My 8150 Bulldozer experience - so far!

[guskline]

And you have made your point its obvious you guys aren't going to agree anytime soon, so why keep adding more pages to this thread. I don't think the OP wanted this to turn into a Intel vs AMD thread he was just posting his real life experience with the build.

Thank you Makaveli. Couldn't have said it better. When I get home tonight, I'm going to install the GTX680 and play some games on the Bulldozer. Then i'm going to download the benchies that infa64 mentioned and run them on the Bulldozer with the GTX680 and the 2500k with the GTX680 and post the results. Time permitting I'll have some more info to post by tomorrow. Thanks again for your post.

 

[pcsavvy]

+1

 

[Durvelle27]

Thank you Makaveli. Couldn't have said it better. When I get home tonight, I'm going to install the GTX680 and play some games on the Bulldozer. Then i'm going to download the benchies that infa64 mentioned and run them on the Bulldozer with the GTX680 and the 2500k with the GTX680 and post the results. Time permitting I'll have some more info to post by tomorrow. Thanks again for your post.

would love to see that

 

[AtenRa]

Now you are recommending Bulldozers? You claim not to be AMD biased, but you are recommending bulldozers?

So, if i recommend an Intel CPU (and i have so many times) im Intel biased???

Everyone knows what AtenRa is. You pretend to be better than that, but you are the same.

What everyone knows what AtenRa is ???

 

[Makaveli]

Thank you Makaveli. Couldn't have said it better. When I get home tonight, I'm going to install the GTX680 and play some games on the Bulldozer. Then i'm going to download the benchies that infa64 mentioned and run them on the Bulldozer with the GTX680 and the 2500k with the GTX680 and post the results. Time permitting I'll have some more info to post by tomorrow. Thanks again for your post.

i'm looking forward to seeing those results also

 

[elitejp]

So, if i recommend an Intel CPU (and i have so many times) im Intel biased???




What everyone knows what AtenRa is ???

Seriously I think your the only one trying to pick a fight in this thread, and its getting pretty annoying.

Back to the topic:
I was pretty surprised about how well haswell does compared to Sandy/Ivy Bridge. As im looking at building a computer to mainly deal with photoshop i started running into people on forums that were actually recommending the AMD 8150. But from the majority of posts on this forum you continually hear how intel just "totally destroys" amd and how bulldozer is an "epic fail" etc. So I just figured that intel was the way to go. Im glad to see a bit of level headed opinions in this thread. Not everyone uses their computer to game. Then in further research I saw the amd 8150 ranking higher than the i5/i7 chips in a cost to value comparison. It just seems to me that amd isnt this slow chip that everyone is trying to make it out to be. It isnt the fastest but outside of spending your day running benchmarks and posting it on the internet does amd really feel slower in everyday use compared to intel? From what I am reading here probably not. This and the fact that amd really goes out of their way to maintain backwards compatibility really makes me like the company even more.:thumbsup:

 

[MentalIlness]

Boy a very tough question. Here's what I'm going to do. This weekend, I'm going to switch out the GTX680 from my Intel 2500k rig (both 2500ks are identically clocked just different mbs and the 3 monitor one has 2 GTX670s in SLI) below, rig 2 and put it in rig 3, the Bulldozer rig, AND I'm going to hook up the rig 3 box to the 28 inch Hanns G monitor and "game" for awhile. I'll then post my feelings. I only have COD MW3, Crysis2 and BF3 on the Dozer rig. Were you looking for a particular game? Hope that helps.

I can already tell you that the Bulldozer rig hooked up to a 23 inch monitor and a single 5850 is very smooth in gaming. Hard to tell the difference. BUT I'll put in the GTX680 and use the 28" monitor to narrow the gap. BTW the intel rigs have 520 ssds and faster secondary HDs so that might account for some of the difference. Let me close by saying that in most benchies so far the 2500k clocked at 4.5Ghz is faster but the Bulldozer 8150 at 4.5Ghz closes the gap. Also most of the benchies are single threaded.

