How good is a10 7870k for a bit of gaming?

[lemonade]

That doesn't sound right. What are you using to measure the temperature?

Both the BIOS printout and HW Monitor, the fans are also going into overdrive and the whole case because a radiator as a result of the heat!

Whoever decided to slap on a load paste on the heatsink is stupid, it leaks down onto the chip from the heatspreader! very dangerous!

Cleaned it all up and put my trusty MX2 paste on, lets see if it makes a difference, the stock heatsink is probably not upto the job either so thats another expense to add getting a good aftermarket cooler.

 

[King Mustard]

The AMD A10-7870K scores 5,452 in PassMark. To compare:

£241 - 7,818 - Intel Core i5-6600K
£190 - 7,418 - Intel Core i5-6600
£162 - 7,087 - Intel Core i5-6500
£157 - 6,489 - Intel Core i5-6400
£100 - 5,452 - AMD A10-7870K
£130 - 5,430 - Intel Core i3-6100
£98 - 5,233 - AMD A10-7700K

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I've been testing my build for last 2 days, and the APU gets ridiculously hot! upto 90c on load and idles at around 60c. This was my fear with AMD CPU chips, they are stupidly inefficient and why I moved to Intel all those years ago. This is also in an air con-ed room, I would hate to think what it would be like in the living room tucked inside cabinet.

I am going to put my own thermal paste on it as the stock heatsink comes with way too much paste which might be adding to the problem.

Thats abnormally hot especially with the fact the A10 7870K uses an updated cooler unlike the previous ones which are all aluminium,and also uses solder instead of TIM now too.

Some more pictures of the retail package:

http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-39162-view-a10-7870k-processor-on-sale.html

Plus the chip idles at around 30W to 35W too.

You shouldn't be getting 60C at idle.

 

[davida76]

The 260x will cope fine on that PSU. Btw the 750TI uses around 20W less than a 260X so you're splitting hairs really.

EDIT

Actually the HIS IceQ 260X/360 is using less power (7W) than the 750TI in that review, and OCUK sell it here.

Just to reiterate what AMDMatt said re the psu I built an i5 gtx 960 itx combo with ssd and 2.5inch mechanical drives in an ml07 case and the psu fan hardly ever span up, only way I could get it to kick in was running intel burn and furmark together. They seem to be very efficient psu's.

edit: ignore, I see you stuck with the 7870k.

 

[lemonade]

Thats abnormally hot especially with the fact the A10 7870K uses an updated cooler unlike the previous ones which are all aluminium,and also uses solder instead of TIM now too.

Some more pictures of the retail package:

http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-39162-view-a10-7870k-processor-on-sale.html

Plus the chip idles at around 30W to 35W too.

You shouldn't be getting 60C at idle.

Thats what I was expecting, but damn this thing runs hot, either that or temp sensor is dodgy, as the temps are heavily fluctuating they drop to around 40c sometimes the shoot back up at idle, the office is now chilled with AC on, yet the CPU is still running around 60c on idle

Gonna try some BIOS tweaking and maybe undervolt this as the stock volts are high at around 1.45v, not fussed if I lose a bit of clock speed as a result.

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

1.7GHZ idle sounds a bit high!! I wonder if the motherboard is overvolting too??

What motherboard do you have and what voltages are you seeing for the various clockstates??

 

[lemonade]

The motherboard is MSIa88x1 ac v2. The motherboard parts are hot to touch although its temps are 32c.

The temps, voltages and clock speeds are really erratic, currently its sitting semi idle, only have Steam open downloading a game, but temps are switching between 40-60c, voltage is fluctuating between 0.9v to 1.45v, and the cores clock speeds are heavily fluctuating, max 4.ghz, really hard to pinpoint as all very erratic. Maybe BIOS needs flashing, but this mobo is supposed to support Godavari chips out of the box.

 

[lemonade]

So this is a bit confusing HWMonitor shows upto 82c on load for CPU, and on Speedfan max it went up is 45c and idle is around 34-38c, not sure which one to trust.

 

[davida76]

So this is a bit confusing HWMonitor shows upto 82c on load for CPU, and on Speedfan max it went up is 45c and idle is around 34-38c, not sure which one to trust.

run prime95 and touch the heatsink, you'll soon know which is right Does the catalyst control centre not show temps in the overclocking/overdrive section or is it just gpu?

 

[lemonade]

It wasn't as hot as yesterday! The whole case was like a radiator yesterday, I think changing and putting correct amount of paste has improved things along with installing some intake fans.

My guess is that these software are showing incorrect temps, as the computer is set to shutdown or whatever if temps go over 70c in BIOS, which it hasn't and it is constant over 70c when on full load according to these temp apps.

Gonna play around more tomorrow to get to the bottom of it.

I don't think CCC shows temp of CPU.

 

[lemonade]

Just a quick update on this, havent managed to find any solutions to high temp, it hasn't caused any problems yet so not entirely fussed. Checked the BIOS, its all upto date but there doesnt seem to be options to lower voltage or underclock it.

