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hai guise

Curious as to what everyone's opinions are on this matter; I'll be building a PC shortly, however I've come to a bit of a dilemma - that is, whether I should go for an AMD hexa core, or i7 quad core. Main uses will be some gaming down the road however I need to maintain good performance for using Solidworks (3d modeling). Other (somewhat) related system specs;

8GB DDR3 RAM
ATI Radeon 5850 (taking it from another computer most likely, replacing with workstation GPU)
Windows 7 Home Premium

Now, from what I've read, quad cores are better for gaming than hexa cores, however since my focus will be split between modeling and gaming, I'm not sure that 4 cores will be particularly all-around beneficial. Then there's the other comparison; i7 or a Phenom II? I was considering;

- i7 950 ($299~, and from what I've gathered that'd be the minimum worthwhile upgrade, as sandy bridge has it's own issues)
- AMD 1055T hexa core ($179~)
- AMD 1090T hexa core ($209~)

I'd like to not spend any more than possible, ideally (thus I'm leaning away from the i7), however I still want to be able to enjoy a good gaming experience as well as use Solidworks without issues (inb4 better/different GPU; this one works fine for both applications, however the PC it's currently in doesn't get used for gaymen at all so it's utterly pointless). Most likely won't be overclocking extensively (if I went with the 1055T I'd probably aim for ~3.1GHz or so, though, rather than spend more on the BE), so the BE is really negligible provided the additional speed/price isn't significant.

tl;dr: i7 950, 1055T, or 1090T, ideally best price/performance ratio for 3d modeling and some gaming. wat do?

Also, although I'd love to wait for the release of bulldozer, the potential price point, margin for errors, etc. are all just a little too high; not to mention I'd like to have this system up and running by the end of the month.

Thanks.

Quad will be enough, but it goes to preference and making it last. Imo get on sandy bridges quad since the recall will be done :p

Really quad is fast enough for what you need. I'd look at pricing. 6 is nice, but trust me, its not really needed this this point.

Sandy bridge itself is fine. Its just then damn ports on the mobo

Well that's the thing though, the intel processors are all significantly more expensive (ranging from $80 upwards for the i7s), and I'm not sure what the particular differences are between mainstream/gaming and workstation/3d modeling usages are. I wouldn't be opposed to spending more money if the performance is there but I just ain't sure that a quad core HT is worth $100 more than a hexacore. Maybe I will do the decisive "flip a coin" method for my choice >.>

I think your fine, my college runs autocad on single core HT proccessors, with 1.5gb of ram, so you can likely get by with a dual core and 2gb of ram.

Imo i recomend something like this (use whoever, i just can't find it on newegg)

http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_i..._id=036779
(Add 16gb of ram)

Now get a nice SLI card (so you can add more if your 3d program needs it) , or cheap lime one that you can update later.

Then i'd go sandy bridges unlocked with cosair water cooling (2600k unlocked appox 340ish) (CPU water cooling appox 90ish)

Then throw in the rest of the crap and you have a nice machine.

In most cases the CPU is insignificant at this point. Almost all modern processors can run an OS efficiently. And if you're into gaming it's the GPU that matters. If you want to save money...the processor is one of the places to do it.

Well, that's the problem - I'll be using a GPU designed for gaming, but I still need to do modeling; thus I have to make up for it to an extent by using a more powerful CPU. I can't base this system entirely on gaming (ie. slower processor) or general usage. Unfortunately I can't crossfire between a FirePro/Radeon, as that would be the ideal solution for me.

>In most cases the CPU is insignificant at this point. Almost all modern processors can run an OS efficiently. And if you're into gaming it's the GPU that matters. If you want to save money...the processor is one of the places to do it.

CPU can easily become the bottleneck if you're not playing at high resolutions.

Anyways you should get a Core i5-2500 or Core i5-2500K (same performance but you can overclock the 2500K). Current AMD processors have terrible single-threaded performance and the i7-950 is a generation behind.

Benchmarks:
i5-2500(K) versus i7-970
i5-2500(K) versus Phenom II X6 1100T

Quote:CPU can easily become the bottleneck if you're not playing at high resolutions.

I guess that depends. If you have a $300 graphics card though I don't see why you'd want to save $80 on CPU. I'm assuming (and maybe incorrectly) that OP wants to save money.

Considering his desire for a gaming PC with strong graphics performance I think he should try to have equal performance from his CPU as his ATI Radeon 5850.

The 5850 is sub-$200. An AMD processor could easily bottleneck his GPU.

(2011-03-09, 01:52 AM)Anman Wrote: [ -> ]Anyways you should get a Core i5-2500 or Core i5-2500K (same performance but you can overclock the 2500K). Current AMD processors have terrible single-threaded performance and the i7-950 is a generation behind.

Benchmarks:
i5-2500(K) versus i7-970
i5-2500(K) versus Phenom II X6 1100T

Well, I can't really argue with those results :| Should I consider the i7-2600 (screw the K, no real need to overclock) simply for hyperthreading?

(2011-03-09, 01:57 AM)labrocca Wrote: [ -> ]I guess that depends. If you have a $300 graphics card though I don't see why you'd want to save $80 on CPU. I'm assuming (and maybe incorrectly) that OP wants to save money.

Considering his desire for a gaming PC with strong graphics performance I think he should try to have equal performance from his CPU as his ATI Radeon 5850.

I'm really just trying to determine what's going to get me the best bang for my buck; 6 cores is pretty tempting, especially when it's cheaper than 4 cores but I guess that doesn't mean much if the performance is less. Money isn't a particular issue since I'll be able to get some funding towards the system but nonetheless I want to save money where I can.

Regardless, I'll toy around with some different configurations and see what I can come up with. Thanks so far guys!