CPU Performance
We first see how the AMD FX-8350 scales in CoH 2 using maximum quality settings with the GTX Titan. At the standard frequency of 4.0GHz, we averaged 37fps and boosting the clock speed by another 13% increased performance by 8%, which isn't bad. The problem is we still only achieved 40fps. Moreover, the game seems quite CPU dependent, as we saw a 42% performance increase when going from 2.50GHz to 4.50GHz, though that is an 80% jump in clock speed.
The medium quality settings – which we expect to place more emphasis on the CPU rather than the GPU – saw an 81% performance increase when scaling from 2.50GHz to 4.50GHz, which again is an 80% clock boost. The game is clearly very CPU dependent, but again, at 4.50GHz the FX-8350 was only able to drive the GTX Titan to 49fps.
Interestingly, the Core i7-4770K painted a totally different picture than the FX-8350 when testing on maximum quality, delivering the same frame rate at both 2.50GHz and 4.50GHz: 41fps, which is actually 1fps faster than the FX-8350 at 4.50GHz, suggesting that the Intel part is extremely efficient – more so than we expected.
Effectively what this means is that the Core i7-4770K can push the GTX Titan to its limit in CoH 2 at just 2.5GHz while the FX-8350 needs to be clocked 80% higher to achieve the same level of performance.
This time the Core i7-4770K managed 65fps with the GTX Titan on medium quality, which is much faster than the FX-3850's 49fps. What's more, the i7-4770K was able to push the GTX Titan to the max when clocked at just 3.50GHz. Below that, we saw a sharp drop off in performance once clocked at 3.0GHz and 2.50GHz.
Now let's see how a range of CPUs handle CoH with the GTX Titan and max quality settings. As we've already seen, the Core i7-4770K is capable of 41fps and the FX-8350 just 37fps, while the Core i7-3770K matched the i7-4770K and the i5-3570K was just 1fps slower. The Core i7-3960X was slower than the i5-3570K which is very surprising given how CPU demanding this game is and makes us regret using it as the primary test chip.
The lower-end Athlon II X4 quad-cores are useless in this game, as are the dual-core parts including the Core i3-3220. As is often the case, the Core i7 and Core i5 processors appear to be the best choices, though the FX-8350 does hold its own.
With the more playable medium quality settings the Core i7-4770K and i7-3770K race ahead, followed by the Core i5-3570K and i5-3470. Again, the Core i7-3960X is much slower than expected and this suggests to us that the game really only requires four threads and that clock speed is more important than cache size.
Here the FX-8350 was 31% slower than the Core i7-4770K and 22% slower than its competitor, the Core i5-3470. The old i7-920 was able to match the FX-8350, while the Phenom II X6 and X4 processors showed their age here.