Are octa-core CPUs an overkill for gaming?

[Man]

Checking the prices of used R5-2600 and R7-1700 right now and they both cost about the same at around $120. 

 

Right now the R5-2600 would likely be the better choice because of superior IPC but since more and more titles and game engines are getting parallel and hyper-threaded quads are fast becoming a necessity rather than a luxury, do you think it'd be better to go with the R7 instead of R5? I'm talking about 5-8 years down the line. 

Thanks.

[Dedayog]

Depends what Octacore.  

 

More cores are better if a game can use them, but you want fast cores as well.  If the cores are substantially slower then err on speed vs cores.

 

For now, get the 2600.  If you need it to last 5-8 years... you have prayer beads, right?

[SupaKomputa]

In 5-8 years you probably want to upgrade to a better one, or getting a higher core count for cheap (used).

Next year both intel and amd will have new platform (DDR5), you don't wanna miss that.

2600 is better for gaming for now, i won't bet it for 5 more years tho.

[YoungBlade]

17 minutes ago, Man said:

I'm talking about 5-8 years down the line.

In 5-8 years, I'd predict that neither of these CPUs will be able to play AAA titles from that generation. Zen and Zen+ have about the single core performance of Haswell. Do you think the i7 4770K will be able to play AAA games in 2026?

 

There was only a minor uplift in single-core performance from Zen to Zen+, but when it comes to gaming Zen+ did much better. And even now, few games can take advantage of 8 cores. If you're trying to buy for the future, my advice would be to save your money and get neither CPU.

 

The best currently available options to be able to game long-term would be Zen 2 or 3, and Intel 10th or 11th gen. The original Zen architecture was a huge leap forward from Bulldozer, and the cores made it killer for productivity tasks vs Intel, but for gaming, it wasn't a good architecture. It wasn't awful, but it wasn't "I can game on this for 10 years" levels of good. But if you must get one of these two, I'd go with the 2600, as it has architectural advantages for games that will probably make it age better in that particular use case. The 1700 does have more overall CPU power, but it's harder to leverage it for a game.

 

The issue with more cores is that a game has to be specifically coded in a way that takes advantage of them. Yes, game engines themselves are getting better at this, and low-level APIs like DX12 and Vulkan make it easier, but even now there are games getting released that depend heavily on the world thread. And certain types of games, like simulation games, will possibly never be able to be fully multi-threaded by the nature of how such games work.

[Dedayog]

Also, a used 10400F may be a better call at $150-170, if you can up the budget a bit or lower your other component costs.  

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/154654956342?epid=12038156885&hash=item2402275b36:g:qfUAAOSwfMVhau5I

 

Others may have their opinions.

[xg32]

depends on what the resolution, fps you are targeting and gpu you are pairing it with, for upgrades i wouldnt go below a 10400f for 175usd.