• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

best bang for buck gaming cpu ??

stretch to the i5-4690K

i just built a gaming rig for my brother. when i enabled XMP profile (2133Mhz) for the Avexir memory, the cpu took itself to 3.9Ghz via turbo. temps are fine with the Raijintek Aidos Direct, good £15 cooler. One simple change in bios and you wont need to look at overclocking more for a good while.

Add: I used arctic mx-3 paste with the cooler not the paste that came with it.
 
Last edited:
Pentium K if you like playing older games. Once cores are called for it totally falls on its face.

Next up, AMD FX 6300 with a half decent cooler overclocked to 4.5ghz or so is good enough for any single GPU arrangement.

After that you get into FX 8 territory. FX 8320 is now £100 on the dot pretty much and again, overclocked it will easily push out any game. I run mine with a 7990 and see no ills.

Locked I5s are not worth the money because inevitably the derped crappy clock speed will need a shove, and they're completely locked down.

So for me it's Pentium, FX 6300, FX 8320, I5 4690k, I7 4790k etc.

Intel are in at the low end now but mid range is still completely and totally AMD and devoid of any Intel product whatsoever.

And they're idiots for letting that happen when they have the technology and capability to write AMD's CPUs (note not APUs) off completely.

The day Intel unlock an I3 and heck, even a Celeron they'll get a lot more respect from me but atm it's either poverty or snobbery.
 
The AMDs have poor power efficiency though. Spend the bit extra on an i5 and you'll make it back in lower power bills.
 
MagicBoy said:
The AMDs have poor power efficiency though. Spend the bit extra on an i5 and you'll make it back in lower power bills.
Click to expand...

It's not a bit extra though is it? in the case of the 6300 it's actually double or more and for the 8320 it's £65.

That's too much money to make the power argument worthwhile. The 8320 at stock and specifically the 8320e are far lower TDP than you would think.
 
ALXAndy said:
So for me it's Pentium, FX 6300, FX 8320, I5 4690k, I7 4790k etc.
Click to expand...

Perfect answer grounded in facts.

MagicBoy said:
The AMDs have poor power efficiency though. Spend the bit extra on an i5 and you'll make it back in lower power bills.
Click to expand...

At stock speeds the difference is around about 100 W. If you ran your CPU at full load 24 hours a day 7 days a week that would be a difference on your bill of about £10 a month, or about 1 p an hour.

In other words, to make the £80 outlay back that you claim he will would take over 8 months of constant 100% usage.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/fx-8350-8320-6300-4300_8.html
 
joeyjojo said:
Perfect answer grounded in facts.



At stock speeds the difference is around about 100 W. If you ran your CPU at full load 24 hours a day 7 days a week that would be a difference on your bill of about £10 a month, or about 1 p an hour.

In other words, to make the £80 outlay back that you claim he will would take over 8 months of constant 100% usage.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/fx-8350-8320-6300-4300_8.html
Click to expand...

Fair point, however the i5 is about 25% faster than the 8320 at stock speeds, and the price difference is £43 at OcUK...

I'm not here for a fight, or points scoring. I couldn't give a toss about CPU brand loyalty. I'd buy an i5 given the OPs requirements.
 
Last edited:
MagicBoy said:
Fair point, however the i5 is about 25% faster than the 8320 at stock speeds, and the price difference is £43 at OcUK...

I'm not here for a fight, or points scoring. I couldn't give a toss about CPU brand loyalty. I'd buy an i5 given the OPs requirements.
Click to expand...

25% faster? At the very most in games the i5 is 15% faster (minimum FPS). 0-10% is more common. Compare the i5-4690 to the 7850K (an APU that's got half as many cores as the 8320):

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7963/...iew-core-i7-4790-i5-4690-and-i3-4360-tested/9

(That minimum in F1 looks dubious, I'd be much more inclined to trust the 99th percentile charts.)

This isn't a fight, I just think people should get accurate advise backed up by data.
 
joeyjojo said:
25% faster? At the very most in games the i5 is 15% faster (minimum FPS). 0-10% is more common. Compare the i5-4690 to the 7850K (an APU that's got half as many cores as the 8320):

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7963/...iew-core-i7-4790-i5-4690-and-i3-4360-tested/9

(That minimum in F1 looks dubious, I'd be much more inclined to trust the 99th percentile charts.)

This isn't a fight, I just think people should get accurate advise backed up by data.
Click to expand...

So given £150 to buy the best bang per buck gaming CPU, you'd buy a £108 AMD and hand back £42?
 
MagicBoy said:
So given £150 to buy the best bang per buck gaming CPU, you'd buy a £108 AMD and hand back £42?
Click to expand...

Depends on the whole budget. If the budget is tight that £42 should go on a better GPU. That's almost the difference between a 280 and a 290 for example, and you'll get way better FPS with an 8320 + 290 than a locked i5 + 280 (up to 50% more).
 
Last edited:
Mantle and DX12 will make the CPU less of a bottleneck anyway.

However I would say the Xeon E3-1230v3 wins if you can find one. The only 8-threaded CPU from Intel under £200.
 
joeyjojo said:
Depends on the whole budget. If the budget is tight that £42 should go on a better GPU. That's almost the difference between a 280 and a 290 for example, and you'll get way better FPS with an 8320 + 290 than a locked i5 + 280 (up to 50% more).
Click to expand...

It really depends what he will be spending most of his time playing.

What is the point of overspending on a GPU if he is playing CPU intensive games?

Just the same as the reverse...what would the point be in overspending on a CPU if he is mainly playing GPU intensive games?
 
Threepwood said:
It really depends what he will be spending most of his time playing.

What is the point of overspending on a GPU if he is playing CPU intensive games?

Just the same as the reverse...what would the point be in overspending on a CPU if he is mainly playing GPU intensive games?
Click to expand...

this is very rigid thinking tho. people change and games change. he might start liking something new all of a sudden like video making or overclocking. hes then screwed because he built toward a specific or gpu intensive game. Build around a powerful core not from the outside in.
 
Last edited:
All examples are rigid on a budget. One has to suffer somewhere, which is why I lean towards min/maxing a lot more when on a budget.

Also a powerful core is so very reliant on it's supporting platform, so I would put as much emphasis on platform choice too.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom