Is more than 8 cores still overkill for high end gaming for 1440P with RTX 4090

[cvaldes]

For now...

It is such a boring CPU, might as well be using a Dell

You know, when I'm playing a game, whether it be on the build described in my System Specs, a secondary gaming PC, my iPhone, or my Nintendo Switch, I really don't think about what that device's Geekbench score was, how many cores it has, the number of heat pipes on the CPU cooler, etc.

If I'm having fun, mission accomplished.

Whether the case says Dell, Lian-Li, Nintendo, or NZXT really doesn't matter while I'm playing a game. I realize I'm in the minority here at TPU.

In fact if I'm not thinking about my gaming hardware when I'm playing a game I've chosen wisely.

I don't know any specs of my Super NES Classic. Not a single one. All I know is it's not the same hardware inside as the original, it's some Linux box running a SNES emulator. I have zero idea about the CPU frequency, how much RAM it has, the pixel fillrate of the GPU, the TDP of the device, etc. It has a power connector, HDMI out, and a couple of ports to plug in wired controllers. That's all I know.

Yet, I can still have fun playing Donkey Kong Country. Should I be wringing my hands because it's not a 5800X3D or 13900?

In the end, a computer is an appliance. Like a toaster oven, VCR, automobile or electric toothbrush.

 

[freeagent]

You know, when I'm playing a game, whether it be on the build described in my System Specs, a secondary gaming PC, my iPhone, or my Nintendo Switch, I really don't think about what that device's Geekbench score was, how many cores it has, the number of heat pipes on the CPU cooler, etc.

If I'm having fun, mission accomplished.

Whether the case says Dell, Lian-Li, Nintendo, or NZXT really doesn't matter while I'm playing a game. I realize I'm in the minority here at TPU.

In fact if I'm not thinking about my gaming hardware when I'm playing a game I've chosen wisely.

I don't know any specs of my Super NES Classic. Not a single one. All I know is it's not the same hardware inside as the original, it's some Linux box running a SNES emulator. I have zero idea about the CPU frequency, how much RAM it has, the pixel fillrate of the GPU, the TDP of the device, etc. It has a power connector, HDMI out, and a couple of ports to plug in wired controllers. That's all I know.

Yet, I can still have fun playing Donkey Kong Country. Should I be wringing my hands because it's not a 5800X3D or 13900?

In the end, a computer is an appliance. Like a toaster oven, VCR, automobile or electric toothbrush.

This is my hobby I enjoy playing with computer hardware

I can't play games for more than an hour, possibly because I may have a short attention span. I get bored.

And I like details, sorry

 

[The red spirit]

That was because it was late, made in limited quantities & basically EOL about 6(9?) months later by 6700k ~ that was the first real sign of major node troubles for Intel, though originally 22nm was also late by a quarter or two IIRC.

Intel could have just delayed 6700k to later date. Also media usually covers even such rushed releases too, it was so quiet that you might think that Intel paid them to shut up. The problem with Broadwell is that it looked like laptop chip, great IPC, L4 cache, really fast iGPU, low clocks, incredible efficiency. It really needed higher clocks and it was kneecapped by forcing it into 65 watt TDP, which was dumb, because Haswell and Haswell R i7s were all 84 watts. Otherwise, Broadwell's IPC was superior. Not only that, but if you crannk clocks and match TDP with Skylake chips, Broadwell was faster, because of higher IPC and it sure did overclock reasonably well. It leaves us questioning whether Broadwell was too good or rather too cheap and Intel realized that less efficient and cranked up Skylake would sell well with higher margins. Still, Broadwell was overall superior, not to mention that iGPU in it was lightyears ahead of anything Intel had made up to that point, beating even Skylake's (by 2 times too). Skylake basically did nothing better, not to mention that it was reheated all way until Rocket Lake, which makes Broadwell the highest IPC from Intel even in Comet Lake era. That's why I say that i7 5775c was Intel's 5800X3D, it was just too good.

For now...

It is such a boring CPU, might as well be using a Dell

For real mate? That's your definition of boring? You ain't cranking it enough, if you find it boring.

 

[freeagent]

For real mate? That's your definition of boring? You ain't cranking it enough, if you find it boring.

I'll put it back in soon, I just wanted to play with this one for a bit

 

[R0H1T]

The problem with Broadwell is that it looked like laptop chip, great IPC, L4 cache, really fast iGPU, low clocks, incredible efficiency.

It was a great chip & I was hoping to buy one (brand new) for my z97 mobo even as late as 2018-19, but when it launched it was absurdly priced here & barely in stock. I couldn't ever find one at a semi decent price, even second hand & so gave up on it.

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

has L4 cache. Obviously, now it's ancient, but back then it was kinda like 5800X3D

One moment while I rant about L4 being nothing like massive L3... To say nothing of being an iGPU cache.

I think games are starting to take notice of more and more cores - you may find that more cores make a CPU last longer than high IPC.

 

[The red spirit]

It was a great chip & I was hoping to buy one (brand new) for my z97 mobo even as late as 2018-19, but when it launched it was absurdly priced here & barely in stock. I couldn't ever find one at a semi decent price, even second hand & so gave up on it.

I would dare to say taht it was better than even Comet Lake chips. Broadwell still had more IPC and you could overclock it basically as high as Skylake. And later there were i9s...

One moment while I rant about L4 being nothing like massive L3... To say nothing of being an iGPU cache.

I think games are starting to take notice of more and more cores - you may find that more cores make a CPU last longer than high IPC.

But we don't live in that reality yet and Broadwell today would be around 7 years old, so those who got it ought one hell of the chip and got a lot of value out of it. With decent overclock it's even today very good chip and doesn't bottleneck even RTX 3080. It's essentially i3 12100F, but from many years ago.

 

[Wolverine2349]

One moment while I rant about L4 being nothing like massive L3... To say nothing of being an iGPU cache.

I think games are starting to take notice of more and more cores - you may find that more cores make a CPU last longer than high IPC.

Do you think that scales well beyond 8 cores?? And which games have you noticed that with?

And how do games scale to more and more cores if programming something like a game to use things in parallel processing is so hard to almost impossible from what I have read and heard.

 

[cvaldes]

This is my hobby I enjoy playing with computer hardware

I can't play games for more than an hour, possibly because I may have a short attention span. I get bored.

And I like details, sorry

Thanks for the explanation. That's fine if your attention span is only one hour for gaming and you mostly get your kicks playing with the hardware. I never tell anyone that they must play video games. If you want to use an RTX 4090 as a doorstop, you are free to do so.

Hell, my own interest in video games is limited and my sessions are usually over in a couple of hours.

Why don't you just run benchmarks instead? Some are very pretty and you don't have to worry about your character dying and inconveniently interrupting your admiration of the RTSS statistics overlay.

 

[freeagent]

Why don't you just run benchmarks instead? Some are very pretty

I do

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

Do you think that scales well beyond 8 cores?? And which games have you noticed that with?

And how do games scale to more and more cores if programming something like a game to use things in parallel processing is so hard to almost impossible from what I have read and heard.

Multiprocessing on a latency-sensitive application like a game is a big challenge. I couldn't figure it out, but many intelligent game developers are working to improve this.

I was just noting a trend more than a specific scenario, but as an example Path of Exile added support for 16 logical cores/threads in a patch two years ago (up from 8, IIRC). Unreal Engine 4 ran on 4 cores*, I think UE5 can use at least 8.

*Other parts of UE4 games could use more.

 

[cvaldes]

I do

Great, go nuts.

However I think OP is interested in playing games based on the thread title. Just a guess...

That said, there are certainly people online who cannot have fun playing games until the framerate counter hits a certain number and stop having fun if it drops below a certain threshold, even for a split second.

 

[freeagent]

Great, go nuts.

I do the best I can with what I have

However I think OP is interested in playing games based on the thread title. Just a guess...

Yes indeed, I am replying since I have been singled out

 

[AlwaysHope]

Considering current gen consoles like PS5 & Xbox series X use custom AMD 8 core cpus (Zen 2) & devs aim their game code at those platforms firstly before PC. This is evidence that 8 good cores is all you need for PC gaming. What resolution you play at & choice of graphics card has little, if anything to do with what the games code demands for cpu requirements.

 

[Wolverine2349]

Multiprocessing on a latency-sensitive application like a game is a big challenge. I couldn't figure it out, but many intelligent game developers are working to improve this.

I was just noting a trend more than a specific scenario, but as an example Path of Exile added support for 16 logical cores/threads in a patch two years ago (up from 8, IIRC). Unreal Engine 4 ran on 4 cores*, I think UE5 can use at least 8.

*Other parts of UE4 games could use more.

Yeah though what is interesting is I remember back during the Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad era how everyone was saying a Core 2 Duo was easily enough for gaming and a quad core was a waste and many refuted it by saying a quad core will hold up much better and be needed soon and they were correct.

Then we were stuck on quad cores for a while with rampantly improving IPC and a dual core was a bottleneck for gaming like in 2011-2012 where a Core 2 Quad was still more than enough to drive a high end GPU.

Now I hear the same argument about 8 core CPUs and soon more cores will age better. Though that does not seem to be happening as 6-8 core CPUs on mainstream have been out for 5 years.

Where the 5800X and such and even 5600X are holding up so nicely still and even the 8700K and 9900K are doing fine and holding up.

So basically is it much harder to program for more and more cores. Like was much less step up for game devs to program from 1 to 2 cores and then 4 cores and thus much easier than going from 4 to 6 and then to 8 let alone beyond 8. Is that why 8 cores and even 7 core CPUs with high enough IPC have lasted so much longer for driving high end video cards being like 5 years.

5 years after Quad core came out, dual cores held back high end games a lot it seemed. 8 cores does not seem to hold any high end modern games back and even 6 cores does not and has been that way for some time.

Sop therefore was the jump for game devs from single to dual to quad core much easier than going beyond and only going to get harder and harder programming more and more cores given how hard parallelizing games are.

 

[Vario]

Yeah though what is interesting is I remember back during the Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad era how everyone was saying a Core 2 Duo was easily enough for gaming and a quad core was a waste and many refuted it by saying a quad core will hold up much better and be needed soon and they were correct.

Then we were stuck on quad cores for a while with rampantly improving IPC and a dual core was a bottleneck for gaming like in 2011-2012 where a Core 2 Quad was still more than enough to drive a high end GPU.

Now I hear the same argument about 8 core CPUs and soon more cores will age better. Though that does not seem to be happening as 6-8 core CPUs on mainstream have been out for 5 years.

Where the 5800X and such and even 5600X are holding up so nicely still and even the 8700K and 9900K are doing fine and holding up.

So basically is it much harder to program for4 more and more cores. Like was it step harder and harder for game devs to program from 1 to 2 cores and then 4 cores much easier than going form 4 to 6 and then to 8 let alone beyond 8. Is that why 8 cores and even 7 core CPUs with high enough IPC have lasted so much longer for driving high end video cards being like 5 years.

5 years after Quad core came out, dual cores held back gaming a lot it seemed. 8 cores does not seem to hold anything back and even 6 cores usually do not.

Sop therefore was the jump for game devs from single to dual to quad core much easier than going beyond and only going to get harder and harder programming more and more cores given how hard parallelizing games are.

Get an 8 core. 8 core is the new 6 core. 6 core was the new quad core.

 

[Wolverine2349]

Get an 8 core. 8 core is the new 6 core. 6 core was the new quad core.

That's what I am leaning towards. Is it worth getting a 13900K for the extra L3 cache. I hear L3 cache makes a big difference in games. I will be shutting down trhe e-cores and using 8 P cores and hoping for a strong overclock.

Is the 13900K much better binned than 13700K?? Though my local Micro Center ran out of 13900K and they had it at $499. They have 13700K at $399 same exact price as Ryzen 7 7700X. And I can get a better 8 core chip plus the extra e-cores of course which I will not use as that will be shut off, but a good deal for 8 better cores clock for clock. Though how much important is the 6MB extra L3 cache and better bin for overclocking almost to 6GHz and IMC.

 

[Vario]

That's what I am leaning towards. Is it worth getting a 13900K for the extra L3 cache. I hear L3 cache makes a big difference in games. I will be shutting down trhe e-cores and using 8 P cores and hoping for a strong overclock.

Is the 13900K much better binned than 13700K?? Though my local Micro Center ran out of 13900K and they had it at $499. They have 13700K at $399 same exact price as Ryzen 7 7700X. And I can get a better 8 core chip plus the extra e-cores of course which I will not use as that will be shut off, but a good deal for 8 better cores clock for clock. Though how much important is the 6MB extra L3 cache and better bin for overclocking almost to 6GHz and IMC.

You are running a 4090 so it would make sense to run the best CPU to pair it with, so maybe 13900K or 7950X or wait for the 7x00X3D.

7950X3D sounds like the best all around scenario.

 

[cvaldes]

That's what I am leaning towards. Is it worth getting a 13900K for the extra L3 cache. I hear L3 cache makes a big difference in games.

Isn't that basically why the 5800X3D rules the gaming CPU world? Its massive L3 cache?

 

[Wolverine2349]

Isn't that basically why the 5800X3D rules the gaming CPU world? Its massive L3 cache?

So yeah I guess its worth it then., Though is 36MB for 8 cores over 30MB make a big difference. Or does it have to be triple like 96MB over 32MB that the 5800X3D has over standard 5800X and supposedly the upcoming 7000 3d VCACHE variants will have over the regular Ryzen 7000??

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

So yeah I guess its worth it then., Though is 36MB for 8 cores over 30MB make a big difference. Or does it have to be triple like 96MB over 32MB that the 5800X3D has over standard 5800X and supposedly the upcoming 7000 3d VCACHE variants will have over the regular Ryzen 7000??

Any helps. Look at the difference between the 5500/5600G and the 5600. The main difference is cache - my recommendation would be the 7800X3D or whatever it is called.

 

[phanbuey]

anyone who talks about CPU core requirements for gaming has no clue about either

Some people also like to confuse how games and cores work. Making statements like games will require 8 cores or something to that effect. Games don't require a certain number of cores, they never have and they never will. Games require a certain level of CPU performance, it's really that simple

We know how current and past gen 4-6-8 cores perform so it’s easier to talk about performance in current number of cores. No one is really talking about a 1700x when they say 8 core.

The reason "8" core is the sweet spot is that current AMD and Intals top out at 8 P cores/ one CCD with 8 Zen 3 vcache or one 8 Zen 4 cores is the best performance you can get with the least downside in terms of scheduler issues.

Also # cores are generally tied to cache, which makes a big difference, and ability to process simultaneous threads which helps slightly in certain cases.

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

Games don't require a certain number of cores, they never have and they never will. Games require a certain level of CPU performance, it's really that simple

True, very true. However, if a game cannot utilize more than say 4 cores, your CPU's performance is limited to the 4 best cores (plus a bit as other things are not competing). If a game can use 128 threads, a threadripper 3990WX is a better choice than a 7950X despite having ~40% less single core performance.

 

[cvaldes]

So yeah I guess its worth it then., Though is 36MB for 8 cores over 30MB make a big difference. Or does it have to be triple like 96MB over 32MB that the 5800X3D has over standard 5800X and supposedly the upcoming 7000 3d VCACHE variants will have over the regular Ryzen 7000??

For what? Is there some certain performance threshold the CPU needs to meet?

Some CPUs play games better than others. Go look at reviews for the AMD 7950X and Intel 13900, they're the newest flagship models from both companies. The gaming benchmarks should include other processors including older generations as well as the 5800X3D. Decide what performance you want at what budget.

Whether the L3 cache is 64MB, 96GB, 128GB or 69MB doesn't really matter as long as the CPU part in its entirely provides the performance you are seeking.

There is always a new technology around the corner that will run Program X faster than yesterday's tech. Will the 7800X3D outperform the 5800X3D? It better otherwise AMD engineering didn't do their job.

No one here knows the 7800X3D's future specs nor its price and how it will compete with Intel products that they release between now and the 7800X3D debut.

Some people find it fun to speculate about unannounced products but it doesn't give you any data points to make an informed purchase decision NOW.

And after the 7800X3D is released, the 14900 and later 8800X3D will probably beat it.

Just buy what will provide adequate performance for your specific usage case. If it doesn't exist, then keep waiting... Nothing wrong with that, most people don't marry the first non-family member they meet.

And even if you can find a CPU that provides enough performance, just remember that at some point, some evil game developer will write a game that will require even more performance than what your gear can do.

 

[freeagent]

There is always something new around the corner, if you wait you will always wait while everyone plays. He is right, buy for your needs and be happy.

FWIW I have 5900X, 5800X3D, and 5600X.. 5600X is still a dam good CPU even if it is only 6 cores.