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"I need a New PC!" 2013 Part 2. Haswell = #IntelnoTIM, but free online. READ THE OP.

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Diablos

Member
V300. I did notice tons of negative feedback for it when I was comparing drives for whatever reason, maybe it was a bad batch or something. Made me paranoid and looked at other drives; I just got a Samsung SSD 840 EVO and love it.
 

AJLma

Member
These benchmarks aren't really making a case either way.

The FX series is just behind the intel offerings, and they are nowhere near reaching unplayable or even intolerable levels of anything, they are perfectly fine for the demands of modern gaming.

I've got an FX-6350 and a 7970 GHz that I bought for a combined total of $350, they play Metro Last Light, Battlefield 3, Tomb Raider, Dark Souls downsampled from 4K and pretty much anything besides ArmA 3 at 60FPS on Ultra settings, with 4XAA and up. The argument against AMD chips may look good on paper, but in execution the FX series more than hold up, they are guaranteed to hold up for at least another 3-4 years. Someone would have to royally fuck up huge for the FX series to become obsolete anytime before that.
 

Diablos

Member
I've got an FX-6350 and a 7970 GHz that I bought for a combined total of $350, they play Metro Last Light, Battlefield 3, Tomb Raider, Dark Souls downsampled from 4K and pretty much anything besides ArmA 3 at 60FPS on Ultra settings, with 4XAA and up. The argument against AMD chips may look good on paper, but in execution the FX series more than hold up, they are guaranteed to hold up for at least another 3-4 years. Someone would have to royally fuck up huge for the FX series to become obsolete anytime before that.
Shit, I'm wrong. Okay. I admit it, I am dead wrong here. I thought if you were gaming at 4K you would no doubt want something like Haswell or Sandy Bridge.

I got back into my PC building hobby after neglecting it for a couple years so there are some things I'm a bit rusty on.

And thank you for helping me state that the FX series will be fine for the next few years. Note the benches I just posted above, the FX series actually outperforms the i5 in some cases.
 

kennah

Member
He's right everyone. Let's just do things that are good enough. We've been going about this all wrong. Instead of having great performance to the dollar let's just get what is cheap and hope that things get optimized for us.

These cpus are in the consoles so it has to happen next week right?
 

Diablos

Member
He's right everyone. Let's just do things that are good enough. We've been going about this all wrong. Instead of having great performance to the dollar let's just get what is cheap and hope that things get optimized for us.

These cpus are in the consoles so it has to happen next week right?
Please don't put words in my mouth. I've said numerous times that the FX 6xxx series is ideal for budget-oriented builders for gaming, video editing/encoding, media server. I have also said that if you have the cash or feel that it is necessary you can spend at least another $100-120 on a better Intel offering.

This has nothing to do with PS4 and Xbone.
 

AJLma

Member
Shit, I'm wrong. Okay. I admit it, I am dead wrong here. I thought if you were gaming at 4K you would no doubt want something like Haswell or Sandy Bridge.

I got back into my PC building hobby after neglecting it for a couple years so there are some things I'm a bit rusty on.

And thank you for helping me state that the FX series will be fine for the next few years. Note the benches I just posted above, the FX series actually outperforms the i5 in some cases.

I'm just downsampling from 4K, running all games at 1080p. I'm not sure how CPU power would help or hurt downsampling.

Though if I had a "poor" cpu I'm sure I wouldn't even be attempting.

What bothers me about this argument isn't the fact that people are saying Intel processors are better. It's true, they are. Once Haswell-E comes out, I'll definitely be upgrading to at least a 6 core Intel if I can afford it. Today though, there are a few AMD CPU's that are easily as strong as Intel's offerings. The AMD 6300, 6350, 8320 and 8350 are all CPU's that can be safely recommended to ANYONE looking to build a reasonably priced gaming rig built to ride out the next 3-4 years. These are still very high performance processors. We're not talking about an AMD Athlon X6 here.

They may fall short in some very specific instances, and those instances may manifest in some miniscule ministutter or whatever it is that you guys are claiming, in a few very specific games, but 99% of the time, any of the above AMD CPU's are going to be absolutely fine for gaming. I own 100+ games on Steam, popular titles, indies, a mix of everything. Half of them I bought in the last 4-5 months. I've never had a single performance related problem from my CPU. The worst performing game I've experienced is Far Cry 3, and that game just doesn't seem very friendly with any system.

Not to mention most games today don't take advantage of multicore threading past 4 cores, and correct me if I'm wrong but I don't believe there's a single game on the market that uses proper CPU core scaling. All high end games, probably the ones in development right now, will be better optimized for multicore processing, and eventually with developments in GPGPU computing, the role of CPU's in gaming will change as well.
 

mkenyon

Banned
Tons o' stuff
Listen, because a part that you bought and enjoy is not recommended in this thread doesn't mean that you're a bad person, or that you've made a bad decision.

We're talking about people who are buying from scratch. That being the case, it's not AS GOOD OF an option as i3s/i5s. The 8350 is flat out never a good buy. If it works for you, that's wonderful.

Would an i3 be giving you better performance when the CPU matters? Likely.

Would you notice it? Maybe not. Though you would notice fewer stutters.

Everyone here is happy that you're happy with your performance. That's sincerely great.

Now, on your post:

1) You can't post synthetic benchmarks and then say "look it is going to perform better in n-threaded games cause it's good here". It doesn't work that way.

2) MP games will always heavily favor high IPC due to translating game state. The Vishera line of processors in these games will always have bad stutters where frametimes go above 50ms, regardless of how many threads the engine can use.

3) The only thing your post points out is that Vishera chips are amazingly good value for multimedia creation. If that were the point of this thread, you can bet your ass you'd see them in the OP builds.

4) Banking on n-threaded games in the future is a silly proposition, as a huge number of games will continue to be based on older engines. Titanfall, for example, is on Source. That's going to play poorly on a Vishera chip compared to just about any Sandy/Ivy/Haswell.


So, to reiterate the main crux of why we don't include them in the OP:

For the same price, an i3 will outperform an FX6300 in the games that are bottlenecked by CPU. In games that aren't, they will perform similarly enough to not notice a difference.

That being the case, it's a better idea to buy a motherboard/CPU that has PCI-E 3.0, a much better IMC, more SATA 6GB ports, better features, and has the ability to upgrade to something like an i5 or i7 should you want insane performance in the future.

It's a really close call, the differences listed in the second paragraph aren't huge by any means. But they're enough to warrant the nod towards Intel for the time being.

Now Kaveri.... that's where things might get interesting in the budget builds. I have my fingers crossed for some insane budget performance out of the Athlon Kaveri chips.
 

Diablos

Member
I'm just downsampling from 4K, running all games at 1080p. I'm not sure how CPU power would help or hurt downsampling.
Isn't it almost the same (if not still pretty taxing) because it still has to downsample? I don't know.

Though if I had a "poor" cpu I'm sure I wouldn't even be attempting.

What bothers me about this argument isn't the fact that people are saying Intel processors are better. It's true, they are. Once Haswell-E comes out, I'll definitely be upgrading to at least a 6 core Intel if I can afford it. Today though, there are a few AMD CPU's that are easily as strong as Intel's offerings. The AMD 6300, 6350, 8320 and 8350 are all CPU's that can be safely recommended to ANYONE looking to build a reasonably priced gaming rig built to ride out the next 3-4 years. These are still very high performance processors. We're not talking about an AMD Athlon X6 here.

They may fall short in some very specific instances, and those instances may manifest in some miniscule ministutter or whatever it is that you guys are claiming, in a few very specific games, but 99% of the time, any of the above AMD CPU's are going to be absolutely fine for gaming. I own 100+ games on Steam, popular titles, indies, a mix of everything. Half of them I bought in the last 4-5 months. I've never had a single performance related problem from my CPU. The worst performing game I've experienced is Far Cry 3, and that game just doesn't seem very friendly with any system.

Not to mention most games today don't take advantage of multicore threading past 4 cores, and correct me if I'm wrong but I don't believe there's a single game on the market that uses proper CPU core scaling. All high end games, probably the ones in development right now, will be better optimized for multicore processing, and eventually with developments in GPGPU computing, the role of CPU's in gaming will change as well.
Yep. Again, the thing I regret the most about my build is getting a GTX 660 instead of at least a 760.

Multicore + GPU architecture changes are no doubt going to change everything. I think we are really getting to that point. Look at nVidia's roadmap even.
 

wildfire

Banned
Sigh,

You can NOT offset a CPU that has slow single threaded performance with a GPU!
Having a game that is not CPU limited is a completely different matter, you are not making up for poor CPU performance, you are just not limited by it (on the other hand, if a game is CPU limited, then the GPU can not help one bit!).

That is true in general but that will change with Mantle. AMD has publicly conceded that their CPUs suck for single threaded performance but with Mantle adoption they know they can and hope enough devs adopt it to help them make them on par with Intel.
 

mkenyon

Banned
The AMD 6300, 6350, 8320 and 8350 are all CPU's that can be safely recommended to ANYONE looking to build a reasonably priced gaming rig built to ride out the next 3-4 years. These are still very high performance processors. We're not talking about an AMD Athlon X6 here.
If you play competitive games, this is a bit wrong. Here's some graphs from frame time testing I did in 200MHz steps on a 3570K:

yszxT.png

See those points where the FPS drops dramatically? That's intense action. Now to give you a better idea of what is going on, some of those frames are taking well over 60ms to render.

This graph is backwards, should be number of frames above 33.3ms listed:


Thats a huge number of frames where you are basically multiplying the length it takes to render a frame by 4-15x. When this happens, this means your input latency is additionally increased by the same amount of time.

What this means is that when extremely precise input is required in a competitive game, processors with low IPC basically take a shit, and so does your input. You might be talking an equivalent of up to 100ms with chips like the 6300. That's huge. That's death. That's a loss.

Now in addition to this, I should also point out that just about every serious competitive gamer has started to move towards 120Hz panels. This means you want to keep frametimes below 8.3ms, but even 10ms is great.



Again, you can see a pretty huge drop in 99th percentile as well as a significant reduction in frames above 16.7ms. That's directly related to increasing per thread performance. Game state translation is a bitch, and will continue to be a huge bottleneck in MP games for the forseeable future.
That is true in general but that will change with Mantle. AMD has publicly conceded that their CPUs suck for single threaded performance but with Mantle adoption they know they can and hope enough devs adopt it to help them make them on par with Intel.
TMK, the Mantle improvements will benefit the CPU in an indirect manner. This means whatever benefits are seen by AMD processors will also be seen by Intel processors.

They know they have no gaming CPUs.
 

TheD

The Detective
I by no means meant that throwing a $400 GPU with a 384-bit bus or something into my case is going to crush performance gains from Intel chips. I simply mean it's going to get me to a place for most games that I care to play (sorry, not an RTS guy) that will give me more than satisfactory performance. Saving that $100-120 or so and putting it towards a better GPU is a good idea if your are budget-oriented.

No, you clearly stated twice that you think a GPU can the offset performance of a bad CPU, which is not the case!


Yes, but I think we are finally heading into an era of more multicore-centric game engines and a stronger GPU presence making the difference in what can make a game run great or like crap.

That still does not mean that all games will run fast on a slow 6 core CPU!


Honestly, my power bill was the same when I went from my crappy laptop which didn't use much power to my 6300 rig with a 500W PSU. I


That is one of the worst arguments I have ever read!
The fact is that if a computer is turned on, IT IS USING ELECTRICITY! and unless you are using your own power source (like solar, or wind) it is going to use electricity from the power company (and they charge money for how much you use)!
Thus it is impossible (unless you get some kind of flat rate) for a computer using more power (at the wall) (for the same amounts of time) than the computer it replaced not to cost you more on your powerbill!
Your bill would only be the same if you cut power usage in other areas!

I've already stated numerous times that the latest Intel offerings (Sandy Bridge, Haswell) are better CPU's. I don't know why you seem to think I'm ignoring that. I'm merely stating that the FX series (particularly 63xx series) is classic AMD price/performance. If you want something better, spend the money and get Intel, no argument there. But the FX is not worthless for budget-oriented system builders.

No, their is nothing "classic" about only being as fast as the Intel CPUs when using heavily threaded code and eating 2x the power!
(Lets also not forget that having an 8350 is going to increase the PSU required by your system by a notable amount).

Again, my power bill is the same. Went down a couple bucks after buying a new fridge, actually.


As above, that is BS!

That is true in general but that will change with Mantle. AMD has publicly conceded that their CPUs suck for single threaded performance but with Mantle adoption they know they can and hope enough devs adopt it to help them make them on par with Intel.

No!

The only thing mantle will affect is the driver thread (which uses under half a single SB core even in high end games), it will not do shit for the rest of the game engine (and it will only help games that use mantle in the first place).
 
Anyone know what issue I'm having? I don't seem to know what it is. Thought I ask here since it might be related to drivers or gpu.

In Far Cry 3, whenever I go dive underwater, I get a horizontal transparent bar on the bottom of the screen. It disappears when I resurface.

I know that's not part of the game.

Is this a known issue?
 

AJLma

Member
If you play competitive games, this is a bit wrong. Here's some graphs from frame time testing I did in 200MHz steps on a 3570K:



See those points where the FPS drops dramatically? That's intense action. Now to give you a better idea of what is going on, some of those frames are taking well over 60ms to render.

This graph is backwards, should be number of frames above 33.3ms listed:



Thats a huge number of frames where you are basically multiplying the length it takes to render a frame by 4-15x. When this happens, this means your input latency is additionally increased by the same amount of time.

What this means is that when extremely precise input is required in a competitive game, processors with low IPC basically take a shit, and so does your input. You might be talking an equivalent of up to 100ms with chips like the 6300. That's huge. That's death. That's a loss.

Now in addition to this, I should also point out that just about every serious competitive gamer has started to move towards 120Hz panels. This means you want to keep frametimes below 8.3ms, but even 10ms is great.





Again, you can see a pretty huge drop in 99th percentile as well as a significant reduction in frames above 16.7ms. That's directly related to increasing per thread performance. Game state translation is a bitch, and will continue to be a huge bottleneck in MP games for the forseeable future.

TMK, the Mantle improvements will benefit the CPU in an indirect manner. This means whatever benefits are seen by AMD processors will also be seen by Intel processors.

They know they have no gaming CPUs.

These graphs are from a 3570K? This doesn't really help me understand how it's better than an AMD CPU, but I think I see what you're getting at.

Okay, If you're a hardcore competitive gamer, gaming at above 100hz, then yes, you should buy Intel.

If you're a person like me who just wants high-end games to play at 50-60 FPS at the highest resolution possible, then consider your budget, in my opinion, AMD may be an option for you.

Just out of curiosity. For modern general computing purposes(heavy computer usage, web browsing, document editing, etc), would you recommend someone a Haswell i3 over an FX-6300?
 

TheD

The Detective
What bothers me about this argument isn't the fact that people are saying Intel processors are better. It's true, they are. Once Haswell-E comes out, I'll definitely be upgrading to at least a 6 core Intel if I can afford it. Today though, there are a few AMD CPU's that are easily as strong as Intel's offerings. The AMD 6300, 6350, 8320 and 8350 are all CPU's that can be safely recommended to ANYONE looking to build a reasonably priced gaming rig built to ride out the next 3-4 years. These are still very high performance processors. We're not talking about an AMD Athlon X6 here.

They can not be "safely recommend"!
They all eat a lot of power (the 8350 uses an extra 100 Watts when not overclocked over a Haswell underload, it is even worse when overclocked!)
That not only means that you will have to buy a stronger PSU, but it will drive up your power costs by a notable amount if you use the system under heavy load a lot.

They may fall short in some very specific instances, and those instances may manifest in some miniscule ministutter or whatever it is that you guys are claiming, in a few very specific games, but 99% of the time, any of the above AMD CPU's are going to be absolutely fine for gaming. I own 100+ games on Steam, popular titles, indies, a mix of everything. Half of them I bought in the last 4-5 months. I've never had a single performance related problem from my CPU. The worst performing game I've experienced is Far Cry 3, and that game just doesn't seem very friendly with any system.

I would not call any program that does not have at least 8 heavy threads (in the case of the 8 core FX range) "very specific", if anything, it is the other way around!



Not to mention most games today don't take advantage of multicore threading past 4 cores, and correct me if I'm wrong but I don't believe there's a single game on the market that uses proper CPU core scaling. All high end games, probably the ones in development right now, will be better optimized for multicore processing, and eventually with developments in GPGPU computing, the role of CPU's in gaming will change as well.

But if no games today use more than 4 heavy threads, why get a CPU that will have problems with them instead of a CPU that will not (and perform just as well in the newer games and use a lot less power)?

And no, GPGPU is not some magic cure to multi threading, it is in fact much harder to do and more limited than splitting a program across CPUs.
 

mkenyon

Banned
These graphs are from a 3570K? This doesn't really help me understand how it's better than an AMD CPU, but I think I see what you're getting at.

Okay, If you're a hardcore competitive gamer, gaming at above 100hz, then yes, you should buy Intel.

If you're a person like me who just wants high-end games to play at 50-60 FPS at the highest resolution possible, then consider your budget, in my opinion, AMD may be an option for you.

Just out of curiosity. For modern general computing purposes(heavy computer usage, web browsing, document editing, etc), would you recommend someone a Haswell i3 over an FX-6300?
Yeah, basically the 6300 and 8350 would be handing frames at 100ms+ when the 3570 goes to 30-50.

For general usage I recommend AMD APUs. Have an A8 5600K in my HTPC.
 

AJLma

Member
They can not be "safely recommend"!
They all eat a lot of power (the 8350 uses an extra 100 Watts when not overclocked over a Haswell underload, it is even worse when overclocked!)
That not only means that you will have to buy a stronger PSU, but it will drive up your power costs by a notable amount if you use the system under heavy load a lot.

I've got a 6350, which is an overclocked 6300. My computer runs on a 650 Watt power supply. I just got my electric bill for the month, and besides the extra money that running heat in winter is costing, my electric bill may has not noticeably risen.

I would not call any program that does not have at least 8 heavy threads (in the case of the 8 core FX range) "very specific", if anything, it is the other way around!

I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say here.

But if no games today use more than 4 heavy threads, why get a CPU that will have problems with them instead of a CPU that will not (and perform just as well in the newer games and use a lot less power)?

And no, GPGPU is not some magic cure to multi threading, it is in fact much harder to do and more limited than splitting a program across CPUs.


It's not a magic cure, but it's something real that is going to affect the way that games are developed from the ground up, Mantle is the first of these "next generation" API's. There will be Mantle like solutions supported by Vidia as well, inevitably. The entire SteamOS platform is promised to be one.
 

Diablos

Member
Listen, because a part that you bought and enjoy is not recommended in this thread doesn't mean that you're a bad person, or that you've made a bad decision.

We're talking about people who are buying from scratch. That being the case, it's not AS GOOD OF an option as i3s/i5s. The 8350 is flat out never a good buy. If it works for you, that's wonderful.
I don't have an 8350, in fact I avoided it and went for a 6300 (which I've mentioned that I own quite a few times now) because I was turned off by the 125W TDP. Like someone said (I think it was you), a 125W FX basically requires better cooling even for stock speeds because AMD really cheaped out on cooling for those CPU's (95W FX series with stock HSF and Arctic Silver 5 is okay for stock or a light OC though.)

Would an i3 be giving you better performance when the CPU matters? Likely.
Likely? Isn't it a foregone conclusion that when it really matters, yes, Intel single core performance is superior, every time? Seems like something in the vein of 7970 performance will handle the vast majority of games with FX 6/8 core series though, at >60fps even.

Would you notice it? Maybe not. Though you would notice fewer stutters.
Maybe. Is that worth another $120 that you could have put towards a 7970 or similar? Isn't it worth having that discussion?

Everyone here is happy that you're happy with your performance. That's sincerely great.
I'm happy you're happy that I'm happy. That's great, man. I'm not really setting out to do that and it irks me that people think I am, I'm just trying to emphasize that the 63xx series is not a bad value by any means, but I get the impression people here act like it is an obsolete turd not worth batting an eye at. I think you can't go wrong with it for the next 3-4 years at least. Then it can be an obsolete turd.


1) You can't post synthetic benchmarks and then say "look it is going to perform better in n-threaded games cause it's good here". It doesn't work that way.
So how does it work then (serious question)? I see other synthetic benchmarks posted, so I hope it applies to those people as well!


2) MP games will always heavily favor high IPC due to translating game state. The Vishera line of processors in these games will always have bad stutters where frametimes go above 50ms, regardless of how many threads the engine can use.
I've never had any issues with stuttering that affect my gameplay one way or the other, though I've noticed it at times (usually right when I start playing). It usually goes away if you have the game settings right, at least to a level that I do not notice one way or the other. I'm not big on competitive gaming, but I've watched/talked to some people who play games all day with the FX series and I don't hear them complaining that they lost because they don't have an i5 or something.

3) The only thing your post points out is that Vishera chips are amazingly good value for multimedia creation. If that were the point of this thread, you can bet your ass you'd see them in the OP builds.
The OP seems to have some AMD builds suggested, and a scale for desktop usage (i.e. gaming, streaming) when trying to determine your needs... so, then, *isn't* it part of what this thread is about? Why, then, is the Vishera series held in such low regard in this thread? It seems pretty disingenuous. But it is an outstanding value given its mutlimedia performance and, when paired with a good enough GPU, will be fine for most gaming over the next 3+ years.

4) Banking on n-threaded games in the future is a silly proposition, as a huge number of games will continue to be based on older engines. Titanfall, for example, is on Source. That's going to play poorly on a Vishera chip compared to just about any Sandy/Ivy/Haswell.
Titanfall is coming out for Xbox 360, even. I'm pretty sure just about anything will be able to handle the game at non-shitty settings.

So, to reiterate the main crux of why we don't include them in the OP:

For the same price, an i3 will outperform an FX6300 in the games that are bottlenecked by CPU. In games that aren't, they will perform similarly enough to not notice a difference.

That being the case, it's a better idea to buy a motherboard/CPU that has PCI-E 3.0, a much better IMC, more SATA 6GB ports, better features, and has the ability to upgrade to something like an i5 or i7 should you want insane performance in the future.

