The standard price on this is good (£277.97) but take the £1 Which trial and get a £15 voucher emailed to you. £262.97 with free delivery is a pretty great price for such a good 8-core processor.
From link:
"We are working with Which? to offer you a great deal. Try Which? for £1 and in return you’ll get £15 off orders over £250 when you shop on Laptops Direct. It's quick, easy, and most importantly, you'll save money."
I have been away from the site for a bit, but we did not used to have comments like this.
michaeljb
28 Aug 17#2
Nice price, however if you after a CPU for gaming I'd consider waiting a few week if you can for coffee lake, the new i5 could be better and I doubt ryzen will get any dearer
profet
28 Aug 17#3
I think the 8 core Ryzen will still be a better processor long term than the new i5s. Games are only going to get more multi-core capable in the future, so 8 cores will be a bigger and bigger advantage over 4. The difference in FPS between this and the news i5s will be pretty small at the moment though.
CoeK to profet
28 Aug 17#4
The rumours say 6 cores for the I5 coffee lake processors. Though I still wouldn't bother waiting as they aren't going to be out to buy until next year. There is always something to wait for, in 2019 cannonlake will be out which is a die shrink to 10nm.
Would rather buy a Ryzen now tbh.
CoumbBarr2000 to CoeK
28 Aug 17#5
True, the desktop 6-8-core Coffee Lake's will not be widely available until around October at the earliest. At which point you could wait another 4 months for Ryzen+. And so on and so on.
nomnomnomnom to profet
28 Aug 17#7
Sorry, but this isn't correct.
Games only get a small benefit from multi cores at the best of times. Going from 4 to 8 isn't going to yield any real gains.
The problem with games is that they don't lend themselves well to parallel tasks, so splitting a game up to more cores can actually harm the FPS if you go too far with it.
Even highly threaded, well coded games engines like UE4 very rarely gets any benefit of 4 cores, nevermind 8. Game development is a different ball game though.
fishmaster to profet
28 Aug 17#10
I'd get whatever was the fastest CPU for the task I wanted it for, future proofing and waiting for performance increases never works with computing.
MRP
28 Aug 17#8
Fortunately then the Ryzen are superb at single core and ahead of the vast majority of intel cpu.
You also happen to get twice the cores for half the price.
This 1700 can be easily over clocked to a 1800x. 3.8-3.9 on a reasonable cooler is a given.
fishmaster to MRP
28 Aug 17#23
What absolute nonsense. Intel are ahead of AMD on single core performance, whatever you're smoking go ask for a refund!
KITTYBOTS to fishmaster
28 Aug 17#24
Any of these CPUs would blow the low clocked Jaguar cores used in consoles into orbit!! :stuck_out_tongue:
fishmaster to KITTYBOTS
28 Aug 17#25
A newer high end CPU is better than an older architecture APU in a console? Sherlock Holmes has quit his job, you're too good.
KITTYBOTS to fishmaster
29 Aug 17#26
Last time I checked £200 to £300 was Intel Core i5 territory which is distinctly called "mid-range" according to many forum internet experts! If millions and millions of gamers find a "an older architecture APU in a console" acceptable for gaming,then so will many PC gamers,with a CPU with double the number of threads and a few times the single core performance! :stuck_out_tongue:
Sure all of you forum experts must be running dual GTX1080TI cards at 1080p! :stuck_out_tongue:
If not its just arguing over who runs Super PI quicker or some other useless benchmark,when most PC gamers won't have an 8 core CPU,or a 5GHZ Core i7 7700K.
I just find it pretty cool we can have a new 8C/16T CPU with reasonable performance for close to £250 in today's money,when such consumer CPUs were well beyond the reach of many only in January.
Its good to have a choice now.
Nate1492
28 Aug 17#11
Including the 'which trial' as part of your deal is just wrong by the way.
That's not available to everyone, especially if you've already used it. The price should be 277.97 with a 15 minus 1 quid opportunity.
The price is wrong anyway, it should be 263.97.
Please note: Once your trial comes to an end, your membership will continue at £10.75 a month.
This is one of those forget and charge trial services that pray on a large number of people forgetting to cancel in time. Basically, it's not something everyone will want to do, and reducing the price is not really honest, as it isn't related to the CPU deal.
You can get this same processor, from Amazon, without going through the hassle.
269.00 on Amazon, no hassle, or 263.97 with song and dance from an inferior etailer.
