CPU for game development

[Philosobyte]

It's obvious that serious game development will require a powerful GPU, but does it use so much processing power that an i7/Xeon would offer a significant improvement over an i5?

[minibois]

What engines will you use?

[Goodman2265]

Xeon is designed for doing workstation like task (game development for example)

[jc980]

Xeon E1231 V3

[Nena Trinity]

Xeon E1231 V3

This!

[Philosobyte]

What engines will you use?

I don't know much about game engines yet, but I'm going to start exploring Unity in a couple weeks. 

 

 

Xeon is designed for doing workstation like task (game development for example)

 

Xeon E1231 V3

 

This!

Thanks for the answers. Looks like Xeon is the way to go. 

[themaniac]

as i've been told by @valdyrgramr that for game development that more cores/threads help but you dont need to shell out more money for a i7/xeon if you dont want too

[jimakos234]

xeon 1230/1231 v3 + ecc memory

[Nena Trinity]

xeon 1230/1231 v3 + ecc memory

Right ECC is important!

[Philosobyte]

 

xeon 1230/1231 v3 + ecc memory

Why ECC? I thought that slight data corruption only hurts in the financial sector/record keeping. 

[jc980]

 

 

Why ECC? I thought that slight data corruption only hurts in the financial sector/record keeping. 

 

Really unnecessary, just get 32 GBs.

[jimakos234]

 

 

Why ECC? I thought that slight data corruption only hurts in the financial sector/record keeping. 

 

If you are running high density ram 24/7 in a high-demand environment serving critical services, doing severe programming-editing tasks, you should take every step you possibly can to prevent stuff from breaking. The ecc ram is not necessary, but it is recommended, imo for that task. But if you are not going to run the machine 24/7 , you dont really need ecc ram.

[minibois]

I don't know much about game engines yet, but I'm going to start exploring Unity in a couple weeks. 

Xeon would be a good thing to use.

 

I do game dev in Unity using my PC (see signature) and it does good for the development, but the playing is pretty bad..

The PC's at my school with i7 3770's and 650 Ti's do great, the laptops at my internship (dual core AMD APU or Intel Pentium from around 2012 + low end GPU) do good in the dev and meh in the playing of the games.

 

A good CPU will help a lot, but memory is equally important.

[Philosobyte]

If you are running high density ram 24/7 in a high-demand environment serving critical services, doing severe programming-editing tasks, you should take every step you possibly can to prevent stuff from breaking. The ecc ram is not necessary, but it is recommended, imo for that task. But if you are not going to run the machine 24/7 , you dont really need ecc ram.

I do plan on running my machine 24/7. I'll use ECC since my budget allows for it. Thank you. 

[trag1c]

Look for lga 2011v3 chips for game development if youre serious about it. It will allow for development to go more smoothly. You will suffer less cache misses in development allow debugging of features to happen mostly uninterrupted.

[Philosobyte]

You really want 6+cores for development unless you're going i7 that can pull the weight with hyperthreading like a 4790k.  You could budget to an FX like a 9370/8320 or 9590/8350.  i7-5xxx or 4790k, 6+core opteron or xeon.  The lowest Xeon I'd go for is the one mentioned above since it is similar to the 4790.

 

 

Look for lga 2011v3 chips for game development if youre serious about it. It will allow for development to go more smoothly. You will suffer less cache misses in development allow debugging of features to happen mostly uninterrupted.

Hm, that's stretching my budget a bit. If I got the 5820k, would it be okay if I compromised on my GPU? I planned on getting an R9 390, but would I make do with a 380 instead?

[trag1c]

380+5820k is best for now. If you need the extra later on then do what I did and crossfire it when ya get the money.

For game development cpu is much more important than gpu. Ram as well.

[Philosobyte]

380+5820k is best for now.  If you need the extra later on then do what I did and crossfire it when ya get the money.

 

For game development cpu is much more important than gpu. Ram as well.

