Are Quad-core CPUs Finally Dead in 2019?

[Julio Franco]

Today we're discussing quad-core processors, namely how relevant they are in 2019. The last time we covered this specific topic was back in 2017, so this article means to explore if these budget quad-cores are worth buying for gamers, or are they dead on arrival.

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/article/1803-are-quad-cores-dead/

 

[Sausagemeat]

It clearly depends on the model and manufacturer, I just went back and read the Ryzen 2700 & 2600 reviews from this site and according to the results from that April 2018 article, at stock, the Intel quad core 7700K beats out even the Ryzen 8 core at minimums and averages in almost every single game tested.

I personally wouldn’t buy a quad core now though. But I dont see any reason to upgrade anytime soon if you have a fast Intel quad and you’re using it for gaming. Especially if it means taking a single threaded performance hit.

 

[BSim500]

It's all down to choice of games vs demands. Most enthusiasts that buy high end stuff also regularly engage in self-selection bias where "gaming" = "nothing but the 12x newest, slowest & least optimised AAA's at 144Hz" which is regularly quite a bit different to the Top 100 simultaneously played games on Steam at 60Hz, let alone the +20k other games. (Perfect example is the choice of titles here).

Most people who buy lower end chips do so for older games or the bulk of Indie's (eg, Divinity Original Sin, Shadow Tactics Blades Of The Shogun, etc), and more often than not you don't even need quad's for those. Half the games here are total performance turds that can't stay above 60fps at 1080p even with 6C/12T chips. For some Ubisoft titles the "gap" between quad vs hex is often down to multi-layered DRM. Eg, there was one cracker guy who showed the "obfuscated" parts of Denuvo + VMProtect can suck up to 30% CPU usage at which point what's being benchmarked isn't even the game itself but the "wrapper" around the game deliberately filled with (literal) junk instructions.

Probably the biggest lesson I've learned simply looking at games here like AC: Odyssey, Hitman, Shadow Of The Tomb Raider, etc, is that if you give games devs +50% more horsepower, they'll go out of their way to make sure their games run half the speed again for everyone... Seriously modern AAA's are appallingly optimised vs the era of say 2010-2014 where Dishonored 1, Skyrim, Bioshock Infinite, DX:HR, Alien Isolation, etc, ran over +90-120fps even on low-clocked 3.1GHz Sandy Bridge i3's at the time (and today those titles run at +120-180fps on a lowly G4560). And when you look at the disparity of what's "justifying" a halving of fps given 3x the cores, (eg, is AI 6x smarter? Levels 6x larger?, etc, on 6C/12T CPU's getting 50-60fps vs how games only a few years old were on 2C/4T's getting 90-120fps at the time), there's little actual game design improvement and most of the modern slowdowns (especially for single-player titles) seem to point towards virtualization + obfuscation based DRM (Denuvo) and lazy optimization as the biggest culprits.

 

[Vulcanproject]

It clearly depends on the model and manufacturer, I just went back and read the Ryzen 2700 & 2600 reviews from this site and according to the results from that April 2018 article, at stock, the Intel quad core 7700K beats out even the Ryzen 8 core at minimums and averages in almost every single game tested.

Indeed. Obviously the biggest purveyor of quad cores the past 10 years used primarily for gaming is Intel.

This article shows core scaling on an architecture that is somewhat inferior for gaming than the opposition, scaling from a low to a high end. I would argue for many of the tests here the real influence and gains seen aren't primarily from the number of cores, but more cache and boost clocks being better on the active cores.

Unless you test all of these parts at the same clock speeds, then you only get a slightly vague idea of core scaling with this methodology. You really have to take the 8 core, fix the clocks and disable cores to get a 6 or a 4 core. Like for like. Then you understand the impact of core scaling on a given title.

Intel's final high end 4 cores like the 7700k and 6700k show they are comfortably a match for AMD's current 8 cores in gaming as has already been pointed out. Which suggests there is a distinct maximum level of CPU performance you need for the majority of games, and reaching it with either more cores or in the case of those quads better IPC and clockspeeds doesn't matter that much.

The quad core's days for modern gaming are numbered, simply because of the fact next gen consoles will likely pack more overall CPU performance than any quad core, even Intel's best efforts. Ultimately consoles dictate the rough minimum specs of most games, because most games are designed starting at their baseline. Let make some assumptions, and ignore the fact console games also don't get all of their CPU performance (current machines started with 2 cores locked off for the OS, more recently developers get most of the 7th core.)

If they get a Ryzen 8 core clocked at say 3GHz and developers actually utilise all that performance, then you'll rapidly see the extinction of four cores for anything but very low end gaming. Just as today, 2 cores are now only low end gaming. So quads have got a couple years before most games need more.

The minimum will be a 6 core with equivalent overall performance. For example a Ryzen 2600 running 6 cores @ 3.8GHz is basically as good as 8 cores at 3GHz. Arguably better because it has better single threaded performance.

This is why if you plan on keeping the machine's CPU for the long term, it's important to go for at least 6 cores with higher clocks, as a bare minimum.

