i7 4790 ok for new titles?

[It's Chase]

I'm putting together a cheap PC for a friend. I have an old GTX 1080 and some Asus 1150 with 16gbs or RAM in it. Just need a CPU to complete the build.

Looking on ebay, i7 4790 are around $50. Can you even run anything on quad cores anymore? I'm thinking it might not be worth it.

[Cathulhu]

They are showing their age by now.
Depends on what kind of new titles.

[It's Chase]

Originally posted by Cathulhu:

They are showing their age by now.
Depends on what kind of new titles.

Yeah i don't think most games will even start.

I'll pick up a Ryzen 3600 along with a motherboard and some RAM. That should be ok for some newer titles.

[76561198343548661]

i7 4790s is 15-21% slower than i3 10100F . So , i7 4790s can run modern games but would bottleneck GTX 1080

[plat]

Each game should have a table with "minimum" acceptable specifications and "recommended." If you fall below those, esp. the minimum, your game/s may falter and stutter.

I have a gtx 1080--it still handles many games at high settings. In those cases, I take the side panel off. It's still works well.

[It's Chase]

Originally posted by smallcat:

i7 4790s is 15-21% slower than i3 10100F . So , i7 4790s can run modern games but would bottleneck GTX 1080

Not the S variant. I believe that's a slower chip.

[76561198343548661]

Originally posted by It's Chase:

Originally posted by smallcat:

i7 4790s is 15-21% slower than i3 10100F . So , i7 4790s can run modern games but would bottleneck GTX 1080

Not the S variant. I believe that's a slower chip.

True its slower but what i wrote is true as well

[Soulreaver]

Yep will probably bottleneck here and there but I think overall there are worse choices.

[Illusion of Progress]

New title can mean anything. New doesn't mean demanding, and old doesn't mean not demanding. It's more the "average" that gets brought up, which is a bit meaningless with how variable demands can be from game to game.

The majority of newer titles will work fine on a Haswell Core i7, simply because the majority of titles don't NEED all the processing power available today. New CPUs not getting faster per core at a rate they once did, plus CPUs getting more cores but games not often needing them, means older CPUs can hold up more well than not.

On the other hand, the more demanding titles can sometimes have moments where they might struggle on a quad core, and CPUs have gotten faster (even if at a slower rate, a decade adds up). So there are certainly titles where it may struggle at times (though this applies even to high end ones today in some cases) but it won't be "unplayable" by most means.

I can't think of too many things that will outright not launch on such a chip, as that would mean it uses instructions newer than it has and I'm not sure of a title that needs one newer than it has (which might sound strange since it's not a recent chip by any means, but usually it's AVX, which is Sandy Bridge, or AVX2, which is Haswell itself that prevents some older CPUs from properly launching newer games).

That being said, Sandy Bridge to Haswell have held up surprisingly well the last many years, but I feel the sun is/has been set on considering those anymore. If you already HAVE it, it's an option, but if not, I'd pass on it and instead be looking towards like the Intel 8th generation/Zen 3000 series or better by now, preferably something with 6 cores and threading.

[oligopolycorp]

The 4790 has 8 threads.I have a 4770 and it does fine. I can Play Rise and shadow of tomb raider at 1080p60fps and it looks great.The farcry with the 2 girls runs great also.I think both Flight simulator and cyberpunk have a 4790 as recommended.
Newer cpu's are better in some ways but don't underestimate 8 threads nowadays. core count will increase with time.Flight sim and cyberpunk are fairly new.And long story short: check the specs.Edit: FS doesn't have a 4790 as recommended but cyberpunk does.EDIT 2 now cyberpunk doesn't show up but I'm sure it has a 4790 as recommended cpu.

[Ice Robertson]

Well this computer...

Intel Core I7 4770 (3.4Ghz Quad core + HT, 8MB Cache, 84w)
Deepcool GAMMAXX GT A-RGB - (CPU Cooler)
Asus H97M-E mATX (motherboard)
16GB Kingston hyperX DDR3 - 1600mhz CL9 (4x 4GB) (Memory)
ASUS GeForce RTX 2060 Dual EVO OC 12GB (Graphics card)
Samsung 500GB 850 EVO 2.5 inch (SSD SATA)
Samsung 980, 1TB NVMe 1.4 PCIe 3.0 (M.2 SSD)
Creative Sound blaster Audigy Rx 7.1 (PCI-E) (Audio)
Asus 24X DVD writer Sata
Fractal Define R5 black
3x Noctua NF-A14 140mm cooling fans.
Corsair RM650X V2 (650 watt) modular (PSU)

Can run AOE 3 DE with adjusted settings, Also runs CS:GO at a good frame rate (100+).

[plat]

Yes, also if getting that cpu or any other prior to Coffee Lake Intel or first gen Ryzen will put you at odds with getting Windows 11 the "easy" way. Windows 10 will be around until 2025 anyway.

Note: you can install 11 on "unsupported" hardware but there may be special issues with updates and/or watermarks on the desktop.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Just an example of one older machine I have here...
There is no game I can't run well on my 4790K + 32GB DDR3-1866 + GTX 1080 Ti. Plenty of whom run just fine at 4K.

A 4790 + GTX 1080 would be fine. However I doubt would handle GPUs above that. But for a 4790K it should be fine. Plus my CPU is OC'ed to 4.8Ghz on all cores.

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

S-versions are rubbish, slowed down CPUs.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Oh lord, yes Intel S and U models are extremely bad.

Not much differences between a stock 4770 vs 4790 though. Especially when comparing the non-K models of them.

4790 was just a revision of the 4770; better batches of silicon, slightly faster cores. In most games though you rarely see much differences.

Now a 4770K or 4790K; big difference, the 4790K usually has no problems OC'ing to 5.0Ghz without catching fire. And when OC'ed the 4790K is much better suited when coupled with RAM above DDR3-1600, as long as the Motherboard can properly handle its XMP profile; such as DDR3-2133 or 2400 for example.

[A&A]

i7 4790 is like i3 10100