I can't seem to find an ECC 2011-v3 motherboard. Can someone link me to one, or do they not exist?

[trag1c]

 

It depends on what aspect of the deving you're doing.  Most of it is yes CPU extensive; however, the more visual aspects like 3D modelling is where the GPU starts to matter.

Not even then. 3D Modelling still depends on the CPU more then the GPU for every thing but image output and rendering but even then with a proper setup you would have a render farm with many CPU based nodes for processing. You would actually benefit more from upgrading your RAM then upgrading your GPU in a 3D modelling workstation.  The GPU is utterly useless in the actual development side of things. Testing is another story but by that time you would either be wasting your time with a failed product or you have a funded project where you can afford a good GPU. 

 

A GPU is only good for extremely parallel simple tasks which the most software can't take advantage of.  

 

@ Look at Supermicro single socket workstation boards.

[trag1c]

I consider testing part of it, but that's just me.    It's also why I suggested the CPU over a 390, and said if you really need the extra power then crossfire.  I'd suggest at least 16-32 for deving with the ram.  As I do agree that's important.  For me, I've always been testing everything out, so I'm used to adding the GPU power for what I do. However, I did say to get that as a secondary thing compared to the CPU.

 

Then again it could just be the shitty method they teach us where I live in 'Murika.  They always bitch to us about testing, so I'm used to it being part of it.  

I go as far as making sure my feature works (mostly) during development but more serious testing and bug testing should take place later in development once most of the features are in. In promotes good quick development since you're not constantly fixing bugs only to cause more bugs by fixing a bug. Though everybody has their own methodologies.

[trag1c]

Here in south Maryland the main teacher is a nazi about everything.  Everything has to be utter perfection, or he fails you.  You even have to be super dead on with dev comments for anything you make for him.  They have to be the utter most perfect grammar, and if they are the least bit vague then you lose 2 points for each comment.  That's why I just went with a CF in fear that the ones up North might be the same in my state at the Art schools.  Plus, it benefits me when I go to test graphical stuff for benchmarks that have profiles.  

That guy sounds like a real treat. lol.

[BrightCandle]

You are in one of the few groups (programmers) who get some decent usage out of more cores. Depending on the language and software you use the compilation process can be both very time consuming and highly parallel. As a 20 year veteran I haven't once felt the need for ECC as the error rate is just too low. But more cores and clockspeed I absolutely do use. You don't need a Xeon but you should consider a X99 series CPU with 6 or 8 cores.

[Cheddle]

It's obvious that serious game development will require a powerful GPU, but does it use so much processing power that an i7/Xeon would offer a significant improvement over an i5?

 

get something that can crunch the numbers.

 

I would recommend any of the 6 core 12 thread CPU's.

 

even buying an older x58 mobo and a 6 core xeon to suit (should only cost you $300) would be better for render/build times than a similarly priced 4690k.

 

some considerations are lack of SATA 3 and USB3 

[Philosobyte]

You are in one of the few groups (programmers) who get some decent usage out of more cores. Depending on the language and software you use the compilation process can be both very time consuming and highly parallel. As a 20 year veteran I haven't once felt the need for ECC as the error rate is just too low. But more cores and clockspeed I absolutely do use. You don't need a Xeon but you should consider a X99 series CPU with 6 or 8 cores.

Thanks for the experience about non-ECC memory. I noticed valdyrgamr and trag1c don't have ECC memory in their personal systems either.

 

 

get something that can crunch the numbers.

 

I would recommend any of the 6 core 12 thread CPU's.

 

even buying an older x58 mobo and a 6 core xeon to suit (should only cost you $300) would be better for render/build times than a similarly priced 4690k.

 

some considerations are lack of SATA 3 and USB3 

Yeah, I was looking at some of the older Xeons for ECC purposes, but their performance is quite low compared to the 5820k.

 

@trag1c @valdyrgamyr this is all great info