 

[Wizwill]

While I am not a gamer, I am a middle-of-the-road power computer user.I am usually running Nuance direct speech recognition (DSR), at least one browser, a word processor, an HTML editor, Photoshop (for editing smaller images)an audio player and perhaps a video player all at the same time. I expect crisp responses when I open files and while I am usually using multiple monitors, I use a separate video card.

This article is most informative for the needs of gamers. We non-gamers would occasionally like to see a similar article directed at the needs of non-gaming power users. Any chance of that happening that in the near future?

Note:
Edited 5.25.19 to change "discrete" SR to "direct" SR as per current IT industry usage. Cheers!

 

[Squid Surprise]

It says the GPU used is labeled on the individual graphs... but I only see it on the Shadow of the Tomb Raider one (the last graph) saying the 1660... am I blind?

Also, as many have already posted, there is a big difference between Intel and AMD at the quad-core level... why aren’t there any Intels on the graphs?

 

[MaikuTech]

While I am not a gamer, I am a middle-of-the-road power computer user.I am usually running Nuance discrete speech recognition, at least one browser, a word processor, an HTML editor, Photoshop (for editing smaller images)an audio player and perhaps a video player all at the same time. I expect crisp responses when I open files and while I am usually using multiple monitors, I use a separate video card.

This article is most informative for the needs of gamers. We non-gamers would occasionally like to see a similar article directed at the needs of non-gaming power users. Any chance of that happening that in the near future?

I agree to that as well, it shouldn't take 8 cores+ just to run normal apps for desktop productivity use.
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113434
This would be enough for most people doing office/school/programming work with plenty of ram and drive space to utilize.

 

[poohbear]

Is this true though? I always check CPU usage by application in Argus Monitor, and even for newer games with my 4790K (5 yr old quad-core with hyper-threading), my CPU rarely goes above 70% application usage. It usually averages 40%-50% CPU usage. Is that because of hyper-threading?

 

[fps4ever]

I usually enjoy these articles but this one is as clear as mud. Are quad core cpu''s still viable for gaming, hell yes but you have to consider cost vs other cpu's with more cores in that same price range. It has always come down to that.

 

[Nobina]

An octa core CPU isn't necessarily faster than a quad core one. There's no reason for quad cores to die yet, most people use them.

 

[treetops]

I dont know but I bought my 4690k brand new over 4 years ago with a heatsink\fan\warranty and it still sells used for 120$+ without a heatsink\fan\warranty. It now cost 300 brand new, but that is because it is a old model, however the used price is still a relevant marker on its worth. Single threaded performance used to very important and probably still is for gaming.

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html


The old quadcores are still worth it, but you now have to buy them used to get your moneys worth.

 

[McMurdeR]

Is this true though? I always check CPU usage by application in Argus Monitor, and even for newer games with my 4790K (5 yr old quad-core with hyper-threading), my CPU rarely goes above 70% application usage. It usually averages 40%-50% CPU usage. Is that because of hyper-threading?

If you've already got one, a good Intel quad core should do you another couple of years or so. But if you're buying new today, I think this article's conclusion is fairly on the money.

 

[Tantor]

Very good article. This is why I like you guys at TechSpot. You do a better job exploring the subtle nuances of the computer business than most sites.

Quad cores are still a great choice. I picked a Ryzen 2400g when cobbling together a system for a friend. I told him the integrated graphics were great for basic 1080p gaming, and he could always toss in a discrete card and get 'really good' gaming at a later time. I'm going to show him this article, it'll make him feel great.

Video cards (and good PSUs) are the most important elements of a nice gaming system. Everything else is easily updated at your leisure later.

 

[SkOrPn]

I don't think quads are dead until after the Ryzen 3000 series has been released and successful. However, quads died with me the moment Intel released X58 platform and Hexa core chips. All I have used since about 2010 has been 6C12T Intel processors until I replaced them with Ryzen 5 and 7. And this year I am replacing those with the Ryzen 9 consumer grade 16 core chips. So yeah Quad core has been dead to me for almost a decade now. Lol

 

[Lew Zealand]

While I am not a gamer, I am a middle-of-the-road power computer user.I am usually running Nuance discrete speech recognition, at least one browser, a word processor, an HTML editor, Photoshop (for editing smaller images)an audio player and perhaps a video player all at the same time. I expect crisp responses when I open files and while I am usually using multiple monitors, I use a separate video card.

This article is most informative for the needs of gamers. We non-gamers would occasionally like to see a similar article directed at the needs of non-gaming power users. Any chance of that happening that in the near future?

I agree to that as well, it shouldn't take 8 cores+ just to run normal apps for desktop productivity use.
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113434
This would be enough for most people doing office/school/programming work with plenty of ram and drive space to utilize.

