CPU Prices on increase?

[gpuerrilla]

I think AMD CPUs are having great prices for their performance at the moment. But they have many drawback such as limited choice of motherboard, quite hot, consumer decent level of power and based on a very old architecture. But performance wise, they are great.

I am probably sounding subjective, but owning an 8320 based system I can only raise a brow on the past couple of posts!

Bear with me here. I think they have quite a plethora of motherboards offering good features and scope for overclocking. Yes they run hot when benching (does anyone do this though for long periods instead of other things?) but compared to the machine it replaced (C2D) I measured at the wall and it is more efficient than that.

From the other post (Bonjour), they are actually great for gaming and I would quite comfortably say that the majority of 'gamers' still use 1080p with low to mid range components. You really are catering to the select audience on these forums that demand the high power rigs, probably less than 5% of the market at a guess.

I will concede that it is becoming older tech, and the refreshes AMD keep spawning are not helping the avid enthusiast. To call them not great though is bordering the brainwashed retort from reading too many myths on this area of the forum.

Enjoy the performance they give at least for the short term, as in a couple of years they can be replaced by something more substantial - if you need it. In the mean time they will do absolutely fine, from my opinion only a far more expensive i7 would be the upgrade worth considering.

 

[Dave2150]

For anyone considering buying a completely new built, getting anything than the 5820k/x99/ddr4 setup is a bad decision to me. If you have to buy everything new (including ddr4) then the x99 setup is simply the best way forward.

If you buy a AMD FX cpu, you're buying a CPU that consumes far more electricity, is far slower and has 0 upgrade options for the future. It's literally years old technology, for a dirt cheap price to relfect the product.

Of course if you are on an extremely low budget, AMD is great.

 

[gpuerrilla]

I can totally see the point in Dave's post above - wise advice.

I bought on an ultra tight budget a year ago, and believe me the extra £50 meant a huge difference, so the AMD was my only option unless I saved for a few more months.

If I was buying now, and not carrying over any equipment I currently have then it would be an intel i7 all the way as it would be lasting for the 3-4 year period. Unless you can afford to wait, my next upgrade window - for example - would be around mid 2016 as this can last me till at least then.

By mid 2016 I will weigh up the offerings as I do not need cutting edge tech and tend to buy the best value I can for the time I have the money. The existing intel offerings will have been refreshed by then and also there is the slight tiny chance AMD have something worth considering...

 

[setter]

I dunno... 5820k's seem a decent price, makes the 4790k look like a rip off.

I think the hexacore will become the high end gamers choice when DDR4 and the X99 mobos come down a bit.

Id agree with this, the 4790k is a mediocre hot running cpu. Yes i own one myself but to get the best out of it you have to delid. Therefore warranty is gone. My reccomendation for anyone buying new would be the 5820k, yes the ram is expensive at present but may drop soon. AMD chips i wouldnt reccomend at all, sad as it is but they havent been competitive since s939 days.

 

[calliusmaximus]

The additional price for X99 mobo, cpu and ddr4 surely seems excessive when talking about a normal gaming build with one GPU ?
The extra over a normal i7 or even i5 could by you a second gpu or a far faster once.

 

[gpuerrilla]

This is never a factor when you are talking intel. If the FX didn't command good motherboards and a third party cooler then they would have an even larger price gap to performance.

 

[David Bisset]

For anyone considering buying a completely new built, getting anything than the 5820k/x99/ddr4 setup is a bad decision to me. If you have to buy everything new (including ddr4) then the x99 setup is simply the best way forward.

If you buy a AMD FX cpu, you're buying a CPU that consumes far more electricity, is far slower and has 0 upgrade options for the future. It's literally years old technology, for a dirt cheap price to relfect the product.

Of course if you are on an extremely low budget, AMD is great.

Another way of looking it it is that you can get a computer that runs everything fine for a fraction of the price, allowing you to get another complete computer in the near future which is much better upgradability than the 5820k offers. Future-proofing is now and has always been a myth that gets people to buy components they don't need. Spending more now gets you better performance now and that is all - nothing wrong with that. The step between compatible generations is so small (and always has been) that you only upgrade because you want to, not for value.

If you want to be near the bleeding edge then X99 & 5820k makes sense but to say it's a bad decision to go for anything else is quite frankly ridiculous. Anything over an i5 is totally wasted at the moment anyway so you're sinking a lot more money for no real-world gain unless you happen to be one of the very few people running several graphics cards.

 

[Zethor]

I built a budget build a few months ago for my nephew. 8320 + 280x. In restrospect, the 280x was a tad expensive (you can now buy a 780/290 for the same money grrr) but the system runs everything at at high or even max details.
The little bugger hasn't touched his PS4 since.

I think CPUs that have no trouble running any game are now much cheaper than 3-4 years ago, probably because there have been small performance increases during this time.

 

[R3X]

And another way to put it is the 5820K consumes much more wattage and just about catches up to the 4790K in performance and is more expensive.

If there was 1 single game that actually used more then 4 cores the debate would have finished with 5820K being the top dog

That extra £200-250 saved could easily go on a nice shiny 970gtx or monitor or a pot called skylake upgrade.

Still you can't go wrong with either choice I reckon putting that money saved on a new monitor or 970gtx would be a good option.

 

[gpuerrilla]

Some interesting points made.

The energy consumption card that people play is blown way out of proportion, as on here people are overclocking the components anyway. Then there's the time frame of about three years usage till any 'extra' energy consumed would be measurable - which is around the time people upgrade to newer hardware.

Some (not many) games are even utilising the GPU power and make it more or less irrelevant what CPU you have, so that extra £200 you spent did not get you very far. Mantle and DX12 titles having less overheads will only enhance this moving forward.