HT or without HT?

[Kent010]

Hi! I'm planning to build a new gaming rig based on LGA 1155 platform. I'm a newbie in the gaming world and I still have a lot more to learn. I have a limited budget & I'm contemplating on either a hyper-threaded dual core i3s or a pure dual core pentiums. I have yet to decide on the chip models to choose. My understanding is that hyper-threaded core i3s are good for multi-threaded games(e.g. crysis 2) while pure dual core pentiums are good in light threaded games(e.g. call of duty4), I'm not sure if that's the case. I'm playing these games in my old LGA 775 platform. Since I play both games, what's the best choice here? Any sound advice and suggestions shall be appreciated..Thanks!

[fenyal]

performance ladder goes as follows:
i7
i5
i3
pentium
celeron
celeron being the slowest.
hyperthreading is just a bonus, don't rely on that as a primary point of interest. an i3 will be faster in the same hertz bracket and probably keep up even in sub par hertz brackets where the i3 is slower in number but not in efficiency. (meaning a "slower" i3 will actually in fact be faster because of architect difference)

i3's use DMI where pentiums use FSB

DMI = newer and faster
FSB = older and slower

i would recommend an i3 as that would be my choice if my budget allowed.

[hardwarecop]

[fenyal]

Core i3
» Nehalem, Sandy Bridge & Ivy Bridge microarchitecture
» 0.022 and 0.032 micron
» Budget desktop CPU
» Dual core
» Up to 3.5 GHz
» 2.5 and 5 GT/s DMI
» Up to 512 KB L2 cache
» Up to 4 MB L3 cache
» 64-bit
» SSSE3, SSE4, AVX
» Virtualization
» HyperThreading
BGA1284
Socket 1155
Socket 1156
http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_i3/TYPE-Core%20i3.html

Pentium Dual-Core
» Core, Nehalem, Sandy Bridge & Ivy Bridge microarchitecture
» 0.022, 0.032, 0.045 & 0.065 micron
» Budget desktop CPU
» Dual core
» Up to 3.33 GHz
» Up to 1066 MHz FSB
» Up to 2 MB L2 cache
» Up to 3 MB L3 cache
» 64-bit
» Execute Disable bit
» SSE3, SSSE3
» Virtualization
Socket 1155
Socket 1156
Socket 1356
Socket 775
http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Pentium_Dual-Core/TYPE-Pentium%20Dual-Core.html


aside from this information, i would say hardwarecop is correct. upon further investigation it seems CPU's general information on some chips is misleading.

[hardwarecop]

Okay, good that you post the specs again.

For gamers, I would definitely recommend Intel Core i5 processors. i7s have HT/SMT enabled, but modern games don't take the advantage of it (at least not yet. Maybe soon)... And that's one of the reasons why the i7 is significantly more expensive. It's only worth the money when the user also uses rendering programs, but then I think AMD Bulldozer's a better choice because the FX have "real" virtual cores, and SMT is just pipeline tricking

i3 processors are a little bit slow, but not bad for those with a small budget. But also then I would go for a Vishera-6-Module-FX.

Sorry for my bad English, I hope that I expressed my self clearly.