Upgrade - £300 budget

Jamusuk

Jamusuk

Jamusuk

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15 Jun 2011
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Hi everyone, I built my PC about 3-4 years ago and am looking to spend about £300 on an upgrade to keep me going for the next couple of years. Unfortunately I haven’t really kept up with the latest tech so would appreciate some advice!

Primarily usage is for gaming and work (switching between large spreadsheets/databases etc).

This is my current spec:

Case: Antec 900
PSU: Corsair HX 520W
CPU: Core 2 Duo E6750 @ 2.66 GHZ
GFX: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS – 2722MB
MOBO: ASUS P5K
RAM: OCZ – PC2 – 6400 – 6GB
HDD: Seagate Barracuda – 7200RPM – 500GB

This is what I’ve thought I’d upgrade to:

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition 3.4GHz Socket AM3 8MB Cache 125W - Seems like a bargain?

MOBO: Asus M4A88T-M 880G Socket AM3 mATX - Don't know much about AMD mobos but looking around this seemed good?


GFX: XFX HD 6850 1GB GDDR5 Dual DVI HDMI – 775Mhz – 4GHz - Looking to crossfire in the future?

RAM: G-Skill 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600Mhz RipjawsX Mem Mod CL9 (9-9-9-24) 1.5V - recommended by a mate, very easy to overclock?

Any comments/criticisms would great!

Thanks!
 
The 955BE is £10 cheaper - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-244-AM&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=1943

And because the Black edition CPU's have unlocked multipliers you can easily add +1 or more to this and effectively create a 965BE or greater CPU.

For Crossfire you need a 790/890 or 990 chipset motherboard.

Such as,

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-168-GI&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=1481
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-010-SP&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=1782
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-251-GI&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=1782

if you bought a 990 chipset motherboard you also have support for the new Bulldozer CPU's

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-176-MS&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=2046

All the above motherboards run the two PCI=E slots at the same speed when tow GPUs are inserted.
 
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Jamusuk said:
Excellent, thank you.

Would you say my 520W can handle an overclock and crossfire?
Click to expand...

Should be ok, it will be running very close to max, and I would prefer to see a PSU with a 600W+ rating etc, that particular PSU was a good quality unit.

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=18

With that in mind, I found this,

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-6850-6870-crossfirex-review/4

Measured power consumption two 6850 cards
System in IDLE = 186W
System Wattage with GPU in FULL Stress = 393W
Difference (GPU load) = 207 W
Add average IDLE wattage x2 ~ 19W (ATI specified)
Subjective obtained GPU power consumption = ~ 245 Watts
Click to expand...
 
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I think a i3 2100 would be better choice than the Phenom II X4, considering it is faster in gaming, general usage and light work than even the Phenom II X4 980BE at 3.7GHz; any game that don't use all 4 cores fully will be noticably slower than the i3 2100. The only real advantage of Phenom II X4 has over the i3 2100 is probably video encoding- but if it is not something you use the PC for, then it is meaningless to you.

i3 2100 (£89.99):
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-367-IN&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=1671

If you want a reasonably priced decent board that can Crossfire and SLI, I would recommend the MSI P67A-GD53 (£107.99):
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-170-MS&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=1906

Also, overclocking the Phenom II X4 to 3.7~3.8GHz would mean you have to invest on a 3rd party CPU cooler. Not only that, the i3 2100 consume much lesser power comparing to the Phenom II X4, so it would place less burden on the PSU as well. In terms of futre proof, you can upgrade the CPU from the i3 2100 to a i5 2500K later if you got money to spare, whereas AM3 boards are all deadend socket, and upgrading from X4 to X6 doesn't really help with improving gaming performance since games in general only uses 2-3 cores.

Here's comparison between i3 2100 and Phenom II X4 980BE (3.7GHz):
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/362?vs=289

The i3 2100 consume nearly 60W less in comparison to the Phenom II X4 at 3.7GHz.
 
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Oh I dont think a non overclockable i3 2100 is that much faster - http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i3-2120-2100_5.html#sect0

The gaming charts here arnt much better - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/289?vs=88

And then trying to find a suitable motherboard that does symmetrical crossfire will be very difficult without spending over £100

Can get 3.6-3.8GHZ out of the stock copper heatpipe cooler too, I did:D

If you get a AM3+ motherboard, then you are also support for Bulldozer and AMD have a reputation of sticking with sockets for a long tiime so the next next generation of CPU'S will more than likely be supported.
 
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stulid said:
Oh I dont think a non overclockable i3 2100 is that much faster - http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i3-2120-2100_5.html#sect0

The gaming charts here arnt much better - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/289?vs=88

And then trying to find a suitable motherboard that does symmetrical crossfire will be very difficult without spending over £100

Can get 3.6-3.8GHZ out of the stock copper heatpipe cooler too, I did:D
Click to expand...
You are missing the point- the Phenom II X4 at 3.8GHz would probably match i3 2100, IF (and a very big IF) the game uses all 4 cores fully. Problem is most games don't really make use of the 4th core, thus it make the i3 2100 a better all-rounder (including playing older games, or even new games that are not well-optimised for Quad, or mmorpgs such as WOW), considering it can deliver the same gaming performance as the Phenom II X4 at 3.8GHz, may the game be single threaded, dual-threaded or Quad-thread; the Phenom II X4 on the other hand its capability would essentially drop down to 3/4, 1/2 or 1/4, if the game is anything lower than a well optimised Quad-thread.

As for the suitable 1155 motherboard that does symmetrical crossfire, I already mentioned that the MSI P67A-GD53, which is only a little bit over £100.

Yes I'm aware that the i3 2100 is non-overclockable, but even at stock speed it offer same level of gaming performance as overclocked Phenom II X4, and that performance is not affected by the thread limitation imposed by games. Plus he doesn't have to spend extra on getting a 3rd party CPU cooler; and with the Phenom II X4 at 3.7GHz consuming nearly extra 60W over the i3 2100, it's not really justifying investing on it since it only offer 'comparable' gaming performance (and that's not even in all situation).
 
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Oh man now I'm really undecided! You both have such compelling arguments!

AMD - can overclock, crossfire, can upgrade to bulldozer CPU's
Intel - can crossfire, can upgrade to i5

I guess I've got a lot of thinking to do tonight but it may come down to price.

Thank you for all the info, much appreciated.

*edit* Sorry posted this before I saw the above response! I get the feeling this a discussion you to have had before?!
 
The i3 2100 does worse here than other AMD cpu in the same price range - http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html
And with overclocking you can easily pass the 2100 performance - http://techreport.com/articles.x/20873/4
At stock a 980BE does well in gaming - http://techreport.com/articles.x/20873/2

And the Guru3D wattage was taken using a Socket1366 system which consume more power than AMD too, so your PSU will be working less hard than there results.


The fact that its possible to get a crossfire motherboard for much less money too means you got more funds such as - http://www.foxconnchannel.com/produ...us0000148&Socket=Socket+AM3&Chipset=AMD+790GX

Which when they were stocked by OCUk were £50

Theres also a great thread here to help you get the most out of the Phenom CPU - http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18108943 - where you will see a lot of C3 stepping CPU's hitting 4GHZ on stock volts.
 
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stulid said:
The i3 2100 does worse here than other AMD cpu in the same price range - http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html
Click to expand...
Overall marks means nothing since it is just overall score with heavy threaded apps (such as video encoding) results included, and has not relation to average user that only concern about speed of general usage and gaming performance.

Jamusuk said:
AMD - can overclock, crossfire, can upgrade to bulldozer CPU's
Intel - can crossfire, can upgrade to i5
Click to expand...

One problem is that we still don't know how fast will the Bulldozer CPU be, comparing to the i5 2500K...

Jamusuk said:
I get the feeling this a discussion you to have had before?!
Click to expand...
Na. Think this is the first time.

