• 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.

AM3, watts, socket types. Confusion

OwenJ

OwenJ

OwenJ

Associate
Joined
16 Feb 2010
Posts
4
I currently have an xfx 8200 motherboard, p/n MIA78S8209. With a AMD 6400+. According to the XFX compatibility list my cpu is 125watts, it wont support it but i am running it with no problems.

http://www.xfxforce.com/en-gb/products/motherboards/nvidia%20geforceseries/~/ecms.ashx/XFXCPUCompatibilityList-AMD.pdf

Am i correct in saying that AM3 is backward compatible to AM2 and AM2+, ie an AM3 cpu will fit in a AM2 and a AM2+ socket motherboard?

I am looking to upgrade to a phenom II, as of yet i can only find AM3 types. Im looking at getting either 925, 945, 955 or 965. Does anybody know of any problems with this or should i go ahead?

Thankyou Owen
 
Provided the motherboard's BIOS, and power provision supports it, an AM3 CPU can be used in an AM2+ board as AM3 CPUs have both DDR2 and DDR3 memory controllers.
 
If you click the link in the first post (CPU Support List) and find AMD Athlon™ X2 Dual-Core 6400+. It says its 125watts. That is my current set up and ive not had one problem but it says its not supported. So given my setup now, should there be any difference in another 125watt cpu? With it being an AM3 shouldnt matter as its backward compatible.
 
It might not recognize the CPU resulting in performance drop/instability or just won't boot up.

However, it looks like your mobo supports phenoms II up to 910, if your current one is 125 it might pick up the 945/955 but I don't give you my word on it.

Also you can try the new 910e which is low power one, it also should clock to 3.5-3.6 easily so it's a good bet as well.
Or the 555BE, I guess it's worth a try contacting xfx and asking them if it will support it.
 
Some amd motherboards do not support 125W cpus. This doesn't mean the board won't work with one as such, especially if you undervolt it. It means that the manufacturer thinks the board will die earlier than you'd like if used with a 125W cpu, as the cpu's power supply isn't really man enough to cope.

How hot are the mosfets getting?
 
How about the lower wattage energy efficient phenoms (e.g 905e). They should work fine without putting the motherboard at risk.

The risk of early motherboard death is very real. I've had it happen in the Athlon XP / NForce 2 days. A lot of early 780G boards got fried by reviewers putting 125w CPUs in them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom