Does any of the conventional wisdom not apply...

[Infohawk]

Thinking about a building a new budget gaming rig. I have zero interest in overclocking. The conventional wisdom is that intel is the best bang for the buck right now. But if I'm not interested in overclocking, does the same remain true? Anything else I should consider if I'm not overclocking?

 

[Nvidiaguy07]

if you want bang for your buck then your best bet would be overclocking. You can get a 60 dollar chip to perform like a 200 dollar one at stock speeds with minimal effort. Why wouldn't you want to overclock?

 

[Infohawk]

I don't really want to get into a debate on overclocking but in my case I don't want to void any warranties and I am more interested in keeping noise down than performance.

 

[thilanliyan]

I got a a 9850BE for $190 CAD and you can get a 780g motherboard for ~$100 so I'd say if you want to keep price down and don't care much about OCing (although you can if you want to) then AMD is a good choice...but the stock cooler is a bit loud even with Intel I think.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

I dont know about AMD atm. It really depends upon what type of performance you are looking for. If you are a casual user, probably something along the lines of their cheapest dual core and 4gb of cheap DDR2, and pair it with a 4350 and you'll be golden.

If you game, OTOH, its a much different story. If you are not cpu limited, i'd choose an AMD 7750, otherwise pick up an E8400 or an intel quad. The Phenom 1 series of quad cores are not energy efficient and are a bit slower clock for clock. Some people have found my cpu and a cheap ECS mATX board along the lines of $135. The Q8200 matches the performance of the Q6600. It just isn't a good overclocker.

 

[SunnyD]

If you're NOT going to overclock, you'll be better dollar for dollar, MHz for MHz going with Intel in terms of overclocking.

 

[Philippart]

I recently got a Phenom 8750: it's cheap; runs cool; great performance/price for gaming, especially with all these newer games which support multicore cpus (3cores >>>>2cores in such a situation). However I'd buy a new cooler, the stock cooler isn't silent!

I know you don't overclock, but I still want to let you know that Phenoms are great for undervolting this makes it generate even less heat and noise

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: Infohawk
Thinking about a building a new budget gaming rig. I have zero interest in overclocking. The conventional wisdom is that intel is the best bang for the buck right now. But if I'm not interested in overclocking, does the same remain true? Anything else I should consider if I'm not overclocking?

It's difficult to make recommendations, w/o knowing your budget.

Check front page, and AT has their current "PC's for under $1000" guide up.

Also, check out the AT "Bench" tab on the extreme left of the home page for CPU comparisons.

 

[Concillian]

Intel is faster than AMD at the same clock. It's somewhere in the 20% faster neighborhood. So AMD processors only really compete against the celerons and e5200 (which, due to lack of cache are not in the same 20% faster neighborhood) if everything is kept stock.

If going more than dual-core, the Phenoms again only really compete with the x3 Phenoms and their lewst end quads where there is no direct Intel competition. That is, they are the best at that price because the cheapest Intel quads are more expensive.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: Concillian
Intel is faster than AMD at the same clock. It's somewhere in the 20% faster neighborhood. So AMD processors only really compete against the celerons and e5200 (which, due to lack of cache are not in the same 20% faster neighborhood) if everything is kept stock.

That's not unexpected, as outside of the lower-end chips, Intel is also more expensive clock-for-clock.

 

[exar333]

Originally posted by: Scholzpdx
I dont know about AMD atm. It really depends upon what type of performance you are looking for. If you are a casual user, probably something along the lines of their cheapest dual core and 4gb of cheap DDR2, and pair it with a 4350 and you'll be golden.

If you game, OTOH, its a much different story. If you are not cpu limited, i'd choose an AMD 7750, otherwise pick up an E8400 or an intel quad. The Phenom 1 series of quad cores are not energy efficient and are a bit slower clock for clock. Some people have found my cpu and a cheap ECS mATX board along the lines of $135. The Q8200 matches the performance of the Q6600. It just isn't a good overclocker.

+1

If you can find a quad-core combo for less than 200$ from intel, that would be the best deal around. Add 4-8GB RAM for cheap and you are doing great. Skip the Phenoms unless you absolutely need IGP, otherwise get a decent inexpensive discrete 8800gts/4650 card.

 

[n7]

In the lower end, there a bunch of nice cheap AM2 CPUs i'd consider if not OCing.

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: n7
In the lower end, there a bunch of nice cheap AM2 CPUs i'd consider if not OCing.

I agree.

You can get a decent enough AMD CPU for $50 or so these days. The platform should also be upgradeable to the Phenom 2 (OP - if you do go with AMD, I would make sure that you can do this).

 

[Extelleron]

The Phenom X4 9950 for ~$170 is just as good a choice as the Q6600 if you aren't overclocking, but it is not what I would choose for a gaming system.