It's a really close call, the differences listed in the second paragraph aren't huge by any means. But they're enough to warrant the nod towards Intel for the time being.
What games besides most RTS titles are really going to be that severely bottlenecked by the CPU? Emulation, yes (but Xenoblade sure runs nicely at 1080p here)... overall though, is it that big of a deal? Can you point to the amount of games that are going to bottleneck you so terribly that even if you upgraded to a more expensive GPU (770 or higher I guess) you'd still be getting <60fps or lots of dropped frames and stuttering with a FX 6xxx or higher CPU?

That being the case, it's a better idea to buy a motherboard/CPU that has PCI-E 3.0, a much better IMC, more SATA 6GB ports, better features, and has the ability to upgrade to something like an i5 or i7 should you want insane performance in the future.
Is PCI-E 2.0 even close to being maxed yet? Doesn't it have at least 3-5 years to go? I have six SATA 6GB/s ports, btw. Not sure why any home PC user would want more than that.

Honestly, even with an Intel mobo I'd probably just settle for an i5 or Xeon and the next upgrade would be a different CPU/board because those cpu's have a lot of power. Otherwise it's not worth it and I'd rather just get a good GPU with a cheaper AMD CPU. I cannot understand why this opinion doesn't seem to be very welcome, not only for stating what works for you but advising others (which afaik is a big reason why this thread exists), especially since you go on to say:

It's a really close call, the differences listed in the second paragraph aren't huge by any means. But they're enough to warrant the nod towards Intel for the time being.
A small nod, then! If it is indeed a close call, you can't discredit the other advantages a 63xx AMD CPU would give you for multimedia. A gaming PC is not JUST for gaming for a lot of people, they do other things on it, like multimedia (streaming, editing, encoding, compressing, you name it). If it's that close of a call you have to look at the overall value that you are getting, no? They are almost neck to neck a lot of the time for gaming, and outside of that the 63xx has even more benefits to being owned. It's very easy to see why there's a difference of opinion for budget builds, yet there is such hostility towards AMD here it seems. Very odd.

Now Kaveri.... that's where things might get interesting in the budget builds. I have my fingers crossed for some insane budget performance out of the Athlon Kaveri chips.
Hoping for the best when it comes to Kaveri, I think it'll do just fine.

Anyway, it's your thread I assume, but I think it's wrong to at least not mention the 6300 as an alternative.



As above, that is BS!
I'm literally LOLing here. Trust me, I'm well aware of my monthly expenses, money has been especially tight lately. My power bill has not changed. The only time there is a notable change is over the summer when the central A/C is running all the time.

And I didn't "clearly state" anything like you think I did. I said more times than I can remember that an Intel CPU (i5 and above especially) will always give you the edge for performance. I merely said for budget builds if you get a good enough GPU you can get to a level of performance that doesn't suck for most games for AMD FX builds. I didn't say that a better GPU in an AMD build will render an Intel chip inferior, I said it will help you offset (but not eliminate) the fact that your CPU isn't as good as Intel's offerings.

I really hate being called a liar and that's all you seem to be doing. There may be a misunderstanding here but I'm not lying, calm down.
 

Red Comet

Member
Does anybody here know from experience if TigerDirect.com is reliable? They have the video card I want for $20 cheaper than Newegg.
 

Red Comet

Member
I've never had any problems with them.

That's good to hear, I might give them a go then. But I also just discovered that Newegg has this particular graphics card on their eBay store where I'd be able to use my eBay bucks. They don't mention anything about the Nvidia 3 free game deal there, but I wonder if they'd still send me a code.
 

Diablos

Member
That's good to hear, I might give them a go then. But I also just discovered that Newegg has this particular graphics card on their eBay store where I'd be able to use my eBay bucks. They don't mention anything about the Nvidia 3 free game deal there, but I wonder if they'd still send me a code.
They have a live chat, ask them there.

Be advised, if for any reason you don't like your GPU, or if you need to RMA it you will only be refunded a fraction of the price should you redeem the free games. Reason being is because they bundle the "free" games into the price of the GPU so you technically are paying for them at full price, with the GPU at an incredibly deep discount.

I went through this and had to fight with them tooth and nail to get a refund in the amount of the listed price, despite the fact that they advertised the item incorrectly, sold me a defective product and fucked up some other things I won't get into here.
 

mkenyon

Banned
Lest this thread become a ridiculous quote-fest, I'll just post some general responses. I'm sure you can figure out where they fit!

It's not just about single threaded vs. n-threaded. There's a ton of engines that are dual and tri threaded. The big culprits are going to be Source, UE3, and anything Blizzard makes.

Here's a number of benchmarks to give you a better idea of the performance differences:


Now per your streaming remarks, I'm sure you're probably basing this on the TekSyndicate video? If not, apologies for the confusion, but it's a rather popular travesty that I see this argument come out of fairly regularly.

The short of it is that it's rather bunk. Sure, threads help, but you only have 2 more with the 6300 versus an i3. That's not anything significant at all.


That'll give you a good idea of the performance differences when streaming multiplayer game. Yes, that is the 8350 below the i5-760 from five years ago.

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Now, to your question of why don't synthetic benchmarks translate over to gameplay improvements. Well, here's Civilization V. TMK, this is one of the very first games to be N-Threaded, meaning it can use as many cores as your processor has.


Basically, there's a lot more at play than those synthetic benchmarks. You have game state, you have AI, you have two parts talking back and forth with each other making sure everything is all timed up nicely and working as intended.

No, this is not my thread, this is a GAF thread and decisions are made by a number of people talking together. Kharma pushed really really hard for the inclusion of the FX6300 about 6 months ago, but has since changed his mind for the reasons outlined.

I do have one really big question though, where is this magical $120 coming from that you keep referencing? You can't use performance comparisons of the i3 with the 6300 while using the price of the i5s. That's silly as hell. An i3 and 6300 system are going to be the same price. Apples and apples.

And again, to reiterate this *really* important part. When you buy a 990FX mobo and 6300, the only place you can upgrade to is an 8350. If you buy a H/B/Z87 board, you can put in anything up to a 4770K. That's huge. That's money saved down the road.
 

TheD

The Detective
I'm literally LOLing here. Trust me, I'm well aware of my monthly expenses, money has been especially tight lately. My power bill has not changed. The only time there is a notable change is over the summer when the central A/C is running all the time.

Use some logic!
Something using more power at the wall will increase your power usage and thus increase your powerbill.
e.g something no.1 costs 10$ a month to run with your usage pattern, you replace it with something no.2 that costs 15$ a month with your usage pattern, 15/10 = 1.5, thus it is 1.5 times the cost to run something no.2 compared to something no.1!
If your powerbill did not change then you have had to of made cuts in your power usage elsewhere, your usage pattern must of changed or the cost per a KW/H must of dropped (all of which have no bearing on what CPU to get!).
It might only be a small amount per a month, but over a few years it will add up.

I've got a 6350, which is an overclocked 6300. My computer runs on a 650 Watt power supply. I just got my electric bill for the month, and besides the extra money that running heat in winter is costing, my electric bill may has not noticeably risen.

The simple fact is that a CPU like the FX 8350 uses an extra 100 watts underload compared to a Haswell i5 or i7, which works out for me as an extra $45 a year with 4 hours a day heavy usage, even with 2 hours a day heavy usage, over the course of 4 years that is $90 extra in power costs from going AMD! (it is even worse if overclocking).
That is before you take into account that you will need a powersupply that can give you an extra 100 to 150(when overclocking) watts compared to a equivalent Intel system!

I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say here.
You said an AMD CPU "may fall short in some very specific instances", when if anything it is the other way around (it will not fall short in some very specific instances, but for a lot of them it will).

It's not a magic cure, but it's something real that is going to affect the way that games are developed from the ground up, Mantle is the first of these "next generation" API's. There will be Mantle like solutions supported by Vidia as well, inevitably. The entire SteamOS platform is promised to be one.

Mantle is not really about GPGPU, it is about giving lower level assess to the GPU and better multi threaded draw calls.
Even if it does help GPGPU, it could not fix the fact that a lot of programs (and the problems they solve) do not map well to a GPU!

SteamOS is also an operating system (note the "OS"?) not a rendering API!
 

Red Comet

Member
They have a live chat, ask them there.

Be advised, if for any reason you don't like your GPU, or if you need to RMA it you will only be refunded a fraction of the price should you redeem the free games. Reason being is because they bundle the "free" games into the price of the GPU so you technically are paying for them at full price, with the GPU at an incredibly deep discount.

I went through this and had to fight with them tooth and nail to get a refund in the amount of the listed price, despite the fact that they advertised the item incorrectly, sold me a defective product and fucked up some other things I won't get into here.

Whoa, I didn't know that at all. Thanks for the advice. I guess I'll just skip the games then since AC 4 is the only one I'm interested in (already have Batman) and I'd rather play that on consoles with a controller anyway.
 

Cmerrill

You don't need to be empathetic towards me.
This is going to be my first Gaming PC build, just making the transition over from the PS4(finally gave up on consoles).

I'm wondering if anyone has any thoughts on it, and if it's going to be good enough for 1080p/60fps?

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor
Motherboard: MSI ATX LGA1150 Motherboard
Memory: 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
Video Card: GTX 770 2 GB
Case: Thermaltake ATX Mid Tower Case
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply
Optical Drive: LG GH24NS95 DVD/CD Writer

I'm new to this, so be gentle. I'm on a tight budge, and Canadian.
 

kennah

Member
Drop your video card to the 760 (10% slower) and change your processor to the K (30% faster) and make sure that the motherboard has a z87 chipset.

But otherwise very nice solid build!
Is this from that local place?
 

Diablos

Member
Use some logic!
Something using more power at the wall will increase your power usage and thus increase your powerbill.
e.g something no.1 costs 10$ a month to run with your usage pattern, you replace it with something no.2 that costs 15$ a month with your usage pattern, 15/10 = 1.5, thus it is 1.5 times the cost to run something no.2 compared to something no.1!
If your powerbill did not change then you have had to of made cuts in your power usage elsewhere, your usage pattern must of changed or the cost per a KW/H must of dropped (all of which have no bearing on what CPU to get!).
It might only be a small amount per a month, but over a few years it will add up.
Um, yeah, I understand power usage. I'm being completely honest with you when I say there is absolutely no difference in my power bill from using this PC compared to what I had before. Even if we assume it adds up to $90 over the next 3 years as you used for an example, that's over an incredibly long period of time and isn't quite the same as committing, say, an extra $90 right away for a PC build that you are either paying for in full or paying down with monthly payments on your credit card. But honestly, my power bill has not changed much, in fact as I said it dropped a couple bucks when I got a new fridge. That is the only change besides the spike in the summer because of A/C. Besides my PC I don't use many demanding electronics (well, a PS3 at times, but it isn't on too much). My fridge, PC and A/C in the summer are probably the things that draw the most power here.

mkenyon said:
*benchmarks and stuff*
Noted, and not to be ignorant, but when I say multimedia as in streaming, I mean media server/transcoding, encoding video outside of gaming ,etc. Not streaming a game of whatever (I personally don't do that, again, not to be ignorant, lots of people don't).

As for frame time, again... I don't notice anything that hinders my gameplay. Honestly. The only thing that puts me at a disadvantage is the fact that I don't invest as much time as a lot of hardcore gamers do in their favorite games, be it single player or competitive or what have you. Other than that most of the time I'm not like "damn, my build is really holding me back" except for games like Metro that require me to really dial back the IQ a bit.

I do have one really big question though, where is this magical $120 coming from that you keep referencing? You can't use performance comparisons of the i3 with the 6300 while using the price of the i5s. That's silly as hell. An i3 and 6300 system are going to be the same price. Apples and apples.

And again, to reiterate this *really* important part. When you buy a 990FX mobo and 6300, the only place you can upgrade to is an 8350. If you buy a H/B/Z87 board, you can put in anything up to a 4770K. That's huge. That's money saved down the road.
It isn't silly. i5's range from, what, $200-230? A 6300 is $119, sometimes $109, it'll probably drop more. Yes, you can you use your i3 if you want and get the same savings, and I know you and others love that single core thread but frankly the 6300 seems to be a better value overall outside of single-core for some games that really need it. That's a difference of opinion, though. I place much more importance on how fast I can transcode for a media server/encoding video/compression/editing/etc. outside of gaming because it comes as a really nice perk for the cost in addition to holding its own for practically all of my gaming needs for years to come (reinforced by getting a better GPU down the line of course). I totally understand the benches you are showing me about game state/AI/et al but none of these things have hindered my gameplay one way or the other. So I'm not trying to invalidate what you are posting, but I've never found these things to hinder my experience. *shrug* I don't doubt the legitimacy of that information but I game just fine with my 6300, really. Just like I don't know of many instances where I'm bummed out for not having an i3 instead. Maybe when I compress Wii ISO's and they drop frames? Haha. Seriously, for what I play I can't think of anything and there are numerous gamers out there just like me which is why the 6300 deserved a mention in the OP imo.

I don't intend to upgrade anything in this rig except for the GPU in a year or two maybe. That's it. The next time I buy a new CPU, I'm buying a new board, and that'll probably be in 3 or 4 years unless something crazy happens (component failure etc), which is of course always possible.
 

TheD

The Detective
This is going to be my first Gaming PC build, just making the transition over from the PS4(finally gave up on consoles).

I'm wondering if anyone has any thoughts on it, and if it's going to be good enough for 1080p/60fps?

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor
Motherboard: MSI ATX LGA1150 Motherboard
Memory: 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
Video Card: GTX 770 2 GB
Case: Thermaltake ATX Mid Tower Case
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply
Optical Drive: LG GH24NS95 DVD/CD Writer

I'm new to this, so be gentle. I'm on a tight budge, and Canadian.

Do you really need a disc drive?
I have run without one for years and I don't miss it.

Also, if you are going to get a K processor, you will also need a Z87 motherboard.
 

Diablos

Member
This is going to be my first Gaming PC build, just making the transition over from the PS4(finally gave up on consoles).

I'm wondering if anyone has any thoughts on it, and if it's going to be good enough for 1080p/60fps?

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor
Motherboard: MSI ATX LGA1150 Motherboard
Memory: 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
Video Card: GTX 770 2 GB
Case: Thermaltake ATX Mid Tower Case
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply
Optical Drive: LG GH24NS95 DVD/CD Writer

I'm new to this, so be gentle. I'm on a tight budge, and Canadian.
Maybe get one of those hybrid drives? Other than that the build looks good. I'd keep the 770 personally.
 

Cmerrill

You don't need to be empathetic towards me.
Drop your video card to the 760 (10% slower) and change your processor to the K (30% faster) and make sure that the motherboard has a z87 chipset.

But otherwise very nice solid build!
Is this from that local place?

Well kind of, he helped a bit, but then I talked to someone else and he helped a bit more. It's a little above my initial price point, but I want something solid for a few years to come.
 

Cmerrill

You don't need to be empathetic towards me.
Do you really need a disc drive?
I have run without one for years and I don't miss it.

Also, if you are going to get a K processor, you will also need a Z87 motherboard.

Hmm good point about the disc drive.
 

Frenden

Banned
I have an 8350 and just nabbed a GTX 760. I'm planning on using this setup for a year to a year and a half before switching to Intel and getting a newer, better vidya card. Do y'all think the AMD processor is going to hold me back enough to warrant switching to Intel during this upgrade cycle?
 

kennah

Member
I have an 8350 and just nabbed a GTX 760. I'm planning on using this setup for a year to a year and a half before switching to Intel and getting a newer, better vidya card. Do y'all think the AMD processor is going to hold me back enough to warrant switching to Intel during this upgrade cycle?
Don't bother right now. Upgrade when it feels slow.
 

mkenyon

Banned
Noted, and not to be ignorant, but when I say multimedia as in streaming, I mean media server/transcoding, encoding video outside of gaming ,etc. Not streaming a game of whatever (I personally don't do that, again, not to be ignorant, lots of people don't).

As for frame time, again... I don't notice anything that hinders my gameplay. Honestly. The only thing that puts me at a disadvantage is the fact that I don't invest as much time as a lot of hardcore gamers do in their favorite games, be it single player or competitive or what have you. Other than that most of the time I'm not like "damn, my build is really holding me back" except for games like Metro that require me to really dial back the IQ a bit.