I use all those things except speech recognition on a 2C4T 3.9 GHz NUC, you probably rarely even need 4 cores for those uses. Sure 6 cores is great but for most office uses even a quad core is overkill.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Probably the biggest lesson I've learned simply looking at games here like AC: Odyssey, Hitman, Shadow Of The Tomb Raider, etc, is that if you give games devs +50% more horsepower, they'll go out of their way to make sure their games run half the speed again for everyone... Seriously modern AAA's are appallingly optimised vs the era of say 2010-2014 where Dishonored 1, Skyrim, Bioshock Infinite, DX:HR, Alien Isolation, etc, ran over +90-120fps even on low-clocked 3.1GHz Sandy Bridge i3's at the time (and today those titles run at +120-180fps on a lowly G4560). And when you look at the disparity of what's "justifying" a halving of fps given 3x the cores, (eg, is AI 6x smarter? Levels 6x larger?, etc, on 6C/12T CPU's getting 50-60fps vs how games only a few years old were on 2C/4T's getting 90-120fps at the time), there's little actual game design improvement and most of the modern slowdowns (especially for single-player titles) seem to point towards virtualization + obfuscation based DRM (Denuvo) and lazy optimization as the biggest culprits.

Not necessarily. Steve made the point that adding lots of NPCs greatly adds to the CPU demands which results in the 2C and 4C parts underperforming. Compare the number of NPCs in AC:O vs. Skyrim. Yet even a $55 2C part gets 110+FPS in Forza Horizon 4. Not many NPCs there.

Also, have a look at Tomb Raider (2013) and SotR and you'll see the improvements to the visuals which cost those FPS. Have a look at Skyrim today and it looks dated, the visuals of newer games are superior as advances have been made in the past decade. Are they too incremental while costing too many frames? Yeah maybe. But some games *are* well optimized (from EA, Codemasters, Vulkan API, others), while others are very much not (I still play ARK and damn, that game is crap optimized).

 

[JayCD]

This article is just dumb. No one cares about gaming. I thought this was going to be a valid discussion of CPU manufacturing and availability. Plenty of Macs are shipping with quad core CPU so obviously they are not dead. Please come back when you have a worthwhile topic to write about not some silly child games that no one cares about. If your definition of pushing your system to the limit is playing some game then you have pretty pedestrian uses for a computer and shouldn't even care about your CPU cores

 

[EClyde]

Yea, I'm throwing mine away. Framerate is everything

 

[Lew Zealand]

Lulz @the newb who registered here just to post an anti-gaming screed

 

[Evernessince]

Probably the biggest lesson I've learned simply looking at games here like AC: Odyssey, Hitman, Shadow Of The Tomb Raider, etc, is that if you give games devs +50% more horsepower, they'll go out of their way to make sure their games run half the speed again for everyone... Seriously modern AAA's are appallingly optimised vs the era of say 2010-2014 where Dishonored 1, Skyrim, Bioshock Infinite, DX:HR, Alien Isolation, etc, ran over +90-120fps even on low-clocked 3.1GHz Sandy Bridge i3's at the time (and today those titles run at +120-180fps on a lowly G4560). And when you look at the disparity of what's "justifying" a halving of fps given 3x the cores, (eg, is AI 6x smarter? Levels 6x larger?, etc, on 6C/12T CPU's getting 50-60fps vs how games only a few years old were on 2C/4T's getting 90-120fps at the time), there's little actual game design improvement and most of the modern slowdowns (especially for single-player titles) seem to point towards virtualization + obfuscation based DRM (Denuvo) and lazy optimization as the biggest culprits.

Not necessarily. Steve made the point that adding lots of NPCs greatly adds to the CPU demands which results in the 2C and 4C parts underperforming. Compare the number of NPCs in AC:O vs. Skyrim. Yet even a $55 2C part gets 110+FPS in Forza Horizon 4. Not many NPCs there.

Also, have a look at Tomb Raider (2013) and SotR and you'll see the improvements to the visuals which cost those FPS. Have a look at Skyrim today and it looks dated, the visuals of newer games are superior as advances have been made in the past decade. Are they too incremental while costing too many frames? Yeah maybe. But some games *are* well optimized (from EA, Codemasters, Vulkan API, others), while others are very much not (I still play ARK and damn, that game is crap optimized).

Don't forget that enabling ray tracing on Nvidia cards requires a beefy CPU. Battlefield V recommends an 8 core 9900K if you want to use RT.

In the end the CPUs need to be out there in order to get used. We just got 8 core mainstream and soon maybe even 16 core.

 

[Fuzzy Dunalap]

Sweating beside my i5-7300HQ. Paired with a laptop 1050, performs wonderfully for gaming.

 

[amghwk]

C'mon...we all know the thread title is a click-bait.

As long as the CPU can run the latest game, it's not "dead".

And if the quad-core can run 60fps at 1080p maxed out, it's definitely not "dead".

All CPUs will become less effective in running newer games as the time goes on, but they are never "dead".

 

[toooooot]

I bet most programmers are finally getting to understand how to code for quads. Now they, as a majority, will be pushed to learn again.
I remember for how long I d stumble on apps that load only one core and wont use the rest 3.
So are we gonna see now four cores under load and 12 resting?
Looks like this is what we got for few years ahead.

 

[OortCloud]

Yes like many have said this is a daft article with a really daft title.

A whole range of Quad core CPUs released over the past few years are more than capable of running everything but the most specific tasks. Just ignore and move on.

 

[jpuroila]

Since you appear to not have matched the frequencies of the CPUs, the data is pretty worthless.