INTEL or AMD?

H1N1

Member
Hello,

I have a desktop PC. The current specs are
CPU - Intel i7 8700K
GPU - ASUS 1080TI
RAM - Corsair DDR4 - 32GB
Motherboard: ASUS X Hero

As shown from the above specs, the GPU and CPU are old, and the PC is struggling when playing some games; notably Cities Skylines II. It manages games like COD reasonably well. It is more because of CSII, that I am exploring upgrades - and because GTA VI is around the corner which my current rig is the 'minimum' requirement!

Now, we are all very aware that the Cities Skylines II game continues to be poorly optimised, and even high-end PCs struggle with it. That said, for my rig, it is unplayable—even when starting out / very low density.

I do the odd video editing; getting videos off my phone and adding some bits/chopping bits of the video out, etc, which is then uploaded to YouTube, etc - nothing too demanding.

I have seen numerous forums discussing Intel over AMD and vice versa, which I am grateful to have been able to read, as it has provided me with some starting points and things to explore.

From what I can gather, the general conclusion from the forums is that Intel seems to be on a break when it comes to CPUs, with nothing expected this year, and their latest CPU is not performing well for gaming. Therefore, AMD continues to be recommended over and over.

I have seen that the 'X3D' CPU chips are the ones to focus on for gaming, and have been going round and round trying to decide what would be better for the games that I mainly play; as above.
CSII seemingly likes more cores, which drew me to the Ryzen 9 7950X3D chip as it has 16 cores; though it has a lower 'base clock' than the next chip below, it has a higher 'boost clock, ' with 8 of the 16 cores having the 3D V-Cache.
On the other hand, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D chip is recommended over and over for gaming. even though it has 8 cores with a higher 'base clock' than the above, it does have a lower boost clock, and 4 of the 8 cores have 3D V-Cache.

However, I am getting conflicting info.

I am one of those gamers who will have in the background multiple tabs in Edge open, along with Synology Drive running in the background; I'm not sure if this is a factor to consider when thinking about what CPU to get, but worth saying just in case this does sway what CPU to generally head towards.

I have just seen that AMD is in the process of releasing a 9950X3D; a 16-core processor.

What CPU would you recommend?

I would like to pair it with a 5090 - though please do advise if this is complete overkill and would not really be utilised. I would be grateful for your recommendations and rationale to help inform my decision.

Is there anyone who would recommend an INTEL CPU over an AMD ? Or anyone who feels that both are not worth investing in and to wait for INTEL to release a better CPU?
 

Martinr36

MOST VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
I think this answers the question

 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D processor will be released on March 12, 2025. It is a 16-core processor with Zen 5 and 3D V-Cache architecture.
Maybe hang on till that is released.
I would agree. Cities Skylines is very CPU hungry, and the benefits of the new 9000 architecture with the 3d V Cache no longer being limited in frequency and temperature as in the 7950x3d I suspect will make quite a strong increase in performance as the 9800x3d did over the 7800x3d

I would definitely hold out if you can for a week or so
 

H1N1

Member
I have seen by Gamers Nexus that there has been multiple reports regarding the 9800X3D chip.

It seems that the Intel 149000KS are not the only CPUs with issues! hmm
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
I have seen by Gamers Nexus that there has been multiple reports regarding the 9800X3D chip.

It seems that the Intel 149000KS are not the only CPUs with issues! hmm
From early reports, it's possibly 2 batches of the CPUs released late last year, or possibly BIOS related on the mobo, unfortunately at this time, most of the faults are with ASRock boards (ergo me), but it appears specific to BIOS revision 3.15 and upwards (from December last year). ASRock have a current BETA BIOS v3.20 out now, but are close to a suspected fix (hopefully)

It also mainly appears to be issues with too low voltage, and flashing an earlier BIOS restores normal booting.

There are a couple of instances of burnt pins suggesting overvoltage possibly on the VSoC which is the same issue they had on the early 7800X3D BIOSes more on Asus boards, but I thought the later Agesa update specifically locked that down but perhaps that patch somehow wasn't included on the 9000X3D Agesa, that's still ongoing.


Could we please eject the malfunctioning enthusiast component life-pod from the ship please, and resume normal programming... please, pretty please.
 
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