Question for the CPU Gurus

[Terrydew 6]

A question for Rob Steve and the other CPU experts

 

Intel's next line of extreme cpu will be topped by the 6950x which will be a ten core processor. I want to build the best machine possible so I have assumed I would use the 6950. However after reading many posts re HT, cores and masks, I am now not sure. If I have read the threads correctly, as of now it is better to have a higher clock speed than more cores? However I am also assuming that continued iprovement with P3D will result in better utilization of more cores?

 

Focusing on the latter assumption, is that doable or have LM already done all they can as to core utilization? Cost is really not an issue, I just want to know the best cpu to get considering the near term future as the Gurus see it.

 

Thank you for any guidance.

 

Terry

[TheBoom 31]

I'm no where near the level of Steve and others but I did quite abit of research into this very exact dilemma.

 

IMO :

 

The general stand is still that clock is king, however having additional cores seem to alleviate the problem of having too many addons and background apps running with P3D.

 

Since your performance is still going to be bottlenecked by that one main thread that P3D runs most of its processing on, having a higher clock speed tends to give a higher minimum fps.

 

As for smoothness, this is where having more cores seem to help. Especially if you have many addons running you can assign them to cores that are not used by P3D.

 

You can of course let P3D use all 10 cores, but apart from improving scenery rendering it's not going to do much in the way of smoothness or fps. In fact you will probably see more stutters and such as all the cores will compete for throughout for the main thread.

 

As of now going beyond the usage of 6 cores do not seem to help the situation with P3D.

 

The gist of it as I see is buy the processor your wallet allows for. A 4.5ghz 6 core is going to perform identical to 4.7ghz 4 core give or take a few frames. But it will give you more leeway with external addons and programs.

 

And who knows one day they might just build a new engine for P3D that might allow for better multi core usage.

 

Regards

[denon75 11]

joining the discussion i am looking for advice:

Is it worth from P3D v3 performance point of view to pay more for 6700k over 6600k?

 

I find opinion that is not worth it based on gaming benchmarks

http://www.ocaholic.ch/modules/smartsection/item.php?itemid=3948&page=9

[TheBoom 31]

joining the discussion i am looking for advice:

Is it worth from P3D v3 performance point of view to pay more for 6700k over 6600k?

 

I find opinion that is not worth it based on gaming benchmarks

http://www.ocaholic.ch/modules/smartsection/item.php?itemid=3948&page=9

 

I went for the 6700k.

 

The difference is HT. Having HT means more "logical processors", hence more room to play with. If you plan to make this build solely for P3D then you could save some money and go for the 6600k. However if you plan to play other games or do video editing and the likes I would advise the 6700k, considerably better performance and future proof.

 

The average OC for the 6600k does not seem to be far off from the 6700k so I doubt you'd gain much in terms of raw performance.

[Robert McDonald 167]

I went for the 6700k.

 

The difference is HT. Having HT means more "logical processors", hence more room to play with. If you plan to make this build solely for P3D then you could save some money and go for the 6600k. However if you plan to play other games or do video editing and the likes I would advise the 6700k, considerably better performance and future proof.

 

The average OC for the 6600k does not seem to be far off from the 6700k so I doubt you'd gain much in terms of raw performance.

 

Lol.  You went for Hyperthreads on the 6700k, even though you yourself have hyperthreading turned off.  In P3D afaik, the Hyperthreads cause stuttering.  FYI.

[stans 702]

I'm not an expert, but from what I have read... hyperthreading does nothing to improve FSX and, at least in some cases, can decrease performance.  As for the number of physical cores in the CPU, FSX does well on CPU's with 4 cores all running at 4 GHz or better.  6 cores, as long as all 6 can run fast, may provide a slight benefit, but beyond 6 cores the rate of improvement diminishes.  A big advantage of newer CPU's is a higher bandwidth and the ability to use DDR4 RAM.  Plain and simple, FSX is an old program, it was designed for high speed CPU's and RAM, initially for a fast single core, then SP1 gave FSX the ability to run on multiple cores, but they still had to be fast.  I'm sure new software is designed to take advantage of many more cores and hyperthreading, but with FSX, speed is still the king.

[TheBoom 31]

Lol.  You went for Hyperthreads on the 6700k, even though you yourself have hyperthreading turned off.  In P3D afaik, the Hyperthreads cause stuttering.  FYI.

 

Lol, not sure why you're quoting a 3 month old post but nevertheless I use my PC for plenty of things other than P3D. That's where hyperthreading usually comes useful. FYI.

[conura 45]

Lol, not sure why you're quoting a 3 month old post but nevertheless I use my PC for plenty of things other than P3D. That's where hyperthreading usually comes useful. FYI.

People always say this to me too. Why do you need hyperthreading, you've wasted your money, blah blah blah. I work with virtual machines all day and HT helps a tonne, not everyone uses their PC for gaming alone.