In cinebench 11.5 the 2500k scores 7.01 but the Bulldozer score 7.38.

Thanks. Looking forward to your results. :thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[paperfist]

Anyone who thinks Bulldozer is good for raw CPU performance and gaming, is 100% jaded.
Sure, you can get a Bulldozer rig cheaper than a Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge rig, but if you have enough money for a SB or IB... would you really build a Bulldozer rig instead? I certainly wouldn't, unless I liked lack luster performance and high wattage use.

I'm not jaded, but I'm considering building an AMD FX-8150 rig over an Intel i5-3570K Ivy Bridge. I don't really game a lot anymore and instead use more productivity aps. For some reason I just want to play around with 8 cores. I know it's not going to be the fastest rig around and I know I'll only be saving $75, but I'm still thinking of going AMD.

I haven't fully decided yet though and Intel's Smart Response has me on the fence.

 

[guskline]

Sorry for the delay in getting back. When I got home last night (long day before the Labor day weekend and the "crazies" were out) I saw a box for WD sitting there. I had posted that I had a Bad WD Blue Caviar 320G that I had to return to WD. It was still under warranty. I had to use a WD Green 1 TB 32meg cache as my secondary drive where I put games etc, not the fastest setup. I open the box and there sits a brand new (July 9,2012 date) WD Blue 500G Sata 3 HD! WOW WD KUDOS to you!

Well out came the green HD and in went the new one. FASTER? Oh yes. Now I'm closer to matching up components with rig 2 below that has a WD Black 500g sata3 hd.

Also I switched the GTX 680 GPU into the Bulldozer rig to play games.

I've run some muti-threaded tests on the Bulldozer and the same on the 2500k rig

These results are with both CPUs clocked to 4.5 Ghz (8150 vs 2500k) and both using the GTX 680

Cinebench 11.5
8150 7.42 CPU pts 52.27 Open GL (Note with a single 5850 GPU it scored 69.03!)
2500k 7.15 CPU pts 63.65 Open GL

Povray for Window 3.7 basic benchmark
8150 4min 45sec
2500k 3min 31 sec

True Crypt 7.1a benchmark with 50 MB buffer size
Results are Encrption/Decryption/Mean
8150
AES 2.4/2.3/2.4
Twofish 763/860/812
AES Twofish 640/703/672
Serpent 412/466/439
Serpent AES 421/414/417
Twofish Serpent 292/302/297
AES Twofish Serpent 272/281/276
Serpent twofish AES 271/280/276

2500k
AES 3.4/3.5/3.4
Twofish 532/578/555
AES Twofish 463/497/480
Serpent 306/321/314
Serpent AES 279/296/287
Twofish Serpent 194/207/200
AES Twofish Serpent 184/195/190
Serpent twofish AES 184/195/189

Man did that take a long time to type!
I'll run more tests later. You can draw your own conclusions . Like Joe Friday I'm just reporting the "facts".

Now my impressions, not facts, impressions. With the GTX 680 in the Bulldozer rig, I know that gaming frame rates may be higher with the SB BUT the limited game play I did with the same games COD MW3 and BF3 felt the same. The 8150 was just as smooth. I've played those games with 965BE OC /1100T OC and the 2500k "felt" faster. Perhaps the memory improvement of the Bulldozer, despite all of its "warts" has helped. Moreover with a high end GPU, right now I think the GTX680 can be called that, the gameplay differences are really masked by the power of the GPU.

BTW, with the addition of the TruePower II 750W and the Corsair H100 cooling, I'm now back to running the Bulldozer at 4.5Ghz solid with 5850s in CF. The GTX680 goes back into the Intel rig.

My impressions are that the Bulldozer 8150 is NOT this horrible monster that some take relish in portraying it as. Is the 2500k more power efficient? YES Is the 2500K better on synthetic gaming marks? For the most part yes. If you buy the same GPU/HD etc would you notice it? In my limited testing no.

