Andy, i wasn't doing like for like....In none of my posts have i mentioned like for like, my comparison on prices is pretty simple. You need a better board, one with decent VRMs 6+2 kind minimum for a decent potential overclock. Compared with Intel, where you can clock decently using a sub par H87 board, saving you money and bringing the price down inline with AMDs offering, you also have to up the cooling (more money)
You also keep banging on about the same 2 or 3 games, the same games where the i5 is what? margin of error behind or ahead lol, whereas in most games...because there's more than just Crysis 3, Farcry3 and BF4 currently out where they're not so heavily threaded Intel win, a lot.
Even in some heavily threaded games, Intel win....a lot.
What's becoming very clear of late is that 1 x Intel core, no matter how good, does not = two AMD cores. I really can't put it any simpler than that. Every time the cores are put to use the AMD will beat the quad core Intel.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with the board I chose for that CPU to 4.2ghz. At that speed it's more than fast enough.
As for banging on about those games? no, the I5 is not within the margin of error at all and that's what you seem to be struggling with. In Crysis 3, Far Cry 3 and so on it's out ahead by the margin it should be, which is the same margin you get with Cinebench and 3dmark Firestrike physics, given they all use all of the processor.
And then again we come back to price. £10 more than a 4670k CPU for a CPU that when used is most certainly faster for the board AND CPU. That's going to be a £60+ saving which would buy you an SSD, or, take you from a 7870 to a 7970. Yet still you seem to think that it's best to blow most of the budget on a CPU.
Madness.