Beginner

Your CPU is, in many ways, the heart of your PC. Sure, if you’re building a gaming PCyour graphics card might steal the limelight — but the centerpiece of your build is still the processor. Your choice of CPU dictates whether you’ll build on an Intel or AMD motherboard, whether you’ll go with DDR4 or DDR5 RAMand even which CPU cooler to buy. When you’ve got this much riding on the processor, it’s imperative to understand a few key details.

As the competition among the best CPUs has grown fiercer in the past 5 to 6 years, consumers have become more aware than ever before about what goes into their beloved processor. If you’re someone still learning the ropes, or if you need a refresher on the most important CPU specs, this guide will point you in the right direction.

Related

How to make your CPU perform better

Is your CPU not performing at its best? Here are some fixes you should try out.

Cores and threads

How many CPUs in your CPU?

Perhaps the simplest way to gauge CPU processing power is by looking at how many cores and threads it has. While this doesn’t give you the complete picture, the cores in your CPU can be thought of as individual processors that determine how effective your CPU is at multitasking. The more physical cores your CPU has, the more simultaneous tasks it can handle.

Threads (also referred to as logical cores) aren’t physical components on the CPU. Instead, threads are more like the number of instructions or tasks a CPU can handle at a time. Threads are virtual constructs that indicate the number of simultaneous tasks that can be handled by the CPU cores.

The ability of each core to handle more than one thread at a time is called Hyper-Threading or simultaneous multithreading. Depending on the CPU architecture, modern CPUs can have single-threaded or dual-threaded cores. Applications today can be heavily single-threaded or multithreaded, so you should look for a CPU that offers both strong single-core performance, as well as a decent number of cores and threads for better multithreading performance.

In general, the newer a CPU, the better its underlying architecture and performance. This is why a newer CPU with fewer cores will often outperform an older one with more cores.

Related

Latest 6-core or a last-gen 8-core CPU: Can less be more?

Can an 8-core AM4 chip compete with the newer 6-core AM5 champion?

Clock speed and architecture

The need for speed

After the number of cores and threads, the next item on the spec sheet that matters the most is the clock speed of the CPU. It’s measured in GHz (gigahertz) in the case of modern CPUs, and represents the number of cycles a CPU executes per second. A cycle can be understood as billions of transistors opening and closing to perform various instructions. The clock speed (also known as core clock or core frequency) can be seen as a measure of how fast individual cores perform on a CPU.

The other important element that’s closely related to the speed and performance of a CPU is IPC, or instructions per clock. As you can guess, it simply means the number of instructions a CPU can execute within every clock cycle. The IPC multiplied by the core clock will give you the number of instructions a CPU can execute per second. Sometimes, a CPU with a slightly lower clock speed but higher IPC can outperform a CPU with a higher clock speed but lower IPC.

In general, newer and more advanced CPU architectures have higher IPC than older architectures. This is another reason that a newer processor will almost always be better than its previous-gen SKU equivalent. Clock speeds of individual cores tend to go down as the number of cores increases. Consequently, games generally run faster on CPUs with lower core counts but high clock speeds, and multithreaded applications will utilize as many cores as they can get.

Related

Does your CPU matter for gaming?

What’s the deal with CPUs when it comes to gaming? Find out here.

Cache is memory directly on your CPU

It matters more than you think

Cache is a small pool of high-speed memory present on the CPU die that helps the processor accelerate data retrieval. Cache operates much faster than system memory (RAM) or storage. As a result, a larger cache can have a huge impact on some workloads. For instance, some of the best AMD CPUs for gaming ship with over 100MB of total cache, with the special 3D V-Cache boosting gaming performance immensely.

Related

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D CPU review: A must-have for framerate chasers

The Ryzen 7 7800X3D can hit FPS surpassing even the 7950X and 14900K, all while costing less and consuming less power.

CPUs typically feature a very small amount of L1 cache, with the L2 and L3 cache being the ones you should focus on. Each CPU core usually features its own L2 cache, while the larger L3 cache shared among all cores. A larger cache might not give you a tangible boost in day-to-day tasks, but it can noticeably improve gaming performance and certain productivity workloads such as video editing and rendering.

CPU socket and compatible motherboards

Know your motherboard

Every CPU has a specific CPU socket it’s compatible with. This is why you can’t just buy your CPU and motherboard independently of each other. Knowing your CPU socket will allow you to buy a motherboard with a compatible socket. If you’re planning your build with PCPartPicker, you don’t have to worry about socket compatibility that much. However, it is still important to know what socket and platform you’re investing in.

