Intel Core i3 3225 

I should also mention with the Arctic Freezer Pro 7 Rev 2 cooler and Arctic MX-2 paste it didn't exceed 60c on P95.

The HD 7660D graphics in the Trinity chip outperforms the HD 4000 on the Intel side by a huge margin - we hit 27fps in Batman: Arkham City at 'v high' settings at 1080p.

For us, the real competition for this i3 chip is the six-core FX-6200.

Seeing the nature of benchmark performance of the HD4000's over its younger brother, it was foolish of me not to spend the extra £10 for the i3-3225.

In this price range you can take your pick of the competition - AMD has three different options for around the £100 mark and that should give pause for thought for even the most ardent Intel fan.

The i3-3225 barely managed 16fps.

That's a massive shame for the eager budget overclockers, but Intel obviously doesn't want anyone getting i5 performance out of an i3 chip, even if it has to introduce artificial barriers.

This processor really complements the PC's performance.

The i3-3225's general CPU performance is pretty good, but when you consider the similarly priced AMD chips - with access to overclocking - it starts to look a little off the pace.

It will still keep a decent GPU filled in games though.

The Intel Ivy Bridge technology is the finest desktop processor tech this side of Haswell, and for the PC build without severe budgetary constraints, it's the architecture we're telling you to stick into your gaming rig.

The current Core i3 range of CPUs is the real entry point for getting Ivy Bridge.

As is the way with i3 chips, this is a dual-core CPU, but unlike the i5 range, Intel has turned HyperThreading back on.