It isn't silly. i5's range from, what, $200-230? A 6300 is $119, sometimes $109, it'll probably drop more. Yes, you can you use your i3 if you want and get the same savings, and I know you and others love that single core thread but frankly the 6300 seems to be a better value overall outside of single-core for some games that really need it. That's a difference of opinion, though. I place much more importance on how fast I can transcode for a media server/encoding video/compression/editing/etc. outside of gaming because it comes as a really nice perk for the cost in addition to holding its own for practically all of my gaming needs for years to come (reinforced by getting a better GPU down the line of course). I totally understand the benches you are showing me about game state/AI/et al but none of these things have hindered my gameplay one way or the other. So I'm not trying to invalidate what you are posting, but I've never found these things to hinder my experience. *shrug* I don't doubt the legitimacy of that information but I game just fine with my 6300, really. Just like I don't know of many instances where I'm bummed out for not having an i3 instead. Maybe when I compress Wii ISO's and they drop frames? Haha. Seriously, for what I play I can't think of anything and there are numerous gamers out there just like me which is why the 6300 deserved a mention in the OP imo.

I don't intend to upgrade anything in this rig except for the GPU in a year or two maybe. That's it. The next time I buy a new CPU, I'm buying a new board, and that'll probably be in 3 or 4 years unless something crazy happens (component failure etc), which is of course always possible.
Please post some data on this. I've never seen anything that puts the 6300's six threads more than a few % above the i3's 4 threads.

Also this i5 is $180 MSRP, $165 right now.

To be totally frank though, and this is in no way meant as an insult, your argument has turned into "though it's a worse buy for a gaming processor, I don't really notice or care, and the very niche use I have for it is benefited by an extra two threads".

The OP is meant to be a guide for the best parts for the money, while keeping a very keen eye towards upgrade paths. As such, the 6300 has no place there. I think you understand that now, right?
Anyone have a top of the line build? Ideally, id like an Intel and nvidia build, budget is about 2000.
4770K
Gigabyte Z87 UD3H (Maximus VI Hero if you want RoG features)
780Ti
Seasonic/Corsair 660W PSU
512GB SSD
Fractal Arc Midi, Corsair Air 540.
 

belvedere

Junior Butler
Quick question about Windows 8 licenses. Do I need to deactivate my current Win 8 installation before installing on my new PC? I'll be using the same hard drive. I've heard mixed things about deactivating it with slmgr, but also heard by simply not using it on two different machines is good enough.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
Nowai. If you want 27", wait for G-Sync. Otherwise get yourself a VG248QE.

Hhahaha, that's the one I already have on my wish list ;)

I just want to be able to match sizes with the current 27" instead of doing dual monitor with a 24 and 27. I read that the 27" variant would have GSYNC support unless that's been debunked.

Reading a few links, it seems unlikely. Guess it's the 24" variant then. Definitely want that GSYNC but I'm still unsure about how much the module will cost.

The secondary question would be, when are bigger GSYNC monitors hitting?
 

Diablos

Member
Please post some data on this. I've never seen anything that puts the 6300's six threads more than a few % above the i3's 4 threads.

Also this i5 is $180 MSRP, $165 right now.
And so what if it isn't more than a few points higher? That still makes it just as good if not slightly better in that case. I showed you benchmarks where it outperforms the latest i3 in almost everything, you claimed they were synthetic (when in fact they were application benchmarks), you wrote it off and posted some nuanced frame timing data that most people will never notice. edit: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i3-4340-4330-4130_6.html#sect0 These are synthetic to you? Or do we have a misunderstanding and you were talking about a game? Please explain.

Where's all these games that I'm going to have such a hard time playing because I don't have the fabled i3 for a budget build? All I got were some mentions of Source, UE3 which is a terrible game engine by default (but I can't complain about how it performs here), and I've never had a problem with a Blizzard game either.

To be totally frank though, and this is in no way meant as an insult, your argument has turned into "though it's a worse buy for a gaming processor, I don't really notice or care, and the very niche use I have for it is benefited by an extra two threads".
And your argument is "all I care about in my bubble is single core performance for games we rarely mention and capturing your gameplay or something." There is absolutely nothing niche about using your PC as a media server for things not related to gaming -- transcoding/encoding/editing audio/video, compressing data. Indeed, for a low price the FX 6300 gives you much value for not only the aforementioned but being paired with a decent GPU to serve your gaming needs as well. Not sure what planet you are from where those things outside of gaming are "niche". Besides playing games as we know them, this is one of the big things you still need a PC for in 2014 that isn't quite up to snuff on a tablet or whatnot.

And I don't care about the data you posted not because I think it is false or stupid, but because I don't notice it. Never have I noticed any problems stemming from the timing of a frame that hindered my game, single or multiplayer. I think you are posting something that to the vast majority of people playing a game is quite nuanced and will not affect them one way or the other.

The OP is meant to be a guide for the best parts for the money, while keeping a very keen eye towards upgrade paths. As such, the 6300 has no place there. I think you understand that now, right?
It absolutely does. Should you buy it today, you are set for the next 3 to 4 years with nothing else but a GPU upgrade halfway through -- possibly -- depending on what you get now. Yeah hardware failure happens, but that can happen to anyone using any combination of hardware.
 

BPoole

Member
These inflated R9 290 prices are really starting to piss me off. I am seriously just considering just buying an Nvidia card even though I'd be paying more money for worse performance
 

RayStorm

Member
I'm not.

My desktop computer died via catching fire and I am typing from my Surface Tablet. I already know I need to replace my mobo and CPU (and quite possibly the fan as well), but my question now is should I also replace my RAM? Or does it sound like something that would only affect the CPU and mobo?

You know, that needs a more detailed explanation. What exactly caught fire? What exactly do you mean by catching fire? Burning and then melting down? Just one short flame?
 

Cmerrill

You don't need to be empathetic towards me.
These inflated R9 290 prices are really starting to piss me off. I am seriously just considering just buying an Nvidia card even though I'd be paying more money for worse performance

Depending on the game, of course?
 
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