Core i7 vs Core i5

I guess I should have done more homework prior (especially vis a vis New Egg's no return computer policy, except for defects), but I am disappointed with my Vaio's Core i7 performance. (Crysis is almost unplayable.) Like most retail Core i7 laptops out there, it's a 1.6GHz (with Intel Turbo Boost to 2+ GHz). I see that my two favorite PC only games Crysis and World in Conflict both call for 2GHz processors (not necessarily Core i7). So, my question is (academic at this point-I am stuck with the Vaio): For gaming, would I have been better served by a Core i5 (typically offered at at least 2+GHz)?

 

It's likely the video card

Laptops aren't great for gaming in less you spend around 1.5-2k and have a good card that is dedicated.

 

Thanks for responding, all. My Vaio has 4GB RAM and has a discrete GPU (NVidia 330M with 1024 dedicated VRAM). It came with Win 7 Home Premium 64-bit. But I did a clean swipe to get rid of Sony bloatware. It now has Win 7 Ultimate 64-bit. And actually can't get Crysis to run now due to a Dx.dll error. I have read of widespread variations of Crysis issues on Win 7. All drivers (i.e. Nvidia) are current. Maybe someone else here has experience with Crysis on a Vaio Core i7 1.6 or another machine with similar specs...

 

Did you install the video drivers? Did you install windows from scratch?

I think the 1.6 GHz is a bottneck. Try to run at 2 GHz at all times you when play games.

That card isn't to bad it's a bit faster then a 8600GT

I'd try to play on All med settings with 1280x1024 rez

Also update your crysis with the patches to make it perform a bit better.

 

Crysis specs a 1.6 single core CPU (thats minimum, meaning it will run on the lowest settings), the I7 should blow it away, but it requires some heavy graphics card to run above medium, not to mention Crysis also has a huge number of bugs and problems that were never fixed..... also it doesn't like Win7 very much.
I ran it fine on an X2 on Win XP, moved upto Win 7 and it bugs out a LOT!
WIC also has some issues although it runs ok for me on Win7.

If you are trying to put these games on high specs on the system you have then you are over doing it, not so much WIC but Crysis still stands as the benhmark for graphics and ideally to run it flat out you want at LEAST an HD4870x2 in order to get decent frame rates.
Having said that, I gave up on Crysis on Win7, too many freezes and CTD's.

It's not your CPU.

 

Thanks, Nedlamar. After trying seemingly every suggested workaround, I finally gave up on Crysis (on Win 7) as well. I guess I will wait (hope) for Crytek to release it later for consoles retroactively after the success of Crysis 2 on the console. (I know, I am jumping the gun.) Or I'll just start over next month on OnLive (fingers crossed). All other games with medium-high settings seem to work fine (Mirror's Edge, Bad Company 2, Fallout 3, The Scourge Project). Thanks to everyone here for the feedback. I kept going back to Fry's, eying several cheaper Core i5's just for the 2+Ghz processors. Now I can stop.