Does that mean I would buy it instead of the Intel chip? Probably not. The price has dropped enough that those already owning a 990FX MB who do a lot of multi-tasking might make the move. For gamers, by the time you add in the cost of better cooling to make the 8150 competitive the better route may be Intel.

For me, I'm happy. I now have an all AMD rig that isn't quite as fast as it's Intel brothers in most games but pretty darned close, plus I have the option of using the Bulldozer for muti threaded apps as my primary rig.

I hope this has helped you. Sorry for rambling but I wanted to be as honest and accurate as can be. That's very hard even for me when we all fall into that Intel vs AMD mode. Makes the Hatfields and the McCoys look like "kissin cousins in comparison.

I'll try to run other benchies as you request them.

 

[soccerballtux]

Ouch. I am waiting for an answer to this, AtenRa!

*grabs popcorn*

IDK. Hm, well it does ok against the 2500k, which is all anyone ever wanted it to beat.
I wonder how well/not well those programs are multithreaded. Why can it keep neck and neck with the best intel chips at BF3 but nothing else??? Maybe BF3 just isn't fully loading each core.

 

[Makaveli]

IDK. Hm, well it does ok against the 2500k, which is all anyone ever wanted it to beat.
I wonder how well/not well those programs are multithreaded. Why can it keep neck and neck with the best intel chips at BF3 but nothing else??? Maybe BF3 just isn't fully loading each core.

I think that's because most people run into gpu bottlenecks before the CPU starts holding things up. Also the low threaded nature of most games doesn't help. I can really only think of a handle full of games that require a quad plus high ipc.

 

[guskline]

soccerballtux, to answer your question, at stock the 8150 CANNOT stay close to the 2500k. At high OCs the gap narrows but in most cases doesn't close. I think you would have to push the 8150 to nearly 5Ghz to take the lead on single threaded apps. The point of my thread is that at 4.5 Ghz each (8150 is base 3.6 and 2500k is base 3.3) the performance is close enough that you don't notice it in most cases especially when I used the GTX680. Synthetic benchmarks still have the 2500k winning most single threaded benchmarks but the gap over the 8150 is narrow. The real problem is that to get to 4.5 Ghz on the 8150 you have power and thermal problems. You need a strong PSU and most likely a liquid cooler. The 2500k is much more power efficient and you can use a cooler such as the Hyper212+ with no problem. Also you should have a quality AM3+ mb with a 990FX chipset for max OCs. If Piledriver can improve thermals and efficiency with a slight improvement in IPC maybe the gap with the 2500k will narrow more.

 

[Vic Vega]

My impressions are that the Bulldozer 8150 is NOT this horrible monster that some take relish in portraying it as. Is the 2500k more power efficient? YES Is the 2500K better on synthetic gaming marks? For the most part yes. If you buy the same GPU/HD etc would you notice it? In my limited testing no.

A coworker and I came to a similar conclusion not too long ago after comparing our PCs, using each others' PCs for work and gaming for several days. We both at the time had Crossfire HD5850s, 74GB Raptor HDs and both had our CPUs clocked at 4.0GHz, his an i7 920, mine a PII X4 965. The conclusion for us at the time was that there was no discernible difference between the two at all, not in gaming, not in desktop use. It just wasn't there. If someone didn't tell you the specs of the machines, you would have thought they were the same - they were even in the same Antec P183/CP-1000 combo with the same LCDs.

So, in your case the tech has moved on. We now have Bulldozer and Sandy Bridge instead of Deneb and Bloomfield but I suspect it's much of the same.

 

[Mallibu]

A coworker and I came to a similar conclusion not too long ago after comparing our PCs, using each others' PCs for work and gaming for several days. We both at the time had Crossfire HD5850s, 74GB Raptor HDs and both had our CPUs clocked at 4.0GHz, his an i7 920, mine a PII X4 965. The conclusion for us at the time was that there was no discernible difference between the two at all, not in gaming, not in desktop use. It just wasn't there. If someone didn't tell you the specs of the machines, you would have thought they were the same - they were even in the same Antec P183/CP-1000 combo with the same LCDs.

