Well it has more performance per core, which is kinda sad in itself. And not many games, even today, can use much more.
Both options are bad but if you can find a Dell tower that just idled on word for a few years....
I'm going to say yes.
most games are GPU bound, so any CPU that isn't garbage will do.
best part of the FX chips, is once you get money, they make great home server CPUs.
The dual ALU's to single FPU design may cripple them in single core performance, but when it comes to integer heavy workloads they just destroy everything in sight.
For DX12 and Vulkan at 1080p or 1440p, sure. But, not all games will take advantage of DX12 properly such as Rise of Tomb Raider. Microsoft seems to be on a roll of putting out unoptimized PC versions of their Xbox One exclusives just to meet the deadline as the Xbox One version of the game without the care for the PC version, and that's why we consistently see shitty DX12 ports from them.
1 Like
i5 2500K wouldn't really be terrible though, but I don't think I be on board knowing that it will not be supported anywhere soon. But the same can be said for the Piledriver FX CPUs.
Asrock have way cheaper AM3+ board with m.2 and what not...
Most reviews have it close to the new I3 in performance. I chose the 8320e mainly cause it was 40 bucks off for the combo plus a 15 buck rebate which was not available for the X4's (860k etc). Allot depends on what is on sale and is available.
I game on a 7850k on the upstairs PC and the 8320e w/GTX 770 downstairs has not improved how bad I am in many games. It just looks better (or worse) when I get killed:)
I would be surprised to see a 90 dollar Zen cpu till early or mid 17
Ok I'm going to bust this myth right now: CPU bound games are not that bad off on an FX setup.
"You don't know what you're talking about! Harble garble intel"
Ah ah ah~, I do. I have been looking at upgrading to an FX machine lately. Tho cost of board, CPU, 1866 ram, and new PSU because the one I bought is used and I am trusting it less and less. Now, if you want to be severely stupid and compare a 5960X to an 8370 (I will be using the 70 in this post because that is the one I will be buying), then yeah, theres a no brainer choice right there.
Now, my first actual modern "-"gamer"-" machine was an i7 870 box. I WOULD be using it now if dell wasn't proprietary and bullshit. However, for its age, it handled well. When the GPU died, I had to build on the cheap. As cheap as cheap was! So, I went to the local scrap depot with a volt meter and dug through motherboards till I found one that was good. I ended up in AM3 land and now I have a Phenom X4 955 BE. Just for note, yes the 955 compared to the 870 is slow, however the 870 also has a lot more extensions that are used by basically everything.
Now, in basic IPC gain going from a 955 BE to an 8370 will put me ahead of an 870 and behind the 2500K (in single core IPC). This is great for me, at least, because even CPU bound games run fucking great on a 955.
Out of curiosity I looked up a basic list of some games GPU and CPU bound.
Examples of CPU-bound games:
Civilization V
Minecraft
Assassin's Creed: Black Flag
Planetside 2
Counter Strike: Global Operations
Dungeons of Dredmor
Total War: Rome II
GTA VExamples of GPU-bound games:
Crysis 3 (though it also leans heavily on the CPU)
Metro: Last Light
Evolve
Witcher 3 (somewhat CPU-bound in certain cases)
Spec Ops: The Line
Borderlands 2
Hard Reset
Thats taken from the PCPartPicker forums BTW.
I have played all the games listed on my machine under CPU and all but AC:BF run great. Now, I have also seen AC played on a 8370 machine and it ran amazingly. You could argue that its an old title, sure, but who cares? If there is a better list of games let me know. Also I am not going to count the new thief game because thats not thief and I don't care what you say. Pbtbbtbt
Now, OBVIOUSLY if you can afford better hardware.... Well then buy the better hardware. Not everyone is in my situation where scrap is gold, but still. The argument that an FX chip is the worst choice and that because 4 months later after people are making bad ass multiGPU 4k capable (80 FPS and up with the new battlefront) machines the calendar says 2016, and 2016 is bigger than 2013, the fact that the parts are barely old does not mean they are trash.
They are just as capable as any other machine and if you're a linux user they're great. Windows stuffs any CPU full of shit. Linux is just lighter. But even in windows they are good chips.
Thres no reason to not use one of the FX chips if your other option from intel is a 2500K in desktop parts. The interesting thing is the old E5 2670's are super cheap and 8 core. I wonder what people will say comparing the two... Either way, bicker as you wish, but theres not too many games that do too much damage to an FX FPS wise.
I also want to put in here that this machine I have would be good if I could overclock it wore than 200 MHZ without it freaking out and if it had PCIe gen 3.
2 Likes
As great as they are for what they can do, the price for boards kills them off as a budget alternative for gamers.
Ah... Very true.
As long as you stay above 60fps on games you want to play anything will work. Even a potato
So, would you buy a potato?
Well, I thought about getting a Wii U so why not?
Thats not fair. That potato has exclusives. :P
Yeah, about 1-2 good exclusives a year, but still, I need to play on the Wii U every now and then, but I have too many PC games (nearly 90, not counting N64, Gamecube and Wii emulation)
save your money for dual core intel chip, cuz not much games are optimized for more than 4 cores nowadays as compared to say 2010.
Nah, I think the only noteworthy dual core chip is the Skylake i3's for modern gaming, although for older games, you can't go wrong with the Pentium G3258 nor an Athlon X4 860K nor an FX 8320.
1 Like
Here is an example of what I would do:
Worst case scenario: Get a better PSU, throw in an RX 480 and you are ready to go.
1 Like
Save your money and buy AMD. by a good ITX fm2 board then when you upgrade you could have a HTPC. Board and Processor will only set you back 160 to 200 bucks. 860k will run anything you throw at it. (Game wise)
Now I know what to do with that R7 360 that's sitting there.
I disagree with this argument because the cpu isn't the only component that needs to be considered. When buying a motherboard for an 83** series cpu you really should be buying a 990fx/x board as even the 83**e cpu's still are near 100 watt tdps and still run somewhat warm. There have been so many horror stories of the 'budget' 970 boards not holding up that imo its just not worth risking it. So, if you want a board for an 83** series cpu that is considered quality, your cheapest option right now is the Gigabyte 990FXA UD3 Rev. 5 for $100. Now, for a H170 board, mind you there is no reason to buy Z170 for a locked I5, you can get a ASRock H170A-X1 for sub $80. So, that price difference fades fast if you compare the complete bundle.
True, but there is no upgrade path for the 83** series cpu's. AMD's new cpu's are launching on AM4, so there is no upgrade path for old I5's, but there is an upgrade path for skylake I5's which are price comparable when you factor in the motherboard.