My logic is quite simple- let's pretend Phenom II X4 at 3.7GHz deliver the same frame rate as the i3 2100 even in light threaded or dual-threaded games like WOW or Crysis (even when reality it deliver lower frame rate)...why on earth would I want to pay extra 60W worth energy on the energy bill?
 
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The merits of i3 and the 955 have been discussed plenty!! They are the only two real options on low budget gaming rigs.....I favour the AMD route. Stulid has already pointed out the advantages especially the reason to opt for the 955BE over the 965.

AMD had said many months ago that AM3 WOULD NOT support bulldozer. However now asus and Gigabyte have said some of their AM3 mobos WOULD support bulldozer with a bios update. AM3+ mobos are also confirmed by AMD to take Bulldozer.

To be fair you are in a catch 22 situation. AMD builds make sense as they can be cheaper than the equilvalent i3 setup, this leaves you more cash to put in the gpu fund ;)

Seeing as you want to run dual GPUs you won't get a cheap budget AMD mobo SO your paying £100ish for either an AM3 or intel 1155 P67 chipset. The 955 and i3 are roughly the same price.

Infact all you are doing is buying components that we know will devalue once bulldozer is released in a few months we hope. If you can't wait, I personally would buy a budget AM3 mobo and the 955BE (£130ish). It has enough grunt for gaming and in some cases pips the i3 in games that want quadcore (this is going to become more common).

When you "need" to upgrade the CPU writing off a cheap mobo isnt so bad. Although you might be lucky and it may accept the bulldozer CPUs!
Use the money you save on the mobo to up the gfx card options. That 6850 isnt really a great card. It's not really any better than the 5850 although it does use less power.

Good luck with the build, any more questions or probs come back to us

*edit* you could consider reusing your gpu current card. That £300 should just about get you a decent i5K combo with RAM. Then upgrade the GPU later on, we've seen the 5850s go for as little as £100 on offer lately. Considering the big titles due for release at the end of the year BF3 & COD MW3 it could well make sense to wait and see how the GPUs handle those games and buy a card then.
 
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honosuseri said:
I personally would buy a budget AM3 mobo and the 955BE (£130ish). It has enough grunt for gaming and in some cases pips the i3 in games that want quadcore (this is going to become more common).
Click to expand...
Nope...you are getting it wrong. It is only in games that uses Quad-core full would the overclocked Phenom II X4 'match' the i3 2100...in games that don't, it will be relatively slower than the i3 2100:
http://techreport.com/articles.x/20873/2
i3 2100 deliver same frame rate as the Phenom II X4 980 (3.7GHz) in BFBC2 (which is well know what one of the best multi-cores optimised game), and in games that not using Quad-cores fully, the Phenom II X4 980 (3.7GHz) falls behind.

It's really simply logic really...let's say both the the i3 2100 and an overclocked Phenom II X4 deliver 40fps- the i3 deliver this over the two physical cores, whereas the overclocked Phenom II X4 deliver this over the four physical cores. Now what would happen if the a game only usages 2 or 3 cores? The i3 will still deliver the full fat 40fps, where as the overclocked Phenom II X4 frame rate will drop to below 40fps, because of 1 or 2 cores are not being used by the game.

I love my Q6600 which I have overclocked to 3.7GHz, but I'm really sick of games not using the 3rd and 4th core (or not using them well) and bottlenecking even my overclocked 5850 during intensive moments (GPU usage dropping from 99% down to 65-90%).
 
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Ok well slight change plan, as it's my birthday coming up my family are very kindly getting the GPU for me!

Therefore thought I use my budget and get the following:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-170-MS

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-368-IN

Was still going to get my original choice of RAM:

G-Skill 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600Mhz RipjawsX Mem Mod CL9 (9-9-9-24) 1.5V

Unless someone can suggest a suitable alternative but don't want to spend more than £30 - £40?

Just need make sure will 520W PSU handle this?

Over the next couple of years I will hopefully upgrade to Crossfire, the PSU, Case etc but I think this will keep me going for awhile!
 
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