What is ghz?

[rookie.wanna.play]

So i’m in the middle of picking a cpu. I3, i5 8400 and an i5 8500. An i5 8400 has 2.6 ghz? Based on what i see on pcpartpicker. How important is that tho? Coz an i3 has 3.6

[FloRolf]

Not at all in this case because the Turbo boost is more important in single threaded tasks and the core count is more important in multi threaded tasks. 

[Princess Luna]

If you have absolutely no understanding of what a CPU frequency mean, you should probably take a day off to watch some YouTube videos on the matter before making purchase decisions.

[Jurrunio]

that is just a unit of frequency.

 

i5s have 6 cores while i3 only has 4, so i3 is not as good as the other two

 

Then there's turbo clocks. 8400 can go much higher (3.8) than i3 which lacks turbo. 8500 is a tiny bit faster, but unless it's the same price, you should still get the 8400

[xriqn]

Unit of frequency that a CPU's clock speed is measured in, can also be used to measure the speed of an electromagnetic wave of some sort. 1GHz in a CPU = 1 billion instructions per second can be executed. This is one of the factors to look for when buying a CPU, the others are cores, CPU model (determines whether u can overclock or not, build quality and other minor factors), lithography and TDP. 

[Peskanova]

4 cores = standard 
6 cores = streaming standard
more cores = workstation 

more or less is that.

3.4 or more is the way to go with gaming. (Gaming allways turbo boosts)

[xriqn]

Just now, Peskanova said:

4 cores = standard 
6 cores = streaming standard
more cores = workstation 

more or less is that.

3.4 or more is the way to go with gaming. (Gaming allways turbo boosts)

Don't forget 2 cores, they're still widely used too!

[Peskanova]

i3 at 3.6 good for gaming , it may be bad for streaming , if you need to compare i3 with more ghz than a i5 its a trick question , i5 is better for overall but that i3 at 3.6 are meat to gaming low budget high performance (maybe better than that i5 but only for gaming)

[Peskanova]

1 minute ago, xriqn said:

Don't forget 2 cores, they're still widely used too!

Yeah but for a new rig I think that 2 cores is not the way to go

[xriqn]

1 minute ago, Peskanova said:

Yeah but for a new rig I think that 2 cores is not the way to go

Depends on what you're building I suppose. It'd be decent for a HTPC or a mini linux machine. I have a dual core machine (it's in my sig if ur curious of the specs) that I literally have waiting for my baby brother as a starter PC. I'm 16 btw before u go thinking im some little kid lol.

[Peskanova]

Yeah you are right but I think dual cores are so specific that you need to know what will be the use, if you know that a dual core can be better price/performance 

[Wh0_Am_1]

28 minutes ago, rookie.wanna.play said:

So i’m in the middle of picking a cpu. I3, i5 8400 and an i5 8500. An i5 8400 has 2.6 ghz? Based on what i see on pcpartpicker. How important is that tho? Coz an i3 has 3.6

OK, I hope that this makes it easy. Ghz is how many times your CPU will check for a new set of instructions per second, and how many times per second it can execute a new set of instructions up to a set limit, determined by the gen and architecture of the processor. But since this is all one architecture of chips basically the faster the better. Therefore the 8400 searches for and executes 2.4 billion instructions per second, while the 8500 does 3.6 billion, from this we can find that the 8500 is at least 50% more powerful than the 8400 unless those clock speeds are incorrect. I hope this makes sense! I would say that it is important. Now that I have types this all out, I am going to sit back and marvel at the staggering heights which modern computers have reached.

[xriqn]

3 minutes ago, Peskanova said:

Yeah you are right but I think dual cores are so specific that you need to know what will be the use, if you know that a dual core can be better price/performance 

Can give a ton of uses for dual cores: HTPC, linux machine, retro games rig, mini server for files and lightweight shit, light gaming (I actually tried CSGO and other moderately new games on my dual core machine and they run pretty well), office work. List goes on I suppose. Have got a single core machine too, only use that for linux and basic crap like word processing and retro games.

[Peskanova]

If you tell the budget and the use we can aid you for the best cpu.

[rookie.wanna.play]

20 minutes ago, FloRolf said:

Not at all in this case because the Turbo boost is more important in single threaded tasks and the core count is more important in multi threaded tasks. 

Thanksss

[DocSwag]

i5 8400 has 50% more cores and its all core turbo is also much higher at 3.8 ghz

[Wh0_Am_1]

17 minutes ago, DocSwag said:

i5 8400 has 50% more cores and its all core turbo is also much higher at 3.8 ghz

Both the 8400 and the 8500 have 6 cores.

[DocSwag]

1 hour ago, Wh0_Am_1 said:

Both the 8400 and the 8500 have 6 cores.

I was referring to the i3 which OP mentioned