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how much CPU limited?

yannis76

yannis76

yannis76

Associate
Joined
16 Aug 2004
Posts
804
I currently have an Athlon x4 740 with a 7790, which serves me quite ok for an htpc.
However since i do compromise some quality settings I was thinking which way would give me the biggest upgrade:

New gpu or
New cpu

I am leaning towards the gpu route which is much more financially feasible.
For my 430psu and gd04 case which would be the best card to put? Max length: 11inches
 
Of course I have and its quite limited.
From my research, reverting to the Intel path I would be need about 150€ taking into account also that I would sell my A85+A4 740 for around 100€.
Upgrading the GPU would cost me around 70€ if I sold my 7790 for around 100€.
I was thinking for a GTX660...
 
Just decided to test the 7790 with an Intel i5-3570 cpu...It seems that GPU speed is indeed more important than CP in 1080p:

Hitman Absolution 1080p high/ultra average fps:
i5-3570: 42/37, x4-740:26/24

Tomb Raider 1080p ultra/utimate average fps:
i5-3570:38/22, x4-740:37/19

Sniper 2 elite benchmark:
i5-3570:22, x4-740:21

As you can see ut clearly depends on the game whether you are CPU or GPU bound, but it seems that even a humble Athlon x4 740 is enough if coupled with a good GPU...
 
I think it is also a matter of whether a game is CPU or GPU bound.
Hitman seems to rely more on the CPU whereas TR and Sniper2 more on the GPU.

I wish I could just fit my 7970 to the x4-740 but its not possible...
 
djshauny1 said:
Id ditch the 740 tbh and go the intel route but thats just me
Click to expand...

To be honest, I wish I had followed this route from the beginning. I didnt because it was more expensive. Problem is that if I want to change now, it is even more expensive. Is there any site with used hardware?
 
Marine-RX179 said:
Hate say I told you so, but had you taken my advice and went with the Intel Pentium and just grabbed a 2nd hand 6850/5850/5870 instead of following the Trinity hype back then, for the money you new to now spend plus the money you waste, you would have been upgrading to a i5 and a 7950/GTX670 now, rather than just the CPU and board (and spare the the kind of pointless move from the A-10 to x4 740, and grabbing a underpowered 7790...which ain't much faster than a 5850/5870).

As it stand, there's not much you can do on the FM2 platform in terms of CPU performance side of things. Your best bet on a limited budget is probably a 2nd hand i5 2500K for around £100-£110, 2nd hand decent model Z68/Z77 board at around £50-£60 (but you can keep your existing ram). You probably gonna need to get a 3rd party cooler as well...something around the £25-£40 range would do. That would bring the total for CPU upgrade to around £175~£200.

As for where to get them...do you have access to the members marketplace here on the forum?
Click to expand...

You were right I admit it. However, as you can read in my posts here, when I started this HTPC project, I wasn't planning to game on it. When I saw TR, Mafia2 and Hitman on the big TV, I liked it and enjoyed gaming where I didn't expect to (this is why I sold ps3 also!!).
Also with 7790 it is much much better than the 5800K. You can actually play at 1080p with medium-high settings. However the more you play the more you think how better would the graphics be...
 
Marine-RX179 said:
This is why when it comes to PC, people don't just buy what they think is good enough at the time, but something that's good enough at the time, AND got options to properly upgrade (FM2 ain't that for sure) and give big amount of boost.

The thing is that 7790 is a card that's in a really awkward position in terms of performance vs price. For the price it sit far to close to the 7850 2GB pricing, yet performance wise, it is closer to the 7770 side than the 7850 (kinda reminds me of the 5830 back then). Also, originally AMD had the 7850 1GB version at the £120-£130 price range, yet they thought it was too good for the customer and chose to replace it with a clearly inferior 128-bit 7790 card, and charge the same money for it :mad: Should have went for either 2nd hand or B-grade 7850 2GB for that kind of money.

Anyway, what's done is done. For now, you best option is keep your 7790, and go for 2nd hand i5 2500K and 2nd hand Z68/Z77 board as I mentioned. Alternatively, you can get the following Gigabyte Z68 board NEW with full 3 years warranty for just £45:
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18523418
Click to expand...

Please, although you might be right performance wise, you must also understand that we were talking about an HTPC that gaming wouldn't play a big role. A10-5800k was superb for this. I never expected to enjoy gaming on my big TV since I never did with the PS3. The 7790 is a bit on the low side but not that bad...Hitman and TR play fine at 1080p with high settings. Mafia2 with Physx on medium is so-so but this is the game I play mostly these days. Maybe this is why I have been looking for a used gtx660 or an upgrade in CPU/mobo...
 
Just out of curiosity I ran TR and Hitman benchmarks with low quality but 1080p:
TR: 60fps
Hitman: 40fps

So I quess that is the limit I would see with a faster GPU, correct?
 
Another reason i chose the 7790 was psu limits (430w). Anyway 170€ for a used gtx660 dc2 oc or evga signature 2 is fair price?

Again, i have to say it. 7790 is not a bad card. Mafia2 runs **** on it...
 
Last edited:
ubersonic said:
The 740 is pretty much the best CPU you can get for FM2 apart form the black edition (minor upgrade) or the 5800K (minor upgrade and expensive due to iGPU) so any CPU upgrade will require a motherboard upgrade too.
Click to expand...

There is also the new 760K 600Mhz higher clocked...
 
Marine-RX179 said:
You keep forgetting one thing- those performance/result difference is under the condition of not being CPU bottlenecked (Anandtech's test system is most likely a Intel i5/i7 overclocked...). With your current CPU, you are NOT going to get that kinda of increase...or anywhere near it.

If you are upgrading, aim for AT LEAST a 7950. For extra £40-£50, the 7950 would be faster than the 660 and 7850 by a fairly big margin and in comparison, with the faster CPU, 384-bit memory bus and 1GB extra vram could potentially last you at least 1 more year...or 2 at a push (if don't mind turn some settings down a bit), before you need to upgrade again.
Click to expand...

It s an interesting discussion, hope you don't get bored:-)
I do understand that i may not see these absolute numbers, but there will a relative increase especially in gpu limited games. The reviews i read consider the gtx660 a close to 7870 performance, especially this oc model of evga. Then you must also understand that such big cards like 670\680\7950\7970 can't fit into my case (Silverstone gd04). Even if i had a strong PSU, i would have to stay with a 9,5" card.
 
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