Related

How to tell what CPU socket you have

Thankfully, finding out what CPU socket your motherboard has isn’t rocket science.

For instance, you should be aware that building a PC with an AMD CPU on the AM4 socket will not give you an upgrade path at all. The AM4 socket has reached end-of-life and been replaced with AMD’s new AM5 socket, which promises drop-in CPU upgrades without changing your motherboard until at least 2026. On the other hand, Intel usually releases a new socket with every other CPU generation.

TDP: Thermal Design Power

Some like it hot

The TDP, or Thermal Design Power, is an estimate of your CPU’s maximum power consumption under standard operating conditions. This gives you insight into not only the power consumed, but also the heat generated by your CPU under maximum load. The higher this number, the hotter the CPU will run during heavy workloads, and the beefier cooling solution it will require.

Mainstream 6-core and 8-core CPUs typically have TDPs of around 65W-125W, and they don’t typically require watercooling your PC. The best air coolers can easily handle CPUs with 200W+ TDPs. Generally, you’ll only need to invest into better cooling if you’re rocking a Ryzen 9 or Intel i9 chip, overclocking your high-end processoror running heavy applications and games regularly.

Related

How to lower your CPU’s temperature

With the latest CPUs heating it up a notch, it’s important to keep them cool. Here’s how.

Integrated graphics

Do you really need a dedicated GPU?

On modern CPUs, you typically don’t “have” to buy a graphics card just to get a display on your monitor and to run light browsing and office work. That’s because modern CPUs have integrated graphics that can power your display needs all by itself. Most consumer-focused Intel CPUs have shipped with on-board graphics for many years now, and this is now also present on consumer Ryzen chips.

Not everyone needs a powerful discrete GPU to power their day-to-day usage. Casual gamers, HTPC users, laptop users, and budget builders can get plenty of use from onboard graphics. When you’re in the market for your next CPU, take a close look at your intended usage. If you’re not looking to squeeze out every frame in a gaming rig, you might be fine with integrated graphics.

Related

How to use integrated graphics instead of GPU?

It is best to use a GPU when playing a game or doing video editing. However, integrated graphics on your CPU will still work in a pinch.

Unlocked multiplier overclocking

Clock speed limits? What are those?

You probably know that many CPUs can be overclocked beyond their factory settings to extract even more juice out of them. But not every CPU can be overclocked. For that, you’ll want an unlocked multiplier. This enables you to dial in your own settings to overclock your CPU in the BIOS or with a desktop utility like Ryzen Master.

If an Intel desktop CPU has a “K”, “KF”, or “KS” at the end of its model name, it supports multiplier overclocking. In contrast, Intel laptop CPUs use “HX” or “HK” suffixes to denote unlocked multipliers. Only the best Intel CPUs are overclockable. On the AMD side, all Ryzen laptop and desktop CPUs have unlocked multipliers, opening the door to overclocking.

Finally, your motherboard chipset must also support overclocking. Every CPU generation brings with it a set of motherboard chipsets, not all of which support overclocking. For instance, Intel allows overclocking only on its high-end Z-series chipsets. AMD is more flexible here, allowing overclocking on all its chipsets except the lowest-end ones such as A320 or A620.

DDR4 vs DDR5 memory support

Old-school DDR4 or modern DDR5

With DDR4 and DDR5 memory standards co-existing right now, some PC builders can be legitimately confused about which CPU to buy. This is because your motherboard can only support one type of memory — DDR4 or DDR5 in today’s context. For CPUs, it’s slightly trickier. AMD completely switched to DDR5 with its Zen 4 CPUs on the AM5 socket. However, Intel’s 12th Gen, 13th Gen, and 14th Gen Core processors can support either DDR4 or DDR5 memory — but this is dependent on your choice of motherboard. In other words, you need to check both your CPU and motherboard before buying RAM to make sure it’s compatible.

Buying a CPU isn’t as hard as it seems

Although the amount of information might be overwhelming, the CPU p urchase process isn’t that complicated. Carefully consider what types of tasks you want to use your computer for before splurging, and then make sure you select a compatible motherboard and memory kit to make sure that the components work together. If you’ve finalized your CPU pick and need a solid motherboard option, check out the best DDR5 motherboards to learn more.

Related

From Intel Dual-Core to AMD Ryzen 8 core CPU – My 15 years of PC building

I’ve built many gaming PCs but the ones I enjoyed the most are all in the past.