Best CPU for an Internet Cafe?

[frozeneyes]

Hi all,

My name is addy from Indonesia, Im nwe to this forum, Im in need of some advices regarding our internet cafe PC's.

As of now we have 15 (3 years old) PC's with specification:
AMD Sempron 140+
ECS AM2 Mainboard
2GB DDR2 RAM
HD4670 Graphic Card
18.5" LCD Monitor

Those computers are mainly for multiplayer and online games like HoN, DOta, DragonNest, etc

We're planning to do some upgrading with a very limited budget

We have some choices for upgrades.

Upgrading Processors, Mainboard and RAMs:
A. Intel G630
ECS H61 mainboard
4GB DDR3 RAM
Cost approximately $120/PC

B. AMD A6 3500
MSI A55M-P33
4GB DDR3 RAM
Cost approximately $150/PC

or upgrading just the Processor
C. AMD Phenom II x4 945
Cost approximately $90/PC

The reason why we choose not to upgrade the graphic card is because for online games as far as i can see theres no games currently using the DX11 technology thus I think HD4670 can still handle online games (with limited graphic quality ofc) but with option B, I have another concern:
is the GPU planted in AMD A6 3500 better than HD4670?

Can you guys give me some pros and cons regarding those choices or perhaps are there better options other than these 3 options?

Thank you in advance for any shared opinios, very much appreciate it

PS. sorry for my english

 

[T_Yamamoto]

The GPU in the APU is not as good as your current GPU. I would go with option c

 

[Makaveli]

Option C aswell for me!

 

[ShintaiDK]

I dont think the X4 945 works in the AM2 socket. Its AM3 only.

http://products.amd.com/en-us/DesktopCPUDetail.aspx?id=534

 

[Soulkeeper]

The 4670 video cards should slightly outperform the llano gpu in most things as they have 32GB/s mem bandwidth and 320ps. With the A6 you'd be sharing the system mem's bandwidth, which at ddr3 1866 or less, will be under 32GB/s in dual channel mode. Only in a few things, or where the newer directx/opengl features are used will the llano pull ahead.

 

[Arkaign]

Yep, go with C. Drop-in FTW, and Llano only moderately shines with the best DDR3 ram, 1333 gimps them terribly, and 1600 is borderline. They need 1866 to even approach decent performance, the 4670 is just plain better.

 

[Denithor]

How expensive is energy in your country? The Intel chips are considerably lower power consumption. Over the course of three years this might add up significantly and offset the higher initial cost.

One idea to consider - instead of upgrading all your systems at once with your limited budget, use that budget to upgrade say a third of your machines now. In 6-12 months upgrade another third to whatever is a good bargain chip at that time. And so on. Getting on a replacement cycle instead of doing them all at once would help spread the impact on cashflow out and let you get better parts each time.

 

[frozeneyes]

thank you all for the opinions, really appreciate it

I dont think the X4 945 works in the AM2 socket. Its AM3 only.

http://products.amd.com/en-us/DesktopCPUDetail.aspx?id=534

ah yea sorry my bad, my board is AM2+ Biostar MCP6P M2+

How expensive is energy in your country? The Intel chips are considerably lower power consumption. Over the course of three years this might add up significantly and offset the higher initial cost.

One idea to consider - instead of upgrading all your systems at once with your limited budget, use that budget to upgrade say a third of your machines now. In 6-12 months upgrade another third to whatever is a good bargain chip at that time. And so on. Getting on a replacement cycle instead of doing them all at once would help spread the impact on cashflow out and let you get better parts each time.

yea that is also my concern when upgrading to phenom II x4 which has the highest TDP out of the 3 CPU listed, and yes that is a good idea to upgrade maybe half of the machines, thanks, I will consider that

again thank you all for the valuable inputs

 

[Vesku]

I dont think the X4 945 works in the AM2 socket. Its AM3 only.

http://products.amd.com/en-us/DesktopCPUDetail.aspx?id=534

AM3 CPUs will work with DDR2 motherboards assuming the bios supports it. Best to checkout your motherboards support page.

 

[videogames101]

I like Option A because 4GB of memory should really be at the top of the upgrade list. The games listed aren't going to be CPU-bound anyways.

 

[Yuriman]

The Phenom option is definitely offers the best performance at the lowest initial cost, but you'll see a decent drop in load power consumption and very significant drops in idle power with the Intel chips.

If you can get a G645 for little more it might be a good idea - it lacks the iGPU and is clocked 200mhz higher.

 

[SPBHM]

Sempron 140 is AM3,
but the X4 945 uses more power, so make sure your MB support 95 or 125w TDP CPUs,
also be aware that the PSU will be more demanded, and if you multiply by 15 you will pay a little bit more money on electricity.

 

[richierich1212]

D. G530s

 

[mikeymikec]

I assume the OS is XP. Are you planning in the security expiry in April 2014, at which point it won't get any more security updates?

I might consider option A but re-using the old graphics cards, then upgrading the graphics cards later (so rather than wait a few years and do complete upgrades, smaller upgrades more often).

I'm not a big fan of the ECS/MSI boards in terms of quality, but I appreciate the (probably) tight budget and perhaps that the boards don't need to last that long.

 

[cytg111]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PicoJava

 

[Zap]

What about an in-between chip upgrade? Instead of going full bore with a single core to quad core upgrade, are there any dual cores you can get?

How about upgrading around half using something similar to A and then using the leftover DDR2 in the other systems if they have 4 RAM slots?

 

[Sheep221]

Don't buy the X4, though it will work in AM2 there will be significant performance drop and significant increase in power consumption. The option A is best, investing $30 more you get fast dual core CPU and additional 2 gigs of RAM which is also a DDR3

 

[VirtualLarry]

I agree with option A.

 

[Jimzz]

Can you sell the current guts/systems to help push the system specs up?

If so try and get a A-10 CPU and A75 based board with 4Gb of 1866 ram.

I would not upgrade the current system as that cost is way to high compared to the others.

 

[Bryf50]

What about something like this if it's available. The extra core and increased clocks would give you a sizeable performance increase. You should also throw in another 2gbs of ram.

 

[DooKey]

I like option A as well. Very low power consumption, good performance, less heat generated and you still have an upgrade path on the cpu for later on.

 

[Hubb1e]

Option A leaves you with a very good upgrade path in 2-3 years and will save you money on electricity over option C which is probably important considering these are probably on 12 hours a day.

Option B is not a good upgrade. You would be better off getting an cheap X2 as another person posted which actually isn't a bad idea except that 2GB of ram is getting a bit long in the tooth for gaming.

Option C is a not viable because your motherboard only supports 95W cpus. You could drop in an X2 for $60, X3 for $70, or an Athlon X4 for $80 but not a Phenom II X4. My vote would probably be for the X3 since it runs at 3.3ghz vs the 3 ghz that the X4 runs at while coming very close to the X2 at 3.4ghz. If your games were more threaded then X4 all the way but they aren't. Still, my first choice would be A but this is quite a bit cheaper when multiplied by 15.

 

[sm625]

Try to find a phenom II that your motherboard will support. I'm sure you feel the need to upgrade due to the fact that you are running on a single core, single thread 2.7GHz cpu. I believe that for the games you mention, all you need is two threads running at 3.4GHz, maybe 3 threads. But dont accept less than 3.2Ghz per thread in your quest for a cpu. Games like HoN and LoL barely use a second thread let alone 3. They do however want their primary thread to run as fast as possible.

My first choice would be a phenom X2 565. But I wouldnt pay more than $90. 2nd choice would be a phenom II X2 560, again no more than $90. 3rd choice: I would get an athlon x3 460 if you can find it for under $80. (Probably not.) 4th choice: athlon x3 455. This one should be found easily enough for under $75.

See this page to get an idea of what to expect from an upgrade: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/Sempron_140/10.html Clearly it doesnt matter what you upgrade to, in the grand scheme of things. The major point is that any upgrade is going to give you a huge boost to fps.

 

[Denithor]

If your current motherboards will support 4 memory sticks each, I like the suggestion above of upgrading half your machines now to base model Intel setups and then using the memory from the out-of-service machines to increase the remaining ones to 4GB.

One further thing I would suggest - buy 4GB sticks for those new machines. That way you can always upgrade to 8GB on each by just adding a second 4GB stick instead of having to replace 2GB sticks. Plus resell on 4GB should be a little higher than 2GB later on.

 

[onething]

A is the best option if these are your only 3 choices.