Intel Xeon X5675 Gaming

[Big Head Tech]

So I have completed my very first server and while I made several mistakes (mainly not getting one with PCI-E passthrough), I want to take the next step.  My next step is getting dual Xeon X5675's with are 3.06GHz Hex Cores on an LGA 1366 server dual socket board.  Load it up with 64GB of ECC memory and drop in 2 980 TI's.  My concern is, are the X5675's strong enough for gaming.  Some games require a 2nd gen I5 to even boot up.  Since it's a server board I can't OC it.  I am thinking I may have to go 2011-3 dual socket but it's a much costlier investment.

[VTF5252]

what games need a gen 2 i5? also yeah should be plenty powerful, if the games use the multi core processing right. 

[Big Head Tech]

2 minutes ago, NTF5252 said:

what games need a gen 2 i5? also yeah should be plenty powerful, if the games use the multi core processing right. 

I saw a few games recently that had a min spec requirement of a 2nd gen I5.

[VTF5252]

Just now, Snaeb said:

I saw a few games recently that had a min spec requirement of a 2nd gen I5.

Which tho?

[Big Head Tech]

Just now, NTF5252 said:

Which tho?

Can't remember, saw it posted on here a few days ago.  Doom 2016 rings a bell.

[VTF5252]

2 minutes ago, Snaeb said:

Can't remember, saw it posted on here a few days ago.  Doom 2016 rings a bell.

You would be correct on that one. Thanks for a real example tho. 

[Pietroglyph]

To step away from the "Which games need a gen 2 i5" I think actually comparing with a gen 2 i5 is the best way to go. Using ARK, and comparing with the nicest gen 2 i5 I could find, I think that you will be fine. Other than in pure gigahertz you exceed pretty much every gen 2 i5, and if that is your baseline then I don't see any problem. Most gen 2 i5s launched at the same time of your processor anyway, and the X5675 was a $1500 processor.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Pietroglyph
It sounds nicer this way.

[Necrodead]

9 minutes ago, Snaeb said:

I saw a few games recently that had a min spec requirement of a 2nd gen I5.

minimum specs listed does not mean you can't play it with something lesser, it just means that it is the minimum they recommend to play the game as they want you to play it. (ex, 1080p at 30fps) The only thing to worry about is some dual cores can't boot some games because you need minimum 4 threads to boot.

 

You will just have sub-par performance on games where you can only use a few cores, because those cores will be slow.

[DunePilot]

If you already have a 1366 board then they make extremely powerful systems for cheap. Overclocking an X5675 puts you into the realm of a slightly overclock or baseline 4790k or 5820k territory. That's about the best idea I can give you on performance. I would personally say if you are building new though to just go ahead and build a 2011v3 socket system. The 1366 only makes sense if you already have a board laying around and lots of DDR3 you want to use.

[i_build_nanosuits]

dual GTX 980ti is very bold for a 3ghz westmere processor...those are 5 years old now and they will limit your gaming performance with such high end GPU solution...

[DunePilot]

Just now, Necrodead said:

minimum specs listed does not mean you can't play it with something lesser, it just means that it is the minimum they recommend to play the game as they want you to play it. (ex, 1080p at 30fps) The only thing to worry about is some dual cores can't boot some games because you need minimum 4 threads to boot.

 

You will just have sub-par performance on games where you can only use a few cores, because those cores will be slow.

Not true.... I play surround 1080p GTA5 on very high settings. That is 75% of 4k resolution mind you.... at 90FPS......

Please wait a minute and let me post some benchmarks before this thread derails into misinformation.

[Big Head Tech]

2 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

dual GTX 980ti is very bold for a 3ghz westmere processor...those are 5 years old now and they will limit your gaming performance with such high end GPU solution...

I am kinda thinking that.  But LGA 1366 is significantly cheaper.  I can grab 2 E5-2670's for 150 bucks but the boards are 300+.

[Pietroglyph]

1 minute ago, Necrodead said:

minimum specs listed does not mean you can't play it with something lesser, it just means that it is the minimum they recommend to play the game as they want you to play it. (ex, 1080p at 30fps) The only thing to worry about is some dual cores can't boot some games because you need minimum 4 threads to boot.

 

You will just have sub-par performance on games where you can only use a few cores, because those cores will be slow.