Gort1951
28 Aug 17#13
Still using an Intel I7 920, I need something a lot better to update and clock speeds are not getting past 4Ghz barely due to heat.
More cores is the future but the software is complicated to write.
profet
28 Aug 17#14
I think we'll see gamed become far more able to use 8+ cores, driven by the fact that the chips themselves are now mainstream. Of course there is an overhead in multithread, but with proper coding, those extra cores can absolutely be used. No one would buy a single core CPU now, would they?
All others have mentioned, this 8core Ryzen still holds its own against Intel 4 core chips - just a few FPS difference. The GPU is far more important tbh. But in the future, I think there is a very good chance quad core will be seen as sub-standard.
getknk
28 Aug 17#16
Come on AMD. Lets start the war again on CPU. Intel is having monopoly now
big.k
28 Aug 17#17
Future gaming will see more cores being used. I remember a time when dual core cpu's were seen as unnecessary and now we live in a time when a quad core is necessary for gaming. Sure, single core IPC is very important but we are approaching the limits of silicon, so the only way to improve performance is to introduce multiple cores. Even if the next i5 is better than Ryzen, I will still go with Ryzen. We've seen what happens when there is no competition, how many times did a new processor come from Intel to only have maybe 5-10% improvement in performance at a very high cost?
KITTYBOTS
28 Aug 17#18
How quickly things move - only at the beginning of the year if you wanted a new consumer CPU with 8 cores and 16 threads,it would have cost you close to £1000 and needed £200 motherboards. Now for close to £250,and a £100 motherboard you can get a solid CPU with 8 cores and 16 threads,and most likely build a whole PC for the standard price of the Core i7 6900K!! :stuck_out_tongue:
hicks12
28 Aug 17#19
I think you're mistaken, no one is comparing it to piledriver here which is a terrible example as that was more cores but significantly weaker ones with shared resources which meant it struggled hard in most scenarios except for fully threaded ones. Zen here is actually really good, the single threaded performance is solid and only trailing Intel by a small margin yet they offer more cores which overall is better as you no longer need to decide between great single threaded performance or great multithreaded performance, you get both.
If you look at any benchmarks you will realise there is a difference between dual core, quadcore and above. The minimum fps tanks on dual cores and even quadcores, its an inconsistent mess on a lot of games even if the 'average' FPS is still reasonably high. the i7s from Intel provide a significant jump compared to the i5s and the R5/R7s also show this compared to the quadcore chips, its worth the premium now as most DX12 games have vastly improved multi threading performance out of the box.
Just a note that Unreal 4 engine is a terrible example, that engine is not very well threaded at this point in time however Vulkan for PC is due to be implemented in to the engine soon with the aims to improve the multi threaded performance by a significant margin so that will change shortly.
Most people dont just play a game, they can have their browser running in the background or a video stream sometimes which drastically impacts performance on quadcores, this doesnt impact as much (if at all) for the R7s due to having more resources available for this. Its hard to recommend an i5 now adays as its so limited, grab an AMD r5 1600 for <£180 (less than the normal i5) and you have a generally faster CPU in both gaming and compute scenarios.
'October is a month away and the 6 core mainstream intels is a big step change. The Zen refresh will be 4+ months after that and just that, a minor refresh'
See im all for waiting for the next thing but to downplay Zen+ is a bit silly, AMD have already said it will provide a minimum of 15% IPC improvement (removing all the single threaded deficit compared to Intel and then some) and it will clock higher... this is going to be a substantial improvement compared to what Intels Skylake was (+100mhz... no IPC improvement!). Coffeelake will bring improvements by having more cores yes but the clock speeds are already taking a hit due to this so the single threaded advantage is disappearing.
If you arent in a rush then sure its worth waiting to see how it actually pans out but you cant go wrong picking Ryzen now as the AM4 platform will be supported for a minimum of 2 more generations (3 years overall, minimum) so you wont have to pick up a new board if you decide to upgrade again for some reason, unlike Intel who at the moment are just retiring their current gen boards after just 8 months for a new socket which provides no significant reason for it!
If you are doing purely gaming its worth considering dropping to the R5 1600 though as that is still 6 cores 12 threads, its very competitive in games and there is a significant amount of room to grow while also costing less than the normal i5 thats recommended. £180 so you can spend the money saved towards the GPU which is generally the most common bottleneck on systems no adays!
