Seemingly inexplicable poor FPS in games

[teppic]

Ok cool but is windows distributing program's workload across cores or is it program dependent? My work is more important then gsmes so if dropping cores is going to cause my work to slow down, not good.

Would the 4 core 4.2ghz fx overclock higher then the 6 core and this provide more gaming performance?

I think the console thing isn't entirely accurate as I'm sure Sony and Microsoft are manufacturing the hardware themselves under license so AMD has little direct involvement. Might be wrong or it is irrelevant.

When's Steamroller due out?

Separate programs will always get distributed across the cores. Whether one program's load is distributed depends on how it's written - newer apps and games tend to use more than one core, while very efficient code can use all of them (e.g. video encoding).

The 6300 can often overclock to 5GHz even on air. That's about as high as you'd want to push Piledriver cores, as higher than that just uses up lots of power and generates a lot of heat. The 8320 isn't much more (£125), but because of the extra cores, it can be harder to overclock as high.

So in games that only use one or two cores you'd get some improvement (because Piledriver is faster than Bulldozer), while in games that could use more than 4 cores, you'd get a much better increase. But like I said, RTS games tend not to use many cores.

Steamroller is due sometime next year. The expectation is it'll work in your board, but it's not guaranteed. The hope is that Steamroller will increase the performance of each core enough that older games perform a lot better, while making new ones much faster.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I think the console thing isn't entirely accurate as I'm sure Sony and Microsoft are manufacturing the hardware themselves under license so AMD has little direct involvement. Might be wrong or it is irrelevant.

Think you might want to have a read around some of the more uptodate news on the consoles.

Both PS4 and XboxOne will be using AMD 8 cores Jaguar CPU supposingly clock at 2.00GHz and 1.60GHz (so probably not even half as fast as an overclocked FX8320/8350), so AMD would be working closely with game developers for optimising the multi-platform (or at least in theory they would). I'm certain that neither Sony or Microsoft would appreciate anyone pointing it out, but both next gen consoles are effectively x86 PC under the console hood

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Think you might want to have a read around some of the more uptodate news on the consoles.

Both PS4 and XboxOne will be using AMD 8 cores Jaguar CPU supposingly clock at 2.00GHz and 1.60GHz (so probably not even half as fast as an overclocked FX8320/8350), so AMD would be working closely with game developers for optimising the multi-platform (or at least in theory they would). I'm certain that neither Sony or Microsoft would appreciate anyone pointing it out, but both next gen consoles are effectively x86 PC under the console hood

They are x86 basically. And, the chips aren't being made by AMD, Microsoft and Sony have both licensed the designs for the chips from AMD and will be choosing a manufacturer, whether or not that will be AMD themselves, we'll have to see but it doesn't look like AMD will have much involvement past designing the chips. The chips are APUs that are more powerful then what AMD is manufacturing themselves.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Separate programs will always get distributed across the cores. Whether one program's load is distributed depends on how it's written - newer apps and games tend to use more than one core, while very efficient code can use all of them (e.g. video encoding).

The 6300 can often overclock to 5GHz even on air. That's about as high as you'd want to push Piledriver cores, as higher than that just uses up lots of power and generates a lot of heat. The 8320 isn't much more (£125), but because of the extra cores, it can be harder to overclock as high.

So in games that only use one or two cores you'd get some improvement (because Piledriver is faster than Bulldozer), while in games that could use more than 4 cores, you'd get a much better increase. But like I said, RTS games tend not to use many cores.

Steamroller is due sometime next year. The expectation is it'll work in your board, but it's not guaranteed. The hope is that Steamroller will increase the performance of each core enough that older games perform a lot better, while making new ones much faster.

So what you're saying is that I'd benefit from a 6300 overclocked to the sky? I have pretty extensive watercooling so heat won't be an issue.

 

[teppic]

So what you're saying is that I'd benefit from a 6300 overclocked to the sky? I have pretty extensive watercooling so heat won't be an issue.

Since most of the games you play won't be using more than 6 cores, a 6300 clocked to 5GHz is your best bet. If you might start playing shooters and stuff, then the 8320 is a good choice.

 

[Martini1991]

Why on Earth would anyone spend 1.5K and end up with an FX8150?

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Why on Earth would anyone spend 1.5K and end up with an FX8150?

How have you got that far through the thread and worked out I've spent £1,500 and bought an FX8150, board, RAM, and everything else for that budget and watercooled it all?

I've had the 8150 for at least a year. When I bought it, I thought more cores the better. For what I'm using my system for everyday, that is true but not for gaming. Now I'm looking for a solution, improve gaming as I'm gaming more now then before while maintaining the multi-tasking (if that's the right term) capabilities of my system.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Since most of the games you play won't be using more than 6 cores, a 6300 clocked to 5GHz is your best bet. If you might start playing shooters and stuff, then the 8320 is a good choice.

Ok, so...slow games (RTS, sims etc) 6 cores good. More speed per core. For fast paced games and multi-core games, more cores the better! There's a couple of 6300 going nice and cheap, sub-£100. Even then, £110 off OCUK won't break the bank and I need to build a second system so starting to upgrade my current system isn't a bad idea.

Another thing that's been puzzling me, is RAM. AMD says 1600mhz is the max, board says 2600mhz(or something) is max supported. Overclocking, I want RAM faster then 1600mhz becuase adjusting the bus underclocks my RAM. What shall I go for? 1800ish so I can overclock or can I run faster then 1600mhz with the AMD?

