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G2120 vs A10-5800K for gaming HTPC

yannis76

yannis76

yannis76

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Joined
16 Aug 2004
Posts
804
Hi,

I am trying to decide which route to follow in order to replace my old Zotac and PS3. I am between an A10-5800K and an Intel G2120.
I want to be able to play at 1080p games like Fifa, Resident Evil and other coop games. My questions are the following:
1) Is the A10-5800K enough for 1080p gaming?
2) Adding later a 7750 card or better will allow me to play at 1080p?
3) The 100W A10 is going to produce more noise than the 55W G2120?
4) For watching HD is just the G2120 enough?

The rest of the system is the following:
Silverstone GD04
Asus (A85 or H77)
2x4GB Kingston 2400

My purpose is to build a system that will replace my Zotac box (HD player) and my PS3 (Fifa playing, BR/CD/DVD player).

thx
 
After reading in these forums, I am still confused. Now I also found Celeron G530 as an alternative. Would this CPU and its HD graphics be enough for HD playpack (1080p)?
If I add later a discrete GPU, would I also be able to play games at 1080p?
 
These are my thoughts too...
I mean just by spending 50€ more I might be able to build a decent 1080p gaming machine.

I just don't know which Intel CPU to buy..
 
Decided!

I just placed an order for my next HTPC-gaming machine:

A10-5700
Silverstone GD04
Kingston Hyper X Beast 8GB DDR3 Non ECC CL11 2133MHz (KHX21C11T3K2/8X) (Kit 2 x 4096)
Asus Socket FM2 F2A85-M LE GLan Audio Raid
Be Quiet Power Supply 300W ATX 24 pin Pure Power BN103 Active-PFC Retail

I decided on AMD based on low I was actually playing PS3 (only Fifa and Resident Evil with mates) and also by the fact that A10-5700 performs pretty good with a discrete GPU (if I want to upgrade later).

Any comments would be appreciated.

Thank you
 
shadow_boxer said:
Spot on!
Click to expand...

I dont disagree, but why not try now the 5700 or 5800K and see how it actually plays...Even if its playing at a lower resolution, there will still be some gaming ability, whereas with the Pentium I definitively need a VGA. I repeat, that gaming apart from Fifa 13 and some other coop game wont be my main activity on this PC. It is mainly built for HD video, music, some BR, Internet etc.

Right now my dilemma is 5800K or 5700. My case will be a Silverstone GD04 with AMD stock cooling
 
Marine-RX179 said:
The problem is 5800K the CPU side would become a limitation the moment you add a half-decent graphic card to it, and there with no upgrade path for improving the CPU performance; whereas in comparison there's already a clearly upgrade path from the Intel Pentium (which already provide more consistence/better gaming performance if you use a dedicated card) to the i5 or even i7 in the future.

If you are certain you are fine with dropping resolution (which won't be pretty), then the 5800K is a sounded choice (but as I have already shown you...a Pentium G640 plus a 2nd hand 6850/5850 would only cost a fiver to tenner more and provide capable performance for 1920 res for most game). I think the games you mentioned the 5800K would probably handle them ok without some settings turned down, but the question you gonna have to ask yourself is..."what if I play more than this sort of games, and would like to play something else that's more demanding in the future?" The graphic performance between the intergrated 7660D and the 6850/5850 is day and light, with the 6850/5850 being something like 80-100% faster.
Click to expand...


Let's not forget that right now I can't buy both a CPU and GPU. So for the meantime and if I ever buy a discrete GPU, the AMD path is better. If I had gone the Intel route I should absolutely forget gaming until I got a dedicated VGA.

As far as the future is concerned, I was in a dilemma between Intel and AMD until I saw some benchmarks with Trinity and discrete GPU. The performance was clearly for Intel, but that doesn't mean that the A10-5800K could not play adequate at 1080p. If money wasn't an issue, I might pick up the Intel route.
Furthermore, this build is just an HTPC with some gaming abilities (similar to PS3). It will be placed on a furniture under the TV in the livingroom. So noise and heat do play a role here. I will probably never get a high end CPU or GPU because they cannot be installed due to heat/noise restrictions. So the upgrade path to a better Intel CPU with a better GPU is somewhat non existent to me.

If I am doing something wrong on the above, please correct me since there is still time to cancel/change my order.
 
Looking at the Intel path I was wondering what do you think about the below specs and whether these can play HD content (1080p):

INTEL CELERON G555 2.7 GHZ DUAL CORE SOCKET 1155 65W BOX (BX80623G555)
ASUS SOCKET 1155 P8H77-M LE GLAN AUDIO
KINGSTON HYPER X 8GB DDR3 NON ECC CL9 1866MHZ (KHX1866C9D3K2/8GX) (KIT 2 X 4096)
 
malachi said:
Back in November I was looking to upgrade my HTPC for light gaming and running films at 1080. I went for the A8-5600K Black Edition, didn’t bother going for the A10-5800K as I would rather save the extra £25 and put towards some RAM. I didn’t take the Intel route as the FM2 socket was new, has CPU upgrade pretential and the Intel HD4000 graphics is poor for gaming.

