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athlon vs phenom vs clarkdale

ng93

ng93

ng93

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hi im specking a new system but not sure which cpu would give the best 'bang for buck'. i've narrowed the choices down to these four:

phenom II x2 555 (with the possibility of unlocking to x3 or x4)
athlon II x4 640
pentium g6950
core i3 540

It will be used for gaming, programming and running a couple of virtual machines.

oh and i will be overclocking, although never done it before so probably wont get much out of them

TIA
 
As far as I'm aware it goes in this order...

Phenom II 555 - If you can unlock the cores, which is a risk.
Athlon II X4 640 - for the guaranteed extra cores if your using software to make use of them.
Intel i3 - Prob neck and neck with the Phenom II 555 if it was being used on anything that takes advantage of 2 cores or less.
Pentium G6950 - Wouldn't bother with, just a lesser dual core than the i3.
 
Essexraptor said:
Welcome to the forums :)

"Best bang for buck"

Athlon II X4 640

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-268-AM&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=803

or if you miss the offer.......... the 630 which you'll easily match with OCing

OR

the Pentium G6950 ( cheapest socket 1156 CPU with impressive overclocking performance!!!)

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010/06/24/intel-pentium-g6950-cpu-review/1

If I was doing a budget build for someone today these are 2 that I would shortlist :)
Click to expand...

LOL nearly a 2Ghz overlock on that Pentium G6950, guess that clears that one up for me. :eek:;)
 
:)

many people overlook the G6950, I guess it's the "Pentium" tag, but if your on a low or restricted budget it's one hell of a impressive chip

:)
 
Essexraptor said:
Welcome to the forums :)

"Best bang for buck"

Athlon II X4 640

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-268-AM&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=803

or if you miss the offer.......... the 630 which you'll easily match with OCing

OR

the Pentium G6950 ( cheapest socket 1156 CPU with impressive overclocking performance!!!)

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010/06/24/intel-pentium-g6950-cpu-review/1

If I was doing a budget build for someone today these are 2 that I would shortlist :)
Click to expand...

4.62Ghz :eek:

but is the 1.4v core ok for 24/7 oc? and how hard would it be to hit that as ive never oced before.

EDIT: also ive seen some athlon x4s at 3.6-3.8. how would a 4.6 pentium be against them in multi threaded apps?
 
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With the right cooling it would be fine

The link that I posted earlier gives you the setup (hardware, GA-H55M-UD2H, Titan Fenrir TTC-NK85TZ CPU Cooler and the RAM) they used on page 2. All chips vary and they were "extreme" OCing no problem bringing it back a couple of notches for 24/7

1.4v appears to be the max for the CPU

The overclocking and cooling section has stickies on "how to" etc and it's a try and see process that comes with experience of having a go :)
 
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I wouldn't take the X4 over the X3 - no way in hell.
X3 is easily the best budget chip with the G6950 tied or very close second (I say clsoe second as the rest of the build will cost more)
 
Oh, another thing to remember.
While the Athlons will have more cores, the i3 and G6950 have more instructions per clock so can do more, which results in better performance in games.


At OP, out the list you had short-listed I would take the i3 if you can afford it. Most clock to around 4.2, and the HT means they can support the more core intensive games.
 
For me the winners would be the athlonII x3 (sory not listed) of the 540 due to hyperthreading over the 6950.

540 first choice just so it could be oc'd.
 
is hyper threading worth the extra £20 the i3 costs over the g6950? im going to be pairing it with a 768mb gtx460 so would have thought that would be more of a bottleneck in games, especially with the g6950 at 4+ghz. or would it help with productivity (compiling maybe?). sorry for all the questions just dont want to regret my purchase
 
ng93 said:
is hyper threading worth the extra £20 the i3 costs over the g6950? im going to be pairing it with a 768mb gtx460 so would have thought that would be more of a bottleneck in games, especially with the g6950 at 4+ghz. or would it help with productivity (compiling maybe?). sorry for all the questions just dont want to regret my purchase
Click to expand...

Hyper-threading will help in games as some require around 3 or 4 cores to get the most out of them.
GTX460 will not bottleneck, regardless of which chip you use in the end.

i3 will also get above 4GHz pretty easily, and is often run 24/7 at 4.0GHz at least.
Compiling will be aided by the HT as well.

Here's a benchmark to help you decide between G6950 and i3:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/143?vs=123
 
AS stated earlier the G6950 is the best "budget buy" bang for buck...... if your now going to throw money at it ... i3
 
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Essexraptor said:
AS stated earlier the G6950 is the best "budget buy" bang for buck...... if your now going to throw money at it ... i3
Click to expand...

yh i really dont know. would hate to get the pentium and in 6 months find its not quick enough, but dont want to buy the i3 and not use the extra performance.

anyway im not buying untill christmas, so hopefully theyll be some nice price cuts and the i3 will fit better in teh budget:)
 
ng93 said:
yh i really dont know. would hate to get the pentium and in 6 months find its not quick enough, but dont want to buy the i3 and not use the extra performance.

anyway im not buying untill christmas, so hopefully theyll be some nice price cuts and the i3 will fit better in teh budget:)
Click to expand...

You would use the extra performance.
For example, looking at the benchmarks I linked, Fallout: 3 - a nearly 3 year old game, has a great increase in fps over the G6950 and modern games are beggining to utilise 3-4 cores a lot more.
 
Cookeh said:
You would use the extra performance.
For example, looking at the benchmarks I linked, Fallout: 3 - a nearly 3 year old game, has a great increase in fps over the G6950 and modern games are beggining to utilise 3-4 cores a lot more.
Click to expand...

yh looking at those benchmarks again that makes sense, and i suppose in 6-12 months time the gap will be even bigger?

ill be getting the i3 then either 530 or 540 depending if theres any good TWO deals, im assuming theres not much difference?

cheers for the help all
 
If you are not buying until around christmas wait a little longer as Sandybridge will be out soon. Intel is killing off Socket 1156 and replacing it with socket 1155. Cpu's will not be interchangeable between the two sockets.
 
ng93 said:
yh looking at those benchmarks again that makes sense, and i suppose in 6-12 months time the gap will be even bigger?

ill be getting the i3 then either 530 or 540 depending if theres any good TWO deals, im assuming theres not much difference?

cheers for the help all
Click to expand...

Very little difference, from what I recall one just has a higher stock speed (won't overclock further though).

Gap will certainly be bigger, so come that time you could make the jump to i5 for the leap to i7 - or even a new socket all together.
 
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