You're completly wrong there.To me this review is completely unfounded and misleading... I found +78% for min fps in Thief ultra 1920x1080 with fx8350+290 and it's a great improvement... so your "frames per second" what? min, avg, max? if you write just a unique number and don't explain, it doesn't mean anything at all... so I don't trust you, I trust myself... then, BF4 is totally smooth regarding the frametime and compared to D3D, there are only some spikes randomly...'cause they are teething expected issues...why don't you mention something like this?
It’s a sad say when you learn that your CPU was robbing you of 80% performance.
How a CPU is possibly robbing performance, and that being fixed by a piece of software?
The whole point, which is confirmed by what can be seen of DX12, is that DX11 was terribly charging CPU, and it was doing it in a terrible way.
On DX11, multithreading is pretty hard to use, and draw call are charging CPU a lot.
you seems to beleive it is not shocking in 2014. Both AMD and Intel can't improve IPC much anymmore, and CPU gain are optained by increasing the number of core, for close to 10 years now.
DX11 was robbing performance, no one else.
Worse, you said:
Why, just why? How do you choose your component when building a rig?Looking at things realistically if you own an AMD CPU for gaming you are unlikely to be using an FX-8350 with the R9 290X.
I personnaly have a price limit. GPU is the limit like 99.9% of the time. Why would I spend more than 350€ in a 4770k? Even with a 290X, you are never CPU limited with a 8350 in any real life situation. And now less than ever.
What I mean is I will buy the ceapest possible CPU, since it is not the limiting factor, to be able to buy the most powerfull possible GPU, to increase framerate, and play at ultra setting. And that is what mantle allow me, actually, to use a super cheap 8350, to buy an overpower GPU, to buy a rig which will be a lot faster than a 4770k + R9 290, and cheaper. 4770k are 350€ here, and 8350, 150€, I save just 200€. I can have a R9 290 for 320€. So R9 290 + 4770k is 670€. 8350 + R9 290X is 550€. Cheaper and faster. 4770k + R9 290X is 720€ . 8350 + 2 x R9 290 is 790 €. A bit more expensive, and a lot faster.
Buying a 290 and a 4770K is actually stupid now. You just save money to buy an over power CPU, just to overcome DX11 limitation. And that prevent you to buy a 290X.
Btw here in Europe, I can have a 290X for just 399€, with BF4 included.