Best CPU for this game? ( September 2017 )

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

Considering this game to be heavy on the CPU:
What's the current best available CPU out there to run this game?

I also would like to stream and run many programs at the same time, so I was wondering which CPU I should aim for ( let's assume no budget-cap)

[dadyrghluv69]

I run it on a i7 6700k and have no issues with it very good and fast cpu

[Kosmozuikis]

Intel is better at games.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyeVSMcFn00

If you want to multitask then ryzen probably would be better, you'll get lower performance in cities skylines than with intel but it's better at multitasking.

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

wow I'm really happy with the high quality answers so far, gives me quite some useful info to work with, thx guys !

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

I'm gonna go for the Ryzen , since this also has to be a strong computer for programming (and running local webservers, virtual machines etc..), the extra cores should help me there a lot.

Just haven't decided between the Ryzen 7 1800x and Ryzen 7 1700x.
Price difference is 110 euros but not sure yet if the difference is worth it.

[azxcvbnm321]

The 1700X would have been my choice as well. For pure value, Ryzen is hard to beat. As others have said, make sure you get higher speed RAM, tests have shown Ryzen benefits greatly from higher RAM speeds because of its architecture. And a B series motherboard would be fine if you're not going multiple GPUs, the 1700X is unlocked for overclocking potential already.

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

Right now I'm looking for the right motherboard to go with the 1700X ( or 1800x, undecided since I might get a nice boost for my programming-work with the 1800x ).

I'm not gonna OC though!

I've just eliminated the B since I highly prefer the 6 SATA and 8 PCIes above the 4 SATA and 6 PCIe.
So I'm gonna go for a X370 motherboard, it's gonna go together with my current GPU GTX 1070 that I already use.

Haven't decided yet on which X370 motherboard, there are a lot to choose from so any tips / experiences on that are highly welcome :-)

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

Not sure if that Threadripper is a joke xD
I am going to look into the 1900x just out of curiosity to see what's that all about, haven't come accross it before.
The PCIe lanes only has a few reasons:
1) My GPU is really bulky and takes up 3 slots already if I'm not mistaken
2) I have a dedicated wireless network card taking up another PCIe
3) i might even have something else in there that i forgotten about, that's taking up a PCIe
4) want to be future proof for whatever i might want to add

That's why I'm preferring the 8 PCIe above the 6.


Right now my Motherboard selection is down to these 6:

Asus ROG Crosshair VI Extreme
Asus ROG Crosshair VI Hero
Asrock x370 Taichi
ASRock Fatal1ty X370 Professional Gaming
MSI X370 Gaming Pro Carbon AC
ASRock X370 Killer SLI/ac

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

I've now ended up with 2 options:

- Asrock x370 Taichi
vs
- ASRock Fatal1ty X370 Professional Gaming

Hard to decide between the two.

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

I don't like Asus anymore. Heard some negative reviews on its stabilty, and my own Asus computer is also a bit unstable. So i'm gonna give another brand a shot this time.

This brings me to the following 3 options:

€337 = 1700X Ryzen 7
€217 = ASRock x370 Taichi
€554 = Total

€448 = 1800X Ryzen 7
€217 = ASRock x370 Taichi
€665 = Total

€539 = 1900X Ryzen Threadripper
€345 = ASRock X399 Taichi
€884 = Total


That's not a clear call in terms of price/performance imo
Gonna look into that 1900x more deeply now first.

I can afford it, but I'm not sure yet if I'm willing to.

[MarkJohnson]

The Ryzen R7 series are all 8-core and exactly the same except for clock speed. Maybe look at 1700 and 1800 as they are cheaper than the X versions and come with CPU heatsinks. X series don't have heatsinks IIRC.

Better yet, go foe a Ryzen R5 series. The 1600/1600x are 6-core and should more than handle the game. I have an Intel 6-core and it doesn't even use half the cores (around 40% on a huge city with maxed out agents). I'm guessing the Ryzen will fare well. Maybe check some benchmarks running on this game.

The X370 are overkill. They are good overclocking boards, but Ryzen doesn't overclock well and the B350 should OC just fine. Plus the B350 is newer than the x370 and should be more stable in theory. i.e. worked out some of the kinks.

Also, ASRock is Asus. It is Asus's budget lineup. But I do hear good things about the ASRock B350 Taichi. Make sure to get DDR4-3200 for Ryzen. There seems to be issues with slower RAM speeds.

[☆ Acacia ☆ - for Tiffany <3]

I have made my decision, it's going to be:

- Ryzen 7 1800x CPU (it's the recommended one for those people who aren't planning to OC, of which I'm part of)
- ASRock x370 Taichi Motherboard (oh, so that is Asus as well but that's ok, the people who were saying the Asus mobos are poor were at the same time recommending the ASRock Taichi so they were probably really pointing to a particular one of Asus and not Asus as a whole), The extra PCI-e slots and plenty of SATA slots + build-in bluetooth connectivity are better fit to my (future) needs and make me prefer the X370 above the B350 models.
- 2x8 GB RAM which is the G.Skill Flare X F4-3200C14D-16GFX ( according to many reviewers this memory seems to be the sweet spot for the Ryzen 7 1800x CPU )
- CPU Cooler NH-U12 SE-AM4 ( a cooler for OC'ers I guess... but it's quiet and the great cooling increases the longetivity of my CPU so I choose this one anyway, can't be bothered to go for a cheaper one to only save € 20 )

Total price: € 927

I believe overall, this is going to be the best fit for my needs.
Considering the huge upgrade this means compared to my current system, it's still relatively cheap!

I'm coming from a 8 GB RAM system with AMD Athlon(tm) II X4 640 Processor (3.01 GHz) on a Asus M4A79T Deluxe/U3S6 Motherboard.
My other parts were already upgraded last year ( 100 % SSD and GTX 1070 Graphics Card )

Thx for the extremely useful info!!

[BlackWood]

R9 290x
i7 6700 skylake
32 GB RAM
Win 10

Runs great.

[MarkJohnson]

Ooops, I forgot to mention the Intel 6-core CPUs. They are under $400 USD currently and be a great value per performance. Plus they have a higher single thread performance (IPC) for less lag and stutter at heavier loads. My E5-1640 V4 (i.e. same as i7-6850k) runs this game at 40% CPU usage (i.e. 5 cores) and zero stutter on my 655k city. The city runs slow from maxing out the limits of the game, but not my computer. It just idles along.

For comparison, another user loaded my same city with his 1800x and it ran 50% (i.e. using eight full cores) So you can see how the IPC single thread performance pays off, even in this multi-threaded game. But I looked on YouTube for comparison of x1800x to intel 6-core and most test evened out. although professional video editing apps AMD was superior every time as AMD had 2 extra full cores.

But if you have an unlimited budget, then maybe the 8-core or even 12-core Intel's will be fine.

At least the new Ryzen's have brought down Intel's prices a lot.

[~That Goddamn Trans Rights Panda]

Threadripper.

[OVKHuman]

Originally posted by Fromzon:

Considering this game to be heavy on the CPU:
What's the current best available CPU out there to run this game?

I also would like to stream and run many programs at the same time, so I was wondering which CPU I should aim for ( let's assume no budget-cap)

Core i9 7900x or ryzen thread ripper