Are multiple threads important, for everyday use?

[roundturtle]

Looking at the AMD 3700 and the Intel i7 9700k, they both have 8 cores but the 3700 has 16 threads.

My question is, is the thread advantage noticable in everyday use?

Everyday use being gaming with programs open in the background (Discord, Chrome, Musicbee, OBS, etc.), CAD with the same programs open in the background, and just general with use no specific multithreaded workloads. Do the added threads make for a smoother experience or would I be hard pressed to notice any difference?

Another question would be if you guys think that multiple threads are more "futureproof"? 

 

Just wondering and thanks for any input.

[roundturtle]

6 minutes ago, Arika S said:

future proof doesn't exist.

 

for what you're using it for, there wasn't be any massive benefit for going more threads.

 

get what ever is cheaper at the time of purchase when taking into account motherboard prices etc. you will get very similar performance out of them. both are fantastic CPUs, can't go wrong with either.

I know future proof doesnt exist, the question was more if you think that programs will take more advantage of multiple threads in the next few years since thread counts have been growing so much lately.

[vanished]

Do they matter in every day?  Absolutely, if you try going back to a dual or worse yet a single core, even if it's proportionally faster such that the overall compute power is similar, you will notice the experience isn't very good.  However, it is only noticeable up to a point.  I don't have solid numbers resulting from testing but I'd say you want at least 4, but more isn't necessarily going to make a difference.  In games, and more so compute, absolutely, but not so much in day to day stuff.  Either of those CPUs is going to rock in everyday tasks, where they will separate is on more intensive things, and specifically what those are.

[roundturtle]

16 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Do they matter in every day?  Absolutely, if you try going back to a dual or worse yet a single core, even if it's proportionally faster such that the overall compute power is similar, you will notice the experience isn't very good.  However, it is only noticeable up to a point.  I don't have solid numbers resulting from testing but I'd say you want at least 4, but more isn't necessarily going to make a difference.  In games, and more so compute, absolutely, but not so much in day to day stuff.  Either of those CPUs is going to rock in everyday tasks, where they will separate is on more intensive things, and specifically what those are.

I am running a 6600k and agree with you completely, although there are times when i would like more cores/threads, for example when transcoding music, ripping cds or running more modern games with other stuff in the background can lead to some issues.

This post is more about getting some input and ideas on what to recomend a friend who is looking to build a pc, and so I have a better idea of what to recommend him. 

[vanished]

4 minutes ago, roundturtle said:

I am running a 6600k and agree with you completely, although there are times when i would like more cores/threads, for example when transcoding music, ripping cds or running more modern games with other stuff in the background can lead to some issues.

This post is more about getting some input and ideas on what to recomend a friend who is looking to build a pc, and so I have a better idea of what to recommend him. 

In gaming, the 9700k is better, but it's not by an enormous amount, so you might not notice tbh.  As for more traditional compute tasks, the 3700x should pull ahead noticeably.  It's also cheaper if I'm not mistaken, and comes with a cooler too so that's even more savings.  It's also compatible with a currently superior platform with room to grow (upgrade to other AMD CPUs in the future).

[roundturtle]

1 minute ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

In gaming, the 9700k is better, but it's not by an enormous amount, so you might not notice tbh.  As for more traditional compute tasks, the 3700x should pull ahead noticeably.  It's also cheaper if I'm not mistaken, and comes with a cooler too so that's even more savings.  It's also compatible with a currently superior platform with room to grow (upgrade to other AMD CPUs in the future).

Price isnt really an issue for my friend he is also considering the 9900k, if youre gonna build a pc might as well do it right. I personally think that Ryzen 3rd Gen is all-around better especially because they plan on keeping the AM4 around for a while (but they will have to make good cpus to upgrade to for it to be worth it) and the price, but ultimately it will be up to him and not to me.  Could you give me an example of what you mean by traditional compute tasks?

[vanished]

1 minute ago, roundturtle said:

Price isnt really an issue for my friend he is also considering the 9900k, if youre gonna build a pc might as well do it right. I personally think that Ryzen 3rd Gen is all-around better especially because they plan on keeping the AM4 around for a while (but they will have to make good cpus to upgrade to for it to be worth it) and the price, but ultimately it will be up to him and not to me.  Could you give me an example of what you mean by traditional compute tasks?

Well, anything heavy like blender, or a sufficiently large number of simultaneous music transcodes, or a video encoding - something consisting of more than about 8 threads.  That's the region where the 3700x goes from being slightly behind to pulling ahead significantly, mainly because the 3700x can run 16 threads and the 9700k cannot (SMT vs no HT).