Intel i7 870 Performance Test
Introduction
Today I’ll be testing the performance of an i7 870 processor to see how it compares to an i5 750 in 22 different games, at the settings I play them at. This is literally a drop-in upgrade; the processor is swapped while everything else stays the same.
As the base turbo frequency of the i5 750 is 2.8 GHz and it’s 3.2 GHz for the i7 870, that represents a best-case frequency increase of 14%.
I’ll also be using my current primary gaming card, which is a GTX480.
Hardware
- Intel Core i5 750 (2.8 GHz, turbo on), Intel Core i7 870 (3.2 GHz, turbo on, HT off).
- 4 GB DDR3-1333 RAM (2×2 GB, dual-channel).
- Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3 (Intel P55 chipset, F6 BIOS).
- nVidia GeForce GTX480 (1.5 GB, reference clocks).
- Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic.
- 30” HP LP3065.
Software
- Windows 7 (64 bit).
- nVidia driver 258.96, high quality filtering, all optimizations off, LOD clamp enabled.
- DirectX June 2010.
- All games patched to their latest versions.
Settings
- 16xAF forced in the driver, vsync forced off in the driver.
- AA forced either through the driver or enabled in-game, whichever works better.
- Highest quality sound (stereo) used in all games.
- All results show an average framerate.
Those i7s are nice, intel did good with its last cpus (or maybe amd just disappointed abit?). I used to always recammend people buy amd for value, but with the i3/i5 s intel has pretty darn good value.
Athlon II 640 or i3 530? same differnce.