Is the i5 still enough? Bottlenecking explained with an RX-480.

[xAcid9]

Would love to do some test on my own but i don't have any of those games. =( 

[Tellos]

I suspect this is something likely planned for hence looks like coffee lake is gonna start pumping up the core counts on desktop high end CPUs.

[Majestic]

1 hour ago, xAcid9 said:

Would love to do some test on my own but i don't have any of those games. =( 

Which newer games do you have? I can maybe add a few.

 

1 hour ago, Tellos said:

I suspect this is something likely planned for hence looks like coffee lake is gonna start pumping up the core counts on desktop high end CPUs.

If the game developers didn't code for multiple cores, the weak 8 cores on the consoles would struggle.

[xAcid9]

Don't have any 2016 games except Fifa 2017.

 

My potential candidates, 

GTA5

Just Cause 3

pCars

Witcher 3

Cities Skylines

[Majestic]

1 minute ago, xAcid9 said:

Don't have any 2016 games except Fifa 2017.

 

My potential candidates, 

GTA5

Just Cause 3

pCars

Witcher 3

Cities Skylines

Those two I have. I haven't really played skylines much though, do you have some large map you can share? Would maybe be prudent to synchronize the results a bit by using the same map to scroll over, at the same settings.

 

GTA 5 i'd have to download aswell again, all cocking 70GB's of it.

[xAcid9]

39 minutes ago, Majestic said:

Those two I have. I haven't really played skylines much though, do you have some large map you can share? Would maybe be prudent to synchronize the results a bit by using the same map to scroll over, at the same settings.

 

GTA 5 i'd have to download aswell again, all cocking 70GB's of it.

Oh.. dang, i don't have any save game for Skylines since my main SSD went kaput last November. Yeah better to use same map/save for consistency.

[Majestic]

1 minute ago, xAcid9 said:

Oh.. dang, i don't have any save game for Skylines since my main SSD went kaput last November. Yeah better to use same map/save for consistency.

Just make something needlessly huge and I'll run it. I have no idea how to play the game

 

Or maybe some savegames from the webz

[xAcid9]

16 minutes ago, Majestic said:

Just make something needlessly huge and I'll run it. I have no idea how to play the game

 

Or maybe some savegames from the webz

Download Los Santos savegame from Steam Workshop, i think pretty good map to bench unless you prefer other heavy maps. I don't have any DLCs though.

[Majestic]

16 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

Download Los Santos savegame from Steam Workshop, i think pretty good map to bench unless you prefer other heavy maps. I don't have any DLCs though.

There's a few of them

[xAcid9]

Damn, didn't realize there is a lot of them.

Save game

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=406684124

 

Mod needed

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=406133429

[Tieox]

I've my system in my signature, yesterday was streaming Fallout 4 at 1920x1200 no problem 60fps. I think some of these bottlenecks are in certain scenarios but I have to question just how often a real world user would run into them? 

[Majestic]

1 minute ago, Kierax said:

I've my system in my signature, yesterday was streaming Fallout 4 at 1980x1200 no problem 60fps. I think some of these bottlenecks are in certain scenarios but question just how often a real world user would run into them? 

Perhaps reading the article would answer some of the questions. CPU bottlenecks are presented in poor frametimes/framepacing. Anyone susceptible to stutter is going to mind. 

 

That said, Fallout 4 isn't particularly multithreaded, so a CPU with more threads won't help much.

[Tieox]

4 minutes ago, Majestic said:

Perhaps reading the article would answer some of the questions.

Your own verdict pretty much backs me up, you conclude that i5's are in terms of future proofing a false economy in many respects given the cost difference to an i7 with HT. Or a Ryzen build for more cores (unless you have deep pockets, in which case why do you have an i5 currently?) and as workloads in your benchmarks and upcoming titles show the i5 is being left behind at a steady pace.

 

(note I'm currently pondering spending the cash on an i7 7700k)

 

 

 

 

 

[Majestic]

1 minute ago, Kierax said:

Your own verdict pretty much backs me up, you conclude that i5's are in terms of future proofing a false economy in many respects given the cost difference to an i7 with HT. Or a Ryzen build for more cores (unless you have deep pockets, in which case why do you have an i5 currently?)

