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When building a gaming PC, the choice of processor is important as its specifications can make a huge impact on your performance. Because certain applications are known to be multi-core orientated, they are able to utilize more cores effectively, but this is usually application dependent. Also, there are single-core-oriented applications such as gaming, so does it really matter how many cores you have?
The terms octa and quad denote the number of cores present on the processor, each CPU has a physical location on the chip designated for the cores. So, if your processor has eight cores, then you’ll be able to physically see eight cores on the chip, and with a quad-core processor, you will see four cores. The theory behind having more cores is that if the program is multithreaded, the performance will be vastly improved.
Answer: In terms of performance, the Octa-Core processor will be superior in every scenario compared to a Quad-core processor, this is due to the extra multitasking capabilities. Applications such as streaming that use many cores will see a massive performance boost. Even gaming that is single-core orientated will benefit from the multitasking abilities in the background.
Cores Vs Clock Speed?
Cores Vs Clock speed is a popular topic because both of these metrics are used to gauge the performance of a processor. If a CPU has more cores, then it will perform faster, and it has a higher clock speed then it will also perform faster. But the question is, what makes the most impact, Cores or Clock speed? In general, it depends on the application you’re running, some applications use more cores, some use only one, so technically neither is better than the other.
Higher clock speed tends to be beneficial to applications that require only one core to run, and we all know that gaming is coded for single-core use. If you’re gaming, then you will want to focus more on single-core performance, so that means focusing on the processor’s IPC as well as the processor’s core clock speed. Beware, you should not purchase an old processor just because it has a high core clock speed, this is because the newer processors will have massive IPC gains over the old CPUs.
Applications such as Video encoding, and photo manipulation will benefit more from having multiple cores, applications that fit in this category are streaming (x264 software encoding), and photoshop. Focusing on multi-core performance will vastly increase the performance in these applications, therefore having an octa-core processor will be the better option. Because these applications are coded to use more than one core, that means SMT and Hyperthreading will provide you with massive performance gains due to the extra efficiency of each core. Hyperthreading basically splits one physical core into two logical cores for extra performance.
Quad Core Vs Octa Core For Streaming
For streaming, more cores are better for the performance, we typically recommend at least 6-8cores to stream effectively. If you have a Quad-Core processor, then streaming may not be for you as it can cause the stream to react poorly. Streaming is CPU intensive and a 4 core processor may not be able to provide enough performance for a stable stream. Ensuring the selected processors can enable SMT can improve your streaming performance by up to 30%, most AMD processors have SMT enabled, and SMT comes in the form of hyperthreading for Intel.
If you aren’t going are not looking to build a dedicated streaming PC, then you may require 8 cores plus, this is because a single streaming PC will have fewer resources to designate to streaming. An 8 core/Octa-Core processor will be enough for gaming as well as streaming at the same time, if you’re going for a dedicated streaming PC, then 6 Cores will be enough as the processor will be mainly dedicated to streaming. If you’re going down the dedicated streaming PC route, then you will require a capture card which is another expense.
Intel and AMD both provide a decent selection of 8 core processors that you can use for streaming, Ryzen may be the better choice due to them being the cheaper option as well as providing amazing multi-core performance. Intel is an amazing choice if you’re looking for an overkill processor with insane single-core performance, streaming will not be an issue on an Intel processor. An amazing 8 Core processor by Intel would be the I7 12700K which provides you with insane multicore performance as well as single-core performance. A great 8 Core Ryzen processor would be the Ryzen 7 5800x which has decent single-core performance as well as 8cores 16threads.
Quad Core Vs Octa Core For Gaming
For gaming it is a little different because the number of cores does not really impact how much frame rate your game can generate, this is because most games are single-core coded. But again, we recommend an octa-core processor for gaming because of the extra multitasking performance it provides, this will be a benefit for running background tasks which otherwise would cause lag.
With gaming, there is more leniency with the processor you choose, you can get away with a quad-core processor if you’re playing old games. The issue with this is that your PC will suffer when trying to play newer games that require a lot of processing power. Also, your PC will not be future-proofed; you will require an upgrade of the processor far sooner than necessary. A hexa-core processor would be a good balance between a quad-core and an octa-core processor if it provides you with decent single-core performance.
For mid-range configurations, we recommend at least a quad-core processor but try to aim for at least a hexa-core processor. A decent hexa-core processor would be the I5 12600K with a boost clock speed of 4.9GHz, and 12 threads. This processor is a decent option if you’re looking to get into gaming without breaking the bank. An 8-core gaming configuration would consist of an I7 12700K with a boost core clock speed of 5GHz, as well as having 16 threads. The i7 12700K is a future-proofed processor that will last you a long time, the single-core performance shouldn’t bottleneck any GPU.
Conclusion
The verdict of this post will tell you that having an Octa-core processor is better in every way except for the price. An Octa-core processor will ensure that you can run applications such as streaming, video editing, and photoshop more effectively, and gaming will be better due to the increased multitasking capabilities. Octa-core processors tend to lean towards the top-tier processors, so they tend to have higher single-core clock speeds compared to quad-core processors, therefore they will generate more FPS.