So, in your case the tech has moved on. We now have Bulldozer and Sandy Bridge instead of Deneb and Bloomfield but I suspect it's much of the same.

That's a good point, but not the whole truth. I doub't you'd notice anything even if I switched your Phenom with an i3 2100 or Athlon II x4.
I went recently from Phenom II x965->i5 2500 and in some cases the differences where minimal, but in others it was a lot. So it probably depends on what apps/games one is running and his sense of 'speed'.
The last one complicates things a bit. I've seen people that noticed no difference when they replaced HDD with SSD just because "it was fast enough already". Does that mean that SSD's ain't worth it? There's a lot cases of people saying "every game runs ultra smooth on my pc, no probs" and they mean that it runs with ~40fps average.
The fact that Bulldozer is "good enough" in a percentage of software so it's shortcomings can't be seen with naked eye isn't a reason to buy it. Granted, some people go over the board and make it seem that it has totally crap performance but the truth is, it doesn't suck but it's dissapointing at least.
Why should I buy FX when it's less future proof (IPC shortcomings will become more apparent as software progresses), has good performance in few applications but mediocre all-around, and consumes a buttload of power?(It's not the electric bill. It's just I dont like to have a CPU in my box that consumes ~400 watt when overclocked) Saving 30$ bucks isn't even close to a convincing reason,when I buy a brand new system and expect it to be balanced (not mediocre CPU with 450$ GPU, that's dumb unless someone games 24/7..and if he's desperate for budget cuts for a better GPU then he can save another $40 by going to an i3 2100 over FX and having same or better gaming performance )

 

[Vic Vega]

That's a good point, but not the whole truth.

Sure it is. I don't think you understand how this personal experience thing works. That is my and my coworkers' personal experience. It may not be directly relate-able to what YOU have experienced but by no means does it make it untrue. :thumbsup:

 

[Mallibu]

Sure it is. I don't think you understand how this personal experience thing works. That is my and my coworkers' personal experience. It may not be directly relate-able to what YOU have experienced but by no means does it make it untrue. :thumbsup:

What I mean with "the whole truth" is that I may not see the difference between a fast car and a slow car in a crowded road, but that doesn't make them equal. So, wrong expression maybe (my English are bad ()) but point still stands.

 

[guskline]

Mallibu: I understand your comments but fast car slow car might not be the best comparison. How about Very fast and not as fast. The 8150 at 4.5 Ghz in rig 3 below is fast. BTW mallibu have you actually used a Bulldozer 8150 or is your analysis based upon what you have read?

Vic: How about those 5850s in CF AMAZING. One of the best purchases I ever made.

 

[Vic Vega]

Mallibu: I understand your comments but fast car slow car might not be the best comparison. How about Very fast and not as fast. The 8150 at 4.5 Ghz in rig 3 below is fast. BTW mallibu have you actually used a Bulldozer 8150 or is your analysis based upon what you have read?

Vic: How about those 5850s in CF AMAZING. One of the best purchases I ever made.

Easily the best GPU setup I have ever used. I keep thinking about upgrading them but haven't found a reason to yet. They eat up anything.

 

[guskline]

Easily the best GPU setup I have ever used. I keep thinking about upgrading them but haven't found a reason to yet. They eat up anything.

I was able to "Tweak the 8150" to 4.6 Ghz totally stable (20 x 230fsb) and with the 5850s stock, they are the 765 Mhz version, I got 7318 for a performance score in 3DMark11. Not bad for these "oldie moldies"() For 24/7/265 use I'm still staying at 4.5Ghz (21.5 x 210) which yiels a slightly slower score but runs a little cooler.

Game play on a 23" 1920 x 1080 monitor is great. I'll be interested to see what they really did with the PileDriver.

 

[MLSCrow]

I'm not jaded, but I'm considering building an AMD FX-8150 rig over an Intel i5-3570K Ivy Bridge. I don't really game a lot anymore and instead use more productivity aps. For some reason I just want to play around with 8 cores. I know it's not going to be the fastest rig around and I know I'll only be saving $75, but I'm still thinking of going AMD.