On a more positive note, the APU has great performance for what it is, did bit of gaming and it runs games very well, granted havent played anything too demanding, but it plays for example Grid Autosport in 1080p very smoothly. So I am satisfied that I went for this, its a nice little chip, hopefully future APU chips will get better an dmore advanced.

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

What case are you using??

 

[Emlyn_Dewar]

1.45v seems pretty high.
Is it version 2.1 BIOS you are on?

Worrying, as I'm moving to the same motherboard this week. No voltage control... Nooooo.

 

[lemonade]

What case are you using??

I'm using a Silverstone ML05

1.45v seems pretty high.
Is it version 2.1 BIOS you are on?

Worrying, as I'm moving to the same motherboard this week. No voltage control... Nooooo.

Yeh it's really high and it doesn't need to be, people have undervolted them to 1.2, 1.3v and its completely stable, not sure why AMD chose the stock vault so high. I am on 2.1 BIOS indeed.

Unless I missed something in the BIOS, I wouldn't recommend this board if you overclock or want that high level of control, the board is cheap for a reason, but then there doesnt seem to be a great deal of choice with FM2+ itx boards.

 

[moggy-moggy]

Sounds titles run really well on the 7870k, but others like Crysis 3 will need a fair bit of compromise.

I played dirt just give on my 7850k, I was overclocking the igpu though. Tomb raider runs great on it, and many more.

Casual gaming will mostly be fine. Don't expect to be rubbing the latest GTA with anything above low/medium though.

Hi Scougar

I see from your sig you're running an R9 380 with your apu - have you disabled the gpu part of the chip or does the card work in tandem with the 7850? I read somewhere that the latest Godavari apu's can be used with better cards than the original Kaveri? (240/250)

I'm thinking of building a mini itx rig with an A10 7890k (first self build) & will feed it to my 42" led @1080p.

I want to play BF3/4 at reasonable rates and read that frame rates should be better than my main rig - i5 2500k+Sapphire 6770 (which is now over 4 years old but still good!) but will just be browsing/streaming radio etc the rest of the time so don't want to add a gpu at first...

Thanks
Moggy

 

[pandem0nium]

I wouldn't under estimate the A10 7870K paired with 2400Mhz ram. That said it will greatly benefit from Dual Graphics and adding a cheap discrete GPU such as a R7 240/250/260. Nonetheless if you want to go the single GPU route then these would be my suggestions.

Will you be getting a FreeSync monitor?

If not then i would go with one of these, it's faster than the 750TI.

If you intend to get a FreeSync monitor, then i would go with one of these. It will trade blows with the 750TI.

If you intend to get a FreeSync monitor and want to run games at high/ultra settings at 1080P i would highly recommend one of these. £50 over your budget, but you're putting a lot more tussle in your muscle.

By the way, i owned a R7 260X and they overclock like crazy. Here's a 3D Mark Firestrike of a 260X (same as 360X) vs a 750Ti vs a 6850.

Any idea if there will be any 360Xs Matt?

 

[moggy-moggy]

Hi Scougar

I see from your sig you're running an R9 380 with your apu - have you disabled the gpu part of the chip or does the card work in tandem with the 7850? I read somewhere that the latest Godavari apu's can be used with better cards than the original Kaveri? (240/250)

I'm thinking of building a mini itx rig with an A10 7890k (first self build) & will feed it to my 42" led @1080P.

I want to play BF3/4 at reasonable rates and read that frame rates should be better than my main rig - i5 2500k+Sapphire 6770 (which is now over 4 years old but still good!) but will just be browsing/streaming radio etc the rest of the time so don't want to add a gpu at first...

Thanks
Moggy

Anyone any thoughts?

 

[Davedree]

Anyone any thoughts?

Just get yourself an x4 870k (comes with an improved cooler) or an i3 6100.
Waste of time pairing a 240-250 with a kaveri/rebranded godaveri.
It's false economy to think getting the 7890k over the athlon x4 whilst you save for a discreet card, especially as you are going to be using 1080p.

 

[moggy-moggy]

Just get yourself an x4 870k (comes with an improved cooler) or an i3 6100.
Waste of time pairing a 240-250 with a kaveri/rebranded godaveri.
It's false economy to think getting the 7890k over the athlon x4 whilst you save for a discreet card, especially as you are going to be using 1080p.

That was my question - I read the latest Godavari chips can be used with better cards without disabling the gpu. I don't want to buy a separate card at first but would like the option to upgrade the graphics if the bug bites (probably will!)
So I'll need an apu...

 

[Davedree]

Kaveri/godaveri uses ddr3 system memory to feed the igp, crossfire will not work well/ or at all if you were to crossfire with a gddr5 gpu.
It's pointless investing in expensive fast ddr3 memory and then adding a gpu with ddr3 like a 240 or a 250 when this is more expensive and provides less performance than a cheaper athlon x4 and a discreet 7750gddr5/r7 360.


As you have a 6770.re-use that unless you are going the itx route.
I guarantee you will not be satisfied by the igp performance at 1080p.