Hey LQ,

I'm gonna be building a new compy soon and I'm trying to figure out what I want. I plan to evaluate gaming on linux so I know my best bet for that is something nvidia, correct?

For the CPU, as far as I'm aware AMD processors are better for multi-tasking and less efficient for gaming but I'm curious if this is mostly a Windows related issue. Programs have to be written in such a way to take advantage of hyperthreading and multi-cores right? I'm guessing Linux handles this much better?

Any thoughts?

AMD CPU's are good for lots of cores on the cheap. Intel CPU's are superior in almost every way though. Clock for clock they crush AMD, they're FAR more energy efficient, built on much newer, smaller fabs, just in every way dominates other than cores/$. It's sad to say, I've always been an AMD fan, but unless you're doing something that SPECIFICALLY requires lots of cores, you'll get better performance from an Intel for the same price.

As far as graphics, if you're going to be running proprietary drivers, Nvidia all the way. AMD drivers are...well...totally trash.

Thanks for the advice. So even though AMD CPU's have more cores, they will still be out performed than less core Intels for the same price? Power is so cheap the difference of few a hundred watts or so is only a $1-5/month

Sadly, in 90% of usage cases, yes, Intel chips with fewer cores (even including Hyperthreading as a core) will still outperform AMD cpu's. A quad core i5, despite lacking Hyperthreading and thus only having 4 cores, will still EASILY outperform the FX-8320 octo-core in my desktop except in extremely rare use cases. Teh only reason I still have an AMD desktop is because I bought the motherboard 5 years ago with a quad core cpu, and have upgraded it to a hexa-core (Phenom II 1100T) and finally to the octo-core (FX-8320) and was able to keep the same motherboard and ram. So while it's crushed by modern Intel machines, it's still able to play the games I want to play without issues (Nvidia card).

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