The APU played Blu-Rays etc flawlessly but I couldn’t play Super Street Fighter 4, Fifa 2013, Black Ops 2 at a good frame rate. Unless I turned off (not down) certain graphic options. At this point it looked worse than the console counter parts. Black Ops 2 looked like I was playing Quake 3 style graphics. So I crossfired the APU with a 6670 and it didn’t make much a difference, so I dropped the crossfire with APU idea and went for a dedicated 7770.

Super Street Fighter 4 and Fifa 2013 I can play all settings maxed out. Black Ops 2 I can play above medium settings. So they look better than the console versions. Also I can play Diablo 3 at a decent frame rate too. This running off my 240w PSU.
Click to expand...

Very important information. So I assume that A10-5700 is more than enough for the beginning...My plan is to add later a used 7850 or 7770 as you say.
 
CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
I would get the 65W TDP A10-5700 for an HTPC. CPU performance in games is not much different but the power consumption is lower and it will be easier to cool. You are looking at 30W less under heavy CPU load and nearly 40W less under a gaming load using an IGP when compared to an A10-5800K. Also you are looking at just over 11W more under gaming load than a Core i3 3225 which uses a much slower HD4000 IGP.
Click to expand...

I think the numbers are not that different...
In idle the dif is 1W (?!)
In 3D load with GTX680 the dif is 18W

The numbers are from the lnks posted in this thread.
http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/cpu/47257-amd-a10-5700/?page=6

After this I decided to change to A10-5800K and Corsair CX430 PSU.
 
Last edited:
CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
Not with an IGP though:

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/cpu/47257-amd-a10-5700/?page=8

Remember you are using a SFF case,and the A10 5700 is only around 7% slower if using a GTX680.

The main advantage of the A10-5800K is if you want to overclock the CPU with a better cooler.

The GD04 is not the quietest case though,but less heat produced should mean a quieter system as you can use lower fan speeds:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4072/silverstone-gd04-htpc-case-cool-not-quiet

Having said that it is big enough for you to use a water cooler if you mod it slightly:

http://www.overclock.net/t/990111/antec-k-hler-h2o-620-920-club/1680

I would also get an XFX PRO 450W. It is a smaller and more compact PSU than the CX430W,and is made by Seasonic and seems to use more expansive capacitors and even a longer life ball bearing fan.
Click to expand...

You are right! Never saw these graphs!!
The difference is quite substantial...Should I change again to 5700???
On the other hand when I eventually add a dedicated VGA, the power usage differences will be much lower and also the temps, I suppose.
 
So...this is maybe the last day I can choose between A10-5800K and A10-5700...Shall I keep the 5800 or revert it to 5700 due to noise, heat concerns?
 
Marine-RX179 said:
If you getting a quiet 3rd party CPU cooler, I don't see any point worrying over that little extra heat...as it would barely make any difference to the audible noise level.

The FM2 CPUs are slow enough as it is...I certainly wouldn't go for one that cannot overclock. I know you are worrying about the heat due to your case, but I think the 5800K would still be a better option - you can overclock it without too much voltage increase so long as you are not aimming for top overclock that require much higher voltage.

Also, the Silverstone GD04 it has two 80mm fan mount for the rear...you should look into getting two quiet 80mm fans (i.e. the noiseblocker 80mm) for exhausting the heat out of the case. The difference for CPU temp between having and not having rear exhaust case fans is huge...lower CPU temp would also mean your CPU cooler wouldn't have to work as hard, thus its fan be able to spin at lower rpm and quieter.
Click to expand...

thx for the reply!
The case has already 3 120mm fans pushing air into the case. Do you think I should put one or two more?? In the end, if I ever install a dedicated GPU, I will have 6-7 fans in this HTPC. I think they will be too many and noise will be skyrocket.
Actually, I was thinking to activate only the 2 out of the 3 fans...
 
Thx again!

Unfortunately the Asus f2a85-m le has only 3 fan connections where only 1 is controlled by Xpert Fan.
So I have decided to change this to an asrock fm2a85x extreme4-m where there 4 fan connections all controlled in bios.
 
Hi,

I just received the components!
System is pretty fast in movies (VLC) but I have 2 main issues:
1) noise from the stock cooler
2) XMBC cant produce sound from the HDMI

Can you please suggest me a good SILENT cooler for the A10-5800K (low profile)?

thx
 
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