Intel Core i3-3220 review

Performance Analysis

Cinebench and WPrime have a habit of really hammering low-end CPUs as they favor multiple cores and generally more expensive items. The Intel Core i3-3220's results here were pretty poor, but it's what you'd expect given the fact it only has two physical cores. It's when you come up against more typical benchmarks that it begins to show what it's made of.

This budget chip powered its way to seventh in the image editing test, annihilating anything AMD had to offer and completely outdoing older Intel quad-cores too. Owners of LGA1366 CPUs take note - the Core i3-3220 is faster than your CPU at stock speed. Intel cemented Ivy Bridge's x86 prowess over AMD's latest APUs too, with the Core i3-3220 enjoying a 50 per cent advantage in speed over the A10-5800K.

Video editing was never going to be a strong point for a dual-core CPU, but the Core i3-3220 still managed to keep up with the likes of the Core i7-920 and was noticeably faster than the A10-5800K too. Overall it came roughly middle of the table, making it faster than all of AMD's CPUs at stock speed - a damning result for AMD from this ninety-pound CPU.

Without a discreet GPU, AMD rules supreme through, with the AMD A10-5800K in a different league, actually managing to obtain playable frame rates in Skyrim at 1,920 x 1,080, while the Core i3-3220 lagged well behind with a minimum framerate of just 4fps. Throw in a discrete GPU, though, and the tables are turned somewhat. The Core i3-3220 was 5fps faster on the minimum frame rate compared to the A10-5800K and overclocking the latter did nothing to solve this situation.

The AMD APUs exhibited a fantastically low power consumption at idle. At just 33W, this was 13W lower than the Intel Core i3-3220. Under load, the AMD's chips' on-board graphics chewed into the mains though, with the A10-5800K's 144W nearly double that of the Intel Core i3-3220.

Conclusion

While Intel's x86 dominance is clear (you'd simply be a fool to buy an AMD chip if you'll mainly be image editing for example), AMD does have a real winner in the form of the A10-5800K when it comes to using the on-board graphics. Not only is it infinitely better than the Intel HD graphics included with the Intel Core i3-3220, but it's powerful enough to handle some games at 1,920 x 1,080 as well.

However, those tech-savvy enough to understand exactly what's going on in our benchmarks will realise that an Intel Core i3-3220 coupled with a discreet GPU and cheap LGA1155 motherboard is only going to cost £50-100 more than an AMD A10-5800K setup, and will be far more potent in games plus you'll reap the rewards of having an Intel CPU for other tasks too. We're not saying the Core i3-3220 is an alternative to a Core i5, but it certainly gives AMD's best CPUs a run for their money and bloody noses on occasions. A lot will depend which CPU socket you currently own too as which route is the best value.

At face value, the Intel Core i3-3220 is a fantastic buy, whether you're not into games and just need something with a little grunt to power through image editing or web browsing, or plan to drop in a low or mid-range graphics card at some point. It's also very power-frugal. It's a shame that there's no substantial overclocking to be had, but the Intel Core i3-3220 still gets our firm recommendation as an awesome sub-£100 CPU.