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Best CPU for around £100

Howski

Howski

Howski

Associate
Joined
1 Sep 2005
Posts
410
Hi,

Been out of the loop for a while and now I am all at sea with hardware etc. Need to build a new system on a budget so I am looking at spending about £100 on a CPU.

At the moment the only real spec must have is the ability to do proper harware virtulisation, but I am guessing that is built in to nearly all CPUs.

So if you could advise, that would be great!

Thanks in advance!
-Howard
 
Thanks, The i3 had caught my eye but I was struggling to find comparitive benchmarks.

To be honest I am not overy fussed either way with AMD or Intel. Traditionally I have had AMD, but its all about the best CPU not the badge on the dye.
 
Sure, I thought I'd ask about the CPU first as it dictates everything else but it is better if we can get it done in one hit

The plan is to get a working PC with a mixture of older componants and new, then upgrade over then next few months. I have a working HDD, GFX card (PCI-e), case, PSU etc so all I am in the market for is a Mobo, CPU & RAM.

My work pretty much forces me to get at least 16GB of RAM so I need to have at least 4GB sticks. I have a budget of £230 this month with which to get a working computer. The plan is to get 2x 4GB sticks which I have seen for about £30ish which leaves £200 for the Mobo + CPU combo.

I'll be upgrading to a SSD in a month or so to help with the work related stuff I want the Motherboard to have 6GB transfer rate. Wake on LAN would be nice also.

As far as the CPU goes I need it to have hardware virtulisation so I can run the Virtual machines I need.


Thats about it. The games I'll play on it are RTS games like Sup Com FA so nothing too taxing although I might be tempted by Total War.

Thanks again
-Howard
 
I have a Core i3 2100 myself. It lacks full hardware virtualisation - however most people here are considering gaming benchmarks only and probably don't realise this. The Core i5 2500K also has partial hardware virtualisation(lacks I/O MMU virtualisation) unlike the standard Core i5 CPUs.

In your price range,it is a choice between an AM3 Phenom II X4 960T,AM3 Athlon II X4(Phenom II X4 840 and 850),FM1 Llano A6 or A8 or an FM1 Athlon II X4. All support full virtualisation,ie, support I/O MMU virtualisation. The Core i3 is a dual core with HT so I would suggest going with a quad core. The Llano A8-3850 and A8-3870K can be had for around £100 to £110 and has the advantage of a decent IGP too(around HD5550 level). If you don't need a graphics card the FM1 Athlon II X4 651 can be had for around £75 so if you have a graphics card will save you around £25 to £30 over a Llano A8. It is bascially an A8-3870K with a locked multiplier and no IGP.

Edit!!

I forgot about the 95W Phenom II X6 1045T whch has six cores(looks a decent choice to run many VMs). This can be had for between £100 to £110 if you shop around. It probably is the best CPU for your purposes.

You can also get the 125W Phenom II X6 1055T for around £115 to £120. You can get the AM3+ Asus M5A97 PRO and the Gigabyte 970A-UD3 for around £75 to £80 and these have six SATA3.0 ports and USB3.0 ports. I know people who have both motherboards and they seem quite decent for the price.
 
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Get an i3 that you can overclock, they can hit 4GHz easy, 4.6GHz with a good cooler and some mad overclocking skillz. Lots of games are optimised for fast dual cores still.
 
Why does your work force you to get lots of ram, What is the computer used for? It sounds to me like you would be better off with a Phenom II setup.
 
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your very limited with the i3 2xxx range, I think you can go to what the max Turbo speed is.
 
Ah yes, I was thinking of the non k versions of the 2500 & 2600, which I believe can do this!

Did they call it speed bins?
 
What sort of work do you do? May be better to go AMD as they seem to have more virtualization support on their lower end CPUs if you need it?
 
If you are Virtualising, then an AMD Quad will do you better than an i3. Go heavy on the RAM.

At that price point:

For gaming with a discrete GPU then i3 is best.
For light gaming without a GPU then Llano is best.
For workstation use then an AMD Quad is best. Maybe even a Bulldozer?
 
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