Leeman20 to hicks12
28 Aug 17#20
agree competely with you, the ryzen line up realistically was never meant to be the very best at anything. It was meant to be very good at almost everything giving it unbelievable versatlity. Add to that the amazing price point and the decent cooler it comes with, its package overall is lucrative for so many and one of the reasons i chose to go with amd currently. Of course a 7700k will beat this in gaming but the fps difference in most games is narrowing by the months and i highly doubt anyone without a fps monitor would be able to tell a difference anyway.
vulcanproject to Leeman20
28 Aug 17#21
This is a very good deal for this processor but the point is really waiting a month for Coffee Lake makes sense. MOST people's workloads are not massively multi threaded, gaming absolutely ISN'T one of those and won't be so heavily threaded anytime soon. Unless you need 8 cores then 4 or 6 faster ones will be a better choice.
Baffling the claim you shouldn't wait a month to see Coffee Lake and that is comparable to waiting 4-5 months for a minor 14nm+ Zen refresh.
Pretty sure people don't know what they are talking about and are already confusing a minor Zen refresh with altered clocks early next year on 14nm+ with a decent IPC jump to 7nm Zen 2 not due until late next year....
Leeman20 to vulcanproject
29 Aug 17#28
I don't think anyone is saying not to wait for coffee lake, obviously if you can wait then see what Intel's side have to offer and then make an informed decision. If you want to build your pc right now then this processor offers a lot of good options for anyone who does a bit of everything. 8 core processors are going to be overkill for a lot of people, but the deal isn't suppose to be judged on its audience, but at the price point and overall deal it represents. If i was someone looking into buying a new cpu i would wait for coffee lake as even if you don't buy one from Intel, it may make Ryzen a little cheaper if they price drop to remain competitive.
vulcanproject to hicks12
29 Aug 17#27
I'm not mistaken at all. You also isolated Piledriver, but failed to acknowledge not only does the dual core G4560 usually beat 8 thread Piledrivers in games it also often beats older Intel quads in games too. This is a super budget chip we are talking about here but we're barely at the stage of in game optimisation where 4 slow cores beat 2 fast ones!
It's only an illustration that by the time lots of slower cores beat less but faster ones in games, it won't really matter. Even budget chips will tonk everything with lots more cores by then. Buy what is best for your work loads now.
Then you wrote a whole lot I didn't really pay too much attention to because it wasn't true or proven, and then you confused a minor 14nm Zen refresh due in a few months with Zen 2's promised IPC improvements on 7nm, not due for at least a whole year yet.
It's one thing waiting a month for Coffee Lake and another 4 or 5 for a minor Zen refresh and further for big Zen improvements.
At this point it is easier to not go through and correct all your errors.
MRP
28 Aug 17#22
Coffee lake still needs pricing. I am assuming the 'k' will still be required to overclock.
Zoea
29 Aug 17#29
Ordered, thank you. Which code came quickly. Now to remember to cancel...
jenovat to Zoea
31 Aug 17#31
Go cancel!!!
KITTYBOTS
29 Aug 17#30
Also,has anyone noticed Nvidia congratulating AMD on Threadripper twice:
Opening post
From link:
"We are working with Which? to offer you a great deal. Try Which? for £1 and in return you’ll get £15 off orders over £250 when you shop on Laptops Direct. It's quick, easy, and most importantly, you'll save money."
All comments (31)
laptopsdirect.co.uk/amd…ler
Would rather buy a Ryzen now tbh.
Games only get a small benefit from multi cores at the best of times. Going from 4 to 8 isn't going to yield any real gains.
The problem with games is that they don't lend themselves well to parallel tasks, so splitting a game up to more cores can actually harm the FPS if you go too far with it.
Even highly threaded, well coded games engines like UE4 very rarely gets any benefit of 4 cores, nevermind 8. Game development is a different ball game though.
You also happen to get twice the cores for half the price.
This 1700 can be easily over clocked to a 1800x. 3.8-3.9 on a reasonable cooler is a given.
Any of these CPUs would blow the low clocked Jaguar cores used in consoles into orbit!! :stuck_out_tongue:
Sure all of you forum experts must be running dual GTX1080TI cards at 1080p! :stuck_out_tongue:
If not its just arguing over who runs Super PI quicker or some other useless benchmark,when most PC gamers won't have an 8 core CPU,or a 5GHZ Core i7 7700K.
I just find it pretty cool we can have a new 8C/16T CPU with reasonable performance for close to £250 in today's money,when such consumer CPUs were well beyond the reach of many only in January.
Its good to have a choice now.
That's not available to everyone, especially if you've already used it.
The price should be 277.97 with a 15 minus 1 quid opportunity.
The price is wrong anyway, it should be 263.97.
Please note: Once your trial comes to an end, your membership will continue at £10.75 a month.
This is one of those forget and charge trial services that pray on a large number of people forgetting to cancel in time.
Basically, it's not something everyone will want to do, and reducing the price is not really honest, as it isn't related to the CPU deal.
You can get this same processor, from Amazon, without going through the hassle.
amazon.co.uk/AMD…700
269.00 on Amazon, no hassle, or 263.97 with song and dance from an inferior etailer.
More cores is the future but the software is complicated to write.
All others have mentioned, this 8core Ryzen still holds its own against Intel 4 core chips - just a few FPS difference. The GPU is far more important tbh. But in the future, I think there is a very good chance quad core will be seen as sub-standard.
Even if the next i5 is better than Ryzen, I will still go with Ryzen. We've seen what happens when there is no competition, how many times did a new processor come from Intel to only have maybe 5-10% improvement in performance at a very high cost?
If you look at any benchmarks you will realise there is a difference between dual core, quadcore and above. The minimum fps tanks on dual cores and even quadcores, its an inconsistent mess on a lot of games even if the 'average' FPS is still reasonably high. the i7s from Intel provide a significant jump compared to the i5s and the R5/R7s also show this compared to the quadcore chips, its worth the premium now as most DX12 games have vastly improved multi threading performance out of the box.
Just a note that Unreal 4 engine is a terrible example, that engine is not very well threaded at this point in time however Vulkan for PC is due to be implemented in to the engine soon with the aims to improve the multi threaded performance by a significant margin so that will change shortly.
Most people dont just play a game, they can have their browser running in the background or a video stream sometimes which drastically impacts performance on quadcores, this doesnt impact as much (if at all) for the R7s due to having more resources available for this. Its hard to recommend an i5 now adays as its so limited, grab an AMD r5 1600 for <£180 (less than the normal i5) and you have a generally faster CPU in both gaming and compute scenarios.
'October is a month away and the 6 core mainstream intels is a big step change. The Zen refresh will be 4+ months after that and just that, a minor refresh'
See im all for waiting for the next thing but to downplay Zen+ is a bit silly, AMD have already said it will provide a minimum of 15% IPC improvement (removing all the single threaded deficit compared to Intel and then some) and it will clock higher... this is going to be a substantial improvement compared to what Intels Skylake was (+100mhz... no IPC improvement!). Coffeelake will bring improvements by having more cores yes but the clock speeds are already taking a hit due to this so the single threaded advantage is disappearing.
If you arent in a rush then sure its worth waiting to see how it actually pans out but you cant go wrong picking Ryzen now as the AM4 platform will be supported for a minimum of 2 more generations (3 years overall, minimum) so you wont have to pick up a new board if you decide to upgrade again for some reason, unlike Intel who at the moment are just retiring their current gen boards after just 8 months for a new socket which provides no significant reason for it!
If you are doing purely gaming its worth considering dropping to the R5 1600 though as that is still 6 cores 12 threads, its very competitive in games and there is a significant amount of room to grow while also costing less than the normal i5 thats recommended. £180 so you can spend the money saved towards the GPU which is generally the most common bottleneck on systems no adays!
Baffling the claim you shouldn't wait a month to see Coffee Lake and that is comparable to waiting 4-5 months for a minor 14nm+ Zen refresh.
Pretty sure people don't know what they are talking about and are already confusing a minor Zen refresh with altered clocks early next year on 14nm+ with a decent IPC jump to 7nm Zen 2 not due until late next year....
It's only an illustration that by the time lots of slower cores beat less but faster ones in games, it won't really matter. Even budget chips will tonk everything with lots more cores by then. Buy what is best for your work loads now.
Then you wrote a whole lot I didn't really pay too much attention to because it wasn't true or proven, and then you confused a minor 14nm Zen refresh due in a few months with Zen 2's promised IPC improvements on 7nm, not due for at least a whole year yet.
It's one thing waiting a month for Coffee Lake and another 4 or 5 for a minor Zen refresh and further for big Zen improvements.
At this point it is easier to not go through and correct all your errors.
wccftech.com/nvi…ck/
Even on their own website,Nvidia did a build with a Ryzen 7 1700X and a GTX1080TI:
geforce.com/wha…-ti