 

[Martini1991]

It'll probably run more than 1600MHZ, just not officially, the original Intel i7's were rated for 1066MHZ but ran much faster.
Also, not strictly true about RTS's in the slightest, my 4670K will blaze any AMD chip in RTS's, DOWII can barely push 60 FPS average with an AMD chip, I push 110.
Crysis 3? A so called example of multi-threading, the FX8350's are only going to reach parity with me down to the GPU bottleneck.
Shogun 2 also shows the AMD chips to come up trumps, and RTW2 will do the same thing.

 

[teppic]

I don't know any thing much about DOWII, but this thread suggests that even a 6100 overclocked gives very big performance jump in it:

http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/6238/dow2e.jpg
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18374859

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

It'll probably run more than 1600MHZ, just not officially, the original Intel i7's were rated for 1066MHZ but ran much faster.
Also, not strictly true about RTS's in the slightest, my 4670K will blaze any AMD chip in RTS's, DOWII can barely push 60 FPS average with an AMD chip, I push 110.
Crysis 3? A so called example of multi-threading, the FX8350's are only going to reach parity with me down to the GPU bottleneck.
Shogun 2 also shows the AMD chips to come up trumps, and RTW2 will do the same thing.

Anything over 40FPS is good for me. I use 60hz monitors so that's the max FPS I want anyway.

As mentioned before and in other threads, I will be building an Intel system but I'm not spending anymore money on computers this year. Especially not the multiple thousands I'll spend on an Intel system. Board, CPU and RAM will be £1,000 pretty much. I'd want 500GB SSD, so there's another £1,000. i want to check out the new AMD GPU and that'll probably be, you guessed it, £1,000. Watercooling, case, PSU and BD drive...£1,000. So there's £4,000 and I've probably missed a thing or two. Suppose big 120mhz or higher monitor will be required, plus keyboard and mouse and speakers, another £1,000. So that's £5,000 in total. It can wait!!!

 

[Martini1991]

DOWII is stupidly CPU bound.
The gain doesn't surprise me.

Surprised by the result though, it takes a stock FX83 to get 60 FPS average in it.
That's for a game half a decade old.

I think I was a little offhand there, I could have sworn the performance was worse than it was, but I know it's not ; http://www.anandtech.com/show/6396/the-vishera-review-amd-fx8350-fx8320-fx6300-and-fx4300-tested/5

 

[teppic]

DOWII is stupidly CPU bound.

But that FX6100 gain looks a little high, frankly, so does the stock i5.
I've put a load of hours in that game, I've benched it to back and forth, that FX6100 result looks pretty fishy.

I've never played it, but 4.7GHz is a high overclock, particularly if the game can use 4 cores.

A 6300 at 5GHz isn't going to *struggle* with any games. It may be a bit lower than an i5, but given this system it's a very good upgrade for £90.

 

[Martini1991]

Upgrading from an 8 core to a 6 core speaks volumes though.

I'm pushing almost 200 hours in DOWII, but I think I might have been offhand, I think it's more 2/3 cores tbh.
It's so old now and I've been pushing over 100 FPS since Q1 2011 lol.

 

[teppic]

Upgrading from an 8 core to a 6 core speaks volumes though.

Well, only because as I said before, he's not playing games that make use of 8 cores and the 6 core CPUs overclock more easily.

 

[Martini1991]

Well enough of the Intel/AMD stuff.
We can all see the benchmarks.

But I was definitely off hand with DOW, my bad

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Well, only because as I said before, he's not playing games that make use of 8 cores and the 6 core CPUs overclock more easily.

And I won't be leaving performance on the table as each core is more powerful on a 6 core compared to my 8 core. Stock, my 8 core is 8x450. 4.2 6 core is 700mhz a core and overclocked higher. Lets just say it'll run at 4.8, same as my 8 core now. 8 core is 500 per core. 6 core is 800. Total 8 core power in 4 core game, 2000mhz. Total 6 core power in 4 core game is 3200mhz. I'm basically going to get 50% more power. Equivalent 8 core clock would be like 7ghz. Definitely buying a 6370, think that's the 4.2ghz one. And let's not forget, I'll get 5ghz on the 6300 so that's even better.

Anyone disagree with my logic here? I think it makes sense!

 

[teppic]

I didn't read all that logic

But each core of the 6300 is more powerful at the same clock as each on your 8150, so if you push the cores to 5GHz, you've got a nice bump. For games that use more than one core well, that overall improvement keeps getting higher (but don't expect RTS games to be using 6 cores well).

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

I didn't read all that logic

But each core of the 6300 is more powerful at the same clock as each on your 8150, so if you push the cores to 5GHz, you've got a nice bump. For games that use more than one core well, that overall improvement keeps getting higher.

Like a 60% performance increase. go for the top retail speed one as logic suggests, AMD has chosen the best chips to clock to the top speed so they'll overclock the best!

Above post is wrong. It's the quad core that is 4.2 ghz which leads me to suggest, isn't that the one to get as none of my games use more then 4 cores? Or it a good shout to have the two extra cores for my everyday work. Best compromise and try for 5.2ghz or something?

 

[Martini1991]

That logic doesn't work at all.
It's not 60% performance gain in the slightest.

It's a good thing you've got the money to burn.