'm not aiming to play at 144hz in 4-5 years, I know that's stupid, I'm fine playing at smooth 60fps on ultra without worrying about CPU, only buying new GPU. And that isn't happening with my old i5-2500 4c / 4t , 3.3 - 3.7GHz

 

And I know that developers will targeting quad core processors as the minimum, but we know that minimum specs mean 30fps on low, and that is not the point.

 

Thanks for your answer!

[G00fySmiley]

15 minutes ago, Alexroyer said:

Ok I will link posts better than to make a screenshot now that I know how to do it, thanks!

 

Sure, whether I buy new AMD or last Intel CPU I will build it on the newest chipset, and of course that means X570 for the Ryzen 3700X choice. But I don't know if only that can solve my problem of building a gaming PC that is CPU future-proofed.

 

I'm not aiming to play at 144hz in 4-5 years, I know that's stupid, I'm fine playing at smooth 60fps on ultra without worrying about CPU, only buying new GPU. And that isn't happening with my old i5-2500 4c / 4t , 3.3 - 3.7GHz

 

And I know that developers will targeting quad core processors as the minimum, but we know that minimum specs mean 30fps on low, and that is not the point.

 

Thanks for your answer!

AMD chipsets have traditionally been usable for longer than Intel (barring bios hacks as really the last swapover is just a software limitation) so if you are going to update the CPU down the road then def AMD all the way. 

[AngryBeaver]

2 hours ago, Alexroyer said:

Snip

Just wanted to say that while the overall theory of calculating which is better is still relevant. The landscape has vastly changed.

 

Games are now starting to utilize more cores and AMD has taken the IPC lead for the time being. Now other factors are also still present though and that is DX draw calls still being mostly single threaded which still gives Intel cpu's a fps lead, due to higher clocks.

 

Now though it makes a lot more sense to go with AMD for most items. You might have a slight fps penatly in 1080p and even some 1440p titles, but it isn't enough to be noticeable as the frames are still well over 100 fps. Now in productivity the AMD 3rd gens are doing great in terms of performance and price. You can get a hyperthreaded cpu for much less than the non-hyperthreaded  intel offering. all while using less energy. For a similar price point you now get more cores than the intel equivalent. 

 

So these days it comes down to what are you wanting to do with your computer. If you are going to do anything outside of gaming then AMD is a no-brainer. AMD is pretty much a no-brainer unless you just want the maximum amount of fps you can get at 1080p... I personally don't think 220fps vs 240fps is a good enough reason to give up more cores/threads at the same or cheaper price point. This is coming from a die hard Intel Fan btw.