Core i7 or Phenom II X4?

[Plinius]

hi there!

currently i'm running on a machine with an amd phenom X3 8750 (2,4Ghz) and a nvidia geforce 8800gts.
Since I'm having performance issues with lotro from time to time I'm planning to upgrade my pc - it is for sure that i will be using an amd radeon 5870, but i'm not sure about the CPU
i tried to search on the web for benchmarks with up-to-date processors with lotro, but wasn't able to finde some
as processors perform differently on various engines, I would like to ask you for your advice

which processor performs better with lotro:
Intel:
Core i7-920/860

or

AMD:
Phenom II X4 965 (BE)

can you please give me an advice?
best regards and thanks!

[Korrigan]

If money is not a problem, the Core i7 is definitely faster than the Phenom II. And I'm not biased, I have a Phenom II myself. This said, the Phenom II 940 I have, along with an ATI HD4890, permits me to run LOTRO with all settings maxed out, smoother than a babie's bottom.
So at the end it's a money problem. Both the i7 and its motherboard will cost more than the Phenom II and its motherboard. But if you want the best of the best, Core i7 is the way to go, knowing that the Phenom II is still way powerful enough to run LOTRO with all the bells and whistles.

[mersch]

The Core i7 is overall more powerfull than the phenom, but in games that difference is a lot less obvious. I would say (just like Korrigan) if you can afford it, go for the i7. If you want to overclock your pc, or want a better price/performance ratio, go for the amd option.