Quad Core for Gaming

[CoolMaster]

Ok This is a question that is easily ask, and I could search the forum but I needed an up to date answer

 

i was building a computer for my bro when his friend who supposubly knows alot about computers said to get quad core instead of dual core (core 2 duo that is)

 

i said "why? all he's gonna be doing is playing games, thats useless since games are mostly single threaded apps"

 

he said "Nuh uh most all games are multi-threaded especially now most can take advantage of the 4 cores"

 

i said "uh pretty sure ur wrong"

 

so......who's right, are most games now multi-threaded and can take advantage of quad core, or is a dual core of the same speed prolly better for the price

 

thanks!

and I know this has been asked, but Im gonna copy/paste this topic to facebook so i can "attempt" to prove him wrong. of course I could be wrong to....but im pretty sure im right.

 

thanks guys!

[Bleeble]

Your brother's friend is an idiot.

 

Many (all?) of the current games that are multi-threaded only support 2 cores anyway. Upcoming games like Crysis and Hellgate: London are almost certainly multi-threaded, but I can't say for sure. Basically, for anything that's currently out, quad core is a complete waste.

Edited August 12, 2007 by Bleeble

[SMeeD]

If Im not mistaken, most new games will take advantage of two cores but not four. In the future, that will change though.

 

Edit* beat to the punch!

Edited August 12, 2007 by SMeeD

[road-runner]

According to BigRed windows does not even use four cores....

[airman]

i'm pretty sure the quad cores really work as a whole and divide the load among all four cores...at least that's what the intel rep that comes to our store told us.

[Bleeble]

i'm pretty sure the quad cores really work as a whole and divide the load among all four cores...at least that's what the intel rep that comes to our store told us.

I don't think so. It's up to the OS to split the load. I remember that AMD was working on a "reverse Hyperthreading" thing to make two cores act as one (similar to what you're saying) a year or two ago. I don't know what ever happened to that...

[Ziggy54354]

there are a couple of games coming out that support quad-core... so its not a total waste. It's probably more future proof but if you dont plan on keeping your comp for 3+ years then id just get a duo and then for the next comp get a quad once more games support it.

Edited August 12, 2007 by Ziggy54354

[Ziggy54354]

blah delete this

Edited August 12, 2007 by Ziggy54354

[bigred]

i'm pretty sure the quad cores really work as a whole and divide the load among all four cores...at least that's what the intel rep that comes to our store told us.

 

 

xp pro and vista "kinda" support the 4 cores. however they do NOT divide the work load. they reach a threshold and then move another app to the next core. a game that's at the most designed for 2 cores will only use the first 2... at MOST. at the same time neither OS is truely smart enough to balance apps amongst cores... unlike 2000 and 2003 server, linux, or OS X. all of those OS's have vastly superior load balancing abilities and can push an app to an additional core... which is vastly superior. however none are really "gaming" OS's in the first place.

 

 

vienna / windows 7 IS designed from the ground up (all new code / the cuts from vista) and is fully capable of running upto 8 cores correctly provided the app knows what to do. as an example: my main rig is a pair of quad core opterons (yes they're engineering sample chips @ 3.0ghz). to render the same monster 8+gb cad drawing (topo map of michigan) it takes upwards of 2 hours under XP / 8 hours under vista (lord only knows WHY), and less than 20 minutes under OS X. the beta of '7' takes roughly 5 minutes to do this. why? handles the cores propperly, AND supports the ram correctly without having to goof with the registry to create "buckets" for 64gb of ram.

 

reverse hyperthreading was an AMD idea that MS put a bullet in. it would REQUIRE OS support that's not going to be implimented PERIOD.

[Bleeble]

there are a couple of games coming out that support quad-core... so its not a total waste. It's probably more future proof but if you dont plan on keeping your comp for 3+ years then id just get a duo and then for the next comp get a quad once more games support it.

Not a complete waste for future games, yes. Games that you can go to the store and buy today won't use 4 cores.

 

IMO, if he's keeping his computer for 3+ years, his graphics card will be so outdated after 18 months that it won't matter what kind of CPU he has. A year from now, a $300 processor will be selling for $150 or less. Buy something that will do you some good today and save cash. Then upgrade in a year or two if you feel the need.

[Kash]

Umm, guys, isn't this whole thing a rather moot point? Games rely heavily upon graphics cards for most of the work. Having a faster CPU/more cores wouldn't really improve much on the gaming experience, except to make sure it isn't the bottleneck to the graphics card.

 

For CAD rendering or other 2D work, I can understand getting a fast CPU and lots of cores. For games, just get the fastest one you can afford and spend most of your money on the RAM and graphics card(s).

[CoolMaster]

thank you I just wanted to make sure I was right :-D