I haven't fully decided yet though and Intel's Smart Response has me on the fence.

If you're going to build a rig from scratch, even though I'm an AMD fan, I'd say stick with the 3570K, however, if you're heart is set on 8 slower cores, wait a month and get the Piledriver+ refresh aka: FX8350 instead of the FX8150. It should consume a lot less power and perform better (apparently only around 5% in single threaded, but up to 15% in multi) and from the figures I've been looking at, the 8350 should be released for around the same price as the 3570K. From everything I've read, I'm expecting it to come out in October, but who knows...AMD has been so very quiet about Piledriver+ (Vishera). I'd wait for that though. And if it's true that AMD is going to cancel the release of Vishera altogether, I'd personally wait for Steamroller, unless you absolutely need something right now.

Thank god AMD is actually going to come back swinging, it's just that it won't be until Steamroller. I doubt it will beat Haswell, but I firmly believe it will compete with Ivy Bridge, which, honestly, is enough performance for anyone. Hell, I still believe that a Phenom II x4 system is enough for almost anyone (though I admit, it's gotten to that point where it's not enough for me anymore :'()

 

[frozentundra123456]

soccerballtux, to answer your question, at stock the 8150 CANNOT stay close to the 2500k. At high OCs the gap narrows but in most cases doesn't close. I think you would have to push the 8150 to nearly 5Ghz to take the lead on single threaded apps. The point of my thread is that at 4.5 Ghz each (8150 is base 3.6 and 2500k is base 3.3) the performance is close enough that you don't notice it in most cases especially when I used the GTX680. Synthetic benchmarks still have the 2500k winning most single threaded benchmarks but the gap over the 8150 is narrow. The real problem is that to get to 4.5 Ghz on the 8150 you have power and thermal problems. You need a strong PSU and most likely a liquid cooler. The 2500k is much more power efficient and you can use a cooler such as the Hyper212+ with no problem. Also you should have a quality AM3+ mb with a 990FX chipset for max OCs. If Piledriver can improve thermals and efficiency with a slight improvement in IPC maybe the gap with the 2500k will narrow more.

This does not make sense to me. At stock, the 8150 is 0.3ghz higher clocked than the 2500K but you say it cannot compete. Then you say when both are at 4.5ghz, the 8150 is competitive. How can the gap narrow (or as you claim, disappear) when the 2500k is faster at a lower clock and overclocked more to the same final clock? When both are overclocked is there some other kind of bottleneck? I just dont see how taking a slower chip and overclocking it less can suddenly bring equal performance.

 

[guskline]

This does not make sense to me. At stock, the 8150 is 0.3ghz higher clocked than the 2500K but you say it cannot compete. Then you say when both are at 4.5ghz, the 8150 is competitive. How can the gap narrow (or as you claim, disappear) when the 2500k is faster at a lower clock and overclocked more to the same final clock? When both are overclocked is there some other kind of bottleneck? I just dont see how taking a slower chip and overclocking it less can suddenly bring equal performance.

The 8150 was originally designed to run at a higher clock speed to stay competitive with the SB but to keep within the thermal package it was clocked at 3.6/3.9/4.2. As you ramp up the clock speed I notice in most benchmarks the gap between it and my SB 2500k narrows somewhat but never closes in most benchmarks (exception Cinebench 11.5 the 8150 leads at 4.5Ghz but it should with a 4 core advantage!).
For the 8150 to take the lead in most benchmarks it would have to clock at @ 5Ghz and for all practical purposes that can't happen. However, with both the SB 2500k at stock and the Bulldozer 8150 at stock the gap and feel difference is greater than when both are clocked at 4.5 Ghz. Strange but that's what I notice.

 

[guskline]

This is a follow up to all of the above posts. When I started this thread I hopefully made it clear that I was going to try to give an unbiased opinion of my experience of the 8150 as opposed to my 2500ks ( and to a lesser degree my 1100T). Along this "journey" I upgraded both the case and cooling.

My thoughts. If you are building from scratch, a decent z77 mb (in the price range of the Asus Sabertooth 990fx $180) plus a 3570k will cost $40 more than a 8150 plus the sabertooth. SPEND the extra dough! To get the Bulldozer to run close enough to my 2500k, which is slightly slower than the 3570k you have to have high end cooling (spent @$114 for Corsair H100) and ramp up the clock speed which requires a beefier PSU. I am not posting this to "BASH" the 8150. I jumped on it when it dropped to $170. Not the best money move I ever made but considering my "thirst" to try it myself coupled with a solid 990FX mb and two "unused" 5850s I decided to make the move. If you are not a computer nerd like me who loves playing with different combos and only have the $$ for 1 new build, primarily for gaming, I have to recommend an Intel build. The gap, all things considered, is too wide not to choose the Intel especially for gamers. If you have a 1100T on a 990FX mb wait for the PileDriver if not the Steamroller unless you are anxious to see what an "8 core" is like. The 8150 does have better memory handling than the 1100T.

All of this leads to an obvious question. Why, with all the poor Bulldozer 8150 reviews would I buy one? Are you nuts? Well the nuts part my wife has already answered in the affirmative. We have a happy detante after 39 years of marriage. I promised her I wouldn't ask how much she spends at Talbots if she held off on grilling me about how much i spend on computer parts. It's worked so far! I'm sure she has spent $170 on clothing that she "had" to have that isn't her favorite or best looking.

As to the poor reviews for the 8150, they compared the 8150 properly to the 2600k/3770k and even the 2500k and below and it simply didn't match up.
My reason to get one comes down to that famous line in the Dirty Harry movie when Harry (Clint Eastwood) is pointing his 6" S&W 29 .44 mag at the bad guy and saying something like " Now, did I shoot 5 round or six, punk?" I'm like the guy on the ground who says " I gots to know!":sneaky: Well, I now know!D_O

I'll keep playing with this rig to try and "tweak" it some more.

I'll be glad to run more benchmarks if you want and I can get them for free. ( Just ran 3Dmark11 on the 8150 rig and it scored 7318 in performance mode).

Thanks for reading.

 

[Mallibu]

This is a follow up to all of the above posts. When I started this thread I hopefully made it clear that I was going to try to give an unbiased opinion of my experience of the 8150 as opposed to my 2500ks ( and to a lesser degree my 1100T). Along this "journey" I upgraded both the case and cooling.

My thoughts. If you are building from scratch, a decent z77 mb (in the price range of the Asus Sabertooth 990fx $180) plus a 3570k will cost $40 more than a 8150 plus the sabertooth. SPEND the extra dough! To get the Bulldozer to run close enough to my 2500k, which is slightly slower than the 3570k you have to have high end cooling (spent @$114 for Corsair H100) and ramp up the clock speed which requires a beefier PSU. I am not posting this to "BASH" the 8150. I jumped on it when it dropped to $170. Not the best money move I ever made but considering my "thirst" to try it myself coupled with a solid 990FX mb and two "unused" 5850s I decided to make the move. If you are not a computer nerd like me who loves playing with different combos and only have the $$ for 1 new build, primarily for gaming, I have to recommend an Intel build. The gap, all things considered is too wide. If you have a 1100T on a 990FX mb wait for the PileDriver if not the Steamroller unless you are anxious to see what an "8 core" is like. The 8150 does have better memory handling than the 1100T.

I'll keep playing with this rig to try and "tweak" it some more. I'll try to run benchmarks if you want and I can get them for free. ( Just ran 3Dmark11 on the 8150 rig and it scored 7318 in performance mode).

Thanks for reading.

Good to hear that, since that's what we were arguing for all over the thread. Thanks for the detailed feedback.

 

[guskline]

Thanks Mallibu. It's very hard to base an opinion of a computer part on just what