For a budget gaming system (ie. HD 4850 or so as GPU) I would go with an Athlon X2 7750 if you aren't looking to spend much. At stock it is better than an E5200 for gaming purposes. Also the platform is well priced, for example you can get a 790FX board for $105: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813186149

Going w/ a solid 790FX board leaves you with the opportunity to upgrade to Phenom II / Athlon 45nm CPUs (dual, tri-core, or quad), all of which look much more impressive than what AMD has now. All in all it is a solid platform that, when not OCing, is easily the rival of what Intel has at the same price range.

On this forum we don't really see that side of the market, because 99% of the people on here are enthusiasts who OC and/or buy expensive hardware. Anyone who OCs or has a high budget is going to find it hard to justify buying AMD right now, but it is a different story entirely when you have a low budget and are planning on running a stock system.

 

[GaiaHunter]

Originally posted by: Extelleron
The Phenom X4 9950 for ~$170 is just as good a choice as the Q6600 if you aren't overclocking, but it is not what I would choose for a gaming system.

For a budget gaming system (ie. HD 4850 or so as GPU) I would go with an Athlon X2 7750 if you aren't looking to spend much. At stock it is better than an E5200 for gaming purposes. Also the platform is well priced, for example you can get a 790FX board for $105: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813186149

Going w/ a solid 790FX board leaves you with the opportunity to upgrade to Phenom II / Athlon 45nm CPUs (dual, tri-core, or quad), all of which look much more impressive than what AMD has now. All in all it is a solid platform that, when not OCing, is easily the rival of what Intel has at the same price range.

On this forum we don't really see that side of the market, because 99% of the people on here are enthusiasts who OC and/or buy expensive hardware. Anyone who OCs or has a high budget is going to find it hard to justify buying AMD right now, but it is a different story entirely when you have a low budget and are planning on running a stock system.

+1
:thumbsup:

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: GaiaHunter

Originally posted by: Extelleron
On this forum we don't really see that side of the market, because 99% of the people on here are enthusiasts who OC and/or buy expensive hardware. Anyone who OCs or has a high budget is going to find it hard to justify buying AMD right now, but it is a different story entirely when you have a low budget and are planning on running a stock system.

+1
:thumbsup:

+2
:thumbsup:

When AMD doesn't have the performance lead, then they go back to what they always do... price their stuff cheaper than Intel.

I just ordered a dual core Athlon 64 x2 4200+ AM2 chip for $36 with free shipping. The closest I can get to that price with an Intel chip is a Celeron 430 at $40, and the closest dual core Intel chip is the Celeron E1200 at $50. At stock speeds, I'm fairly confident that the 4200+ will be competitive with the E1200 while costing 2/3 the price. Sure, Intel is thought of as having better performance per MHz, but not only does the 4200+ have 400Mhz over the E1200, the E1200 has a mere 1/12 the cache of a chip like the popular E8400. That's got to knock it down a notch or two in performance.

Going up in price, for $70 you can get an Intel Pentium E2200 or an AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+. Sure, the E2200 can easily clock to just over 3GHz on a good board, but at stock speeds on $50 motherboards I'd think the AMD's 900MHz advantage would do it a bit of good.

If you have $300+ to spend on CPU/mobo? Even without overclocking, Intel is probably better at those price points. So, what's your budget?

 

[cusideabelincoln]

You are right, a 4200+ will destroy a Celeron, and at stock speeds the 6000+ would indeed be much faster than the E2200.

 

[aigomorla]

how come no one asked him what his budget was?

Becuase if its within a per say E7500 (out soon i have an ES) or E8500 class, and i saw them on sale at frys not too long ago, there is yet to be an AMD processor which can top that...

saw the E8500 for $150

umm.... the E8500 and E7500 would destory any amd chip stock or overclocked...
even the E8400 would be a smarter choice...

so what is this budget you have?

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: aigomorla
how come no one asked him what his budget was?

I did, in a slightly oblique way.

 

[Denithor]

Intel Dual and Quad core and AMD X4 comparison

Intel and AMD Dual and Tri Core comparison

Worth a read. AMD is not strong in the gaming field right now.

 

[PingSpike]

Honestly, if you're not overclocking AMD is probably worth a look unless you're buying high end. Intel motherboards tend to be more expensive, but their chips overclock way better so they're still cheaper if you go that route. But AMD has a lot of cheap chips that at stock speeds compete fairly well with intels cheaper stuff IIRC.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Originally posted by: Denithor
Intel Dual and Quad core and AMD X4 comparison

Intel and AMD Dual and Tri Core comparison

Worth a read. AMD is not strong in the gaming field right now.

I don't know about that. That second link seems to shine the Phenom 8750 in a good light. Just look at the UT3 results. And if you look at GTAIV benchmarks, the tri-core 8750 would be a better alternative than the similarly-priced E7300. Of course, AMD isn't competitive at the high-end, but in the mainstream they offer good value. But since he did say he was on a budget, I feel the 8750 would be just as worth of a choice for a gaming computer as an E7300.