Actually, the X5675 appears to be hyperthreaded so the two core thing shouldn't be a problem.

[i_build_nanosuits]

1 minute ago, Snaeb said:

I am kinda thinking that.  But LGA 1366 is significantly cheaper.  I can grab 2 E5-2670's for 150 bucks but the boards are 300+.

what you get with those processors is a lot of threads and good multi-threaded performance, but somewhat poor single-threaded performance when compared with newer cpU architecture...games love fast CPU cores more than anything, and you will lack in single-threaded throughput in many games.

An haswell or skylake core i5 would perform better in games.

[Lotus]

A single x5675 running at a 4.3 GHz OC will be much better in gaming than dual x5675 running at 3 GHz. Find a consumer x58 motherboard and overclock the bejeezus out of the chip and don't look back. Do NOT try and game at stock clocks and expect a bottleneck free experience even with a GTX 970, let alone dual 980 ti in sli.

[Big Head Tech]

2 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

what you get with those processors is a lot of threads and good multi-threaded performance, but somewhat poor single-threaded performance when compared with newer cpU architecture...games love fast CPU cores more than anything, and you will lack in single-threaded throughput in many games.

An haswell or skylake core i5 would perform better in games.

Correct but Xeon's rarely come clocked fast which seems to be the issue.   Sadly, I was gonna slap 2 3960x's in a rig but that's not possible from what I've read.

[infamous_last]

My single x5670 handles games very well and never had any problems, dual x56xx will be a walk in the park.

 

[i_build_nanosuits]

Just now, Snaeb said:

Correct but Xeon's rarely come clocked fast which seems to be the issue.   Sadly, I was gonna slap 2 3960x's in a rig but that's not possible from what I've read.

why do you want two CPU's? this is a workstation/rendering machine? you render 4K porn videos all day long?

[Necrodead]

5 minutes ago, DunePilot said:

Not true.... I play surround 1080p GTA5 on very high settings. That is 75% of 4k resolution mind you.... at 90FPS......

Please wait a minute and let me post some benchmarks before this thread derails into misinformation.

GTA uses lots of cores, somes games are restricted to a lesser number, mostly older games, so before you go all gung-ho on me read what I said. 

[DunePilot]

Here is what you can expect with a single 980Ti on an overclocked X5675. Now things are much slower if you are in dual cpu board though since you can't overclock, in that case 980Ti in SLI makes zero sense. You would want to stick with a single 980Ti. Better yet.... if you do not have a board already go ahead and go with a 2011v3 platform. 

X5675 are great for gaming but the best bang for the buck is already having an X58 board and overclocking one in which case they put you just about into the 4790k and 5820k playing field. 

 

http://www.3dmark.com/compare/fs/6044454/fs/5403115

 

 

 

 

[Big Head Tech]

2 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

why do you want two CPU's? this is a workstation/rendering machine? you render 4K porn videos all day long?

Going to be 2 VM's for gaming/editing and a file/backup NAS server.  All in 1.  Going to run single 512GB SSD's in each VM and probably 5 256GB SSD's for backup all using UNraid, and Windows 10 Clients.

[i_build_nanosuits]

Just now, Snaeb said:

Going to be 2 VM's for gaming/editing and a file/backup NAS server.  All in 1.  Going to run single 512GB SSD's in each VM and probably 5 256GB SSD's for backup all using UNraid, and Windows 10 Clients.

i see...and those machines will get the use of 1 GPU each...1 GTX 980ti? what screen resolution you render your games at? 1440p?

[Lotus]

3 minutes ago, DunePilot said:

snip

The first one is a GPU benchmark though and doesn't really have a CPU component to it, so it's not really relevant. The second one is a multithreaded benchmark, and so is also not really relevant for gaming.

[DunePilot]

1 minute ago, Lotus said:

That's a GPU benchmark though and doesn't really have a CPU component to it, so it's not really relevant.

Well... it is weighted somehow, you can see just by comparing scores to some others... I actually think that benchmark is about as accurate as catzilla but thats beside the point. I linked three different things though for that reason, theres a firestrike comparison to a 4790k and also the Cinebench. Scores showing a whole range of 900-1004.

[Big Head Tech]

6 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

i see...and those machines will get the use of 1 GPU each...1 GTX 980ti? what screen resolution you render your games at? 1440p?

3440x1440.