That wasn't your question, you asked how much you would notice these bottlenecks on a subjective level. Which are explained on a case-by-case basis in the article.

 

The actual viability of the product depends on the workload, but I don't find the price you pay for the i5's very compelling these days. Even in the games that only scale up to 4 threads the i5's are nearing their edge, and any game that is capable of scaling beyond 4 threads they fall short. So no, I don't think i5's are viable anymore. Why do I own one? Because it's from 2013 and now 4 years old, back then they were still good value. However, given it's age and the fact it's not being outpaced by the 7600K by much at all, one can question the value given the fact that games are beginning to require better CPU's (threads especially). A Xeon you can get for cheap, or a Ryzen CPu makes much more sense until Intel starts shipping out units with significantly more threads for the same money as the i5.

 

I find i5's poor value these days. And if Intel doesn't change their pricing dramatically they will get creamed with Ryzen 3 and 5.

[Majestic]

@xAcid9 what are the boost frequencies of that CPU? I can set custom boost tables in the BIOS, so I can match your IPC. You'll have to do two seperate tests, one with HT and one without. As we need the 4C results to look at the delta caused by the different driver overhead from Nvidia. 

 

How are we going to test both games?

GTA 5 I suggest we drive around a bit downtown, see picture.

Spoiler

 

As for Cities skylines, I suggest a 60 or 120 recording whilst panning. You know how to make the same graphs as in the article?

[xAcid9]

3.5Ghz on all cores.

 

Randomly drive around or you have specific routes in mind? Maybe start from Michael's house and use his car?

 

Sound good enough for Skylines but gonna be pain in the arse to get perfectly matching camera angle.

 

Yeah i know how to make the graphs, do we need to match graphic settings as well?

[Majestic]

9 hours ago, xAcid9 said:

3.5Ghz on all cores.

 

Randomly drive around or you have specific routes in mind? Maybe start from Michael's house and use his car?

 

Sound good enough for Skylines but gonna be pain in the arse to get perfectly matching camera angle.

 

Yeah i know how to make the graphs, do we need to match graphic settings as well?

Well, I did the test on 3.6ghz, shouldn't matter that much. It's on the OP already. Yeah Michael's House and drive around the circle a bit, traffic causes so much of a variance that the length of the test is the only way to level it out a bit. (2-3 minutes).

 

Cities Skylines, need to play it to figure out what is best.

[xAcid9]

4C4T

Spoiler

 

4C8T

Spoiler

 

This game hate my proc, bottlenecked pretty severely at lower setting. I need 4xMSAA if i want almost constant GPU bound.

You can see a slight frametime bump in 4C4T graph, CPU usage pegged@100% during that period.

 

This is Ivy Bridge though, 6 years old?

[Majestic]

@xAcid9 wait, which game did you post?

[xAcid9]

Opss.. that was GTA5.

[Majestic]

2 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

Opss.. that was GTA5.

I didn't update the frontpage yet, settings I used are in the links now. Were they similar?

[ivan134]

Wait, how come you bought a 480? Something wrong with your 980?

[Majestic]

27 minutes ago, ivan134 said:

Wait, how come you bought a 480? Something wrong with your 980?

Swapped it, cause of the freesync panel. But i'm not exactly sold on the thing. My year long of bashing the drivers hasn't been resolved, rather confirmed.

I like wattman though.

[ivan134]

Just now, Majestic said:

Swapped it, cause of the freesync panel.

Ah okay. Will you be sticking with the card, or upgrading to Vega?

[Majestic]

3 minutes ago, ivan134 said:

Ah okay. Will you be sticking with the card, or upgrading to Vega?

Not sure yet, the freesync implementation of this panel isn't stellar. So I might just upgrade to a better Nvidia card and just deal with the tearing.

Which is not as bad on a 144hz panel asl it is on a 60hz panel.

 

Image quality of this panel is something else though. The contrast is sick.