£300, three different options:

frc · 25 Nov 2011 at 11:01

£300, four different options:

(edit: added another option)
(edit: I keep finding more options at this price point! I'll try to stop adding them...)

Hi there. For about the same money (£300), these are available to me:

1)
i5 2500K 3.3GHz
4GB DDR3 RAM
750GB Hard Drive
Graphics card: none
MoBo: unknown, assume a cheapo one?
Peripherals: none

2)
AMD Phenom II X6 2.8GHz
8GB DDR3 RAM
750GB HDD
Graphics card: ATI HD5450 1GB
MoBo: ASRock N68-GS3 UCC (integrated graphics)
Periphrals: none

3)
AMD Bulldozer FX-4100 3.6GHz
4GB DDR3 RAM
750GB Hard Drive
Graphics card: ATI HD5450
MoBo: Asus M5A78L-M LX
Peripherals: All, including monitor

or 8GB RAM and no graphics card

4)
AMD Athlon II X4 640 3.0GHz
8GB RAM
500GB Hard Drive
Graphics card: none
Mobo: ASRock N68C-S UCC (integrated graphics)
Peripherals: All, including monitor

5)
AMD PHENOM X4 955
4GB RAM
1TB Hard Drive
Graphics card: none
MoBo: ASRock (integrated graphics)
Peripherals: none

6)
AMD A8 3850 2.9GHz
8GB RAM
750GB Hard Drive
Graphics card: none (cpu integrated)
MoBo: ASRock A75M-HVS
Peripherals: All, including monitor

I will be using it for very little gaming, if any. Primarily HD video work, music rendering and manipulation, and apart from that just general time wasting.

Obviously 1) and 2) will need another chunk of cash on top for a monitor etc., so the price isn't quite the same. But for the same amount, £300ish, which of those would you think about for my needs? Please ask if you want more info about my requirements or feel free to point me towards any other OC products that might be worth thinking about?

Thanks

Doomedspeed · 25 Nov 2011 at 11:12

If you are not using it for gaming, i see no point in going for any of the first 2 options, the CPU's are a bit overkill. I don't know a whole lot about the FX 4100. It looks promising but i do not know.

It may be worth looking at the AMD Llano range. The A8-3850 or the A6-3650 would be good optiions to consider as they come with in-built graphics which are decent enough for low/mid range gaming. These chips will have a lot better graphiccal performance than the 5450.

frc · 25 Nov 2011 at 12:56

Doomedspeed said:
If you are not using it for gaming, i see no point in going for any of the first 2 options, the CPU's are a bit overkill. I don't know a whole lot about the FX 4100. It looks promising but i do not know.

It may be worth looking at the AMD Llano range. The A8-3850 or the A6-3650 would be good optiions to consider as they come with in-built graphics which are decent enough for low/mid range gaming. These chips will have a lot better graphiccal performance than the 5450.

Thanks for the suggestion, I hadn't looked at those other AMD chips before.

I've updated my list with a few other £300 options. There's also a tempting £200 option based around an Athlon X2 260:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18343802

which I could later upgrade with a better AMD chip, perhaps? That MoBo supports all the X4 phenoms, not the X6 ones though.

mp260767 · 25 Nov 2011 at 13:01

have you thought of going with an i3 2100/2120, along with an h61 motherboard it would allow you to use the cpu's onboard graphics.

Tediore · 25 Nov 2011 at 13:04

The Llano range would be ideal. You can even Crossfire the integrated graphics with another ATi graphics card of similar spec.

Plays games pretty well, and should be enough for any video stuff. A guy called LinusTechTips on YouTube did a video review/first look on the Llano series, as well as testing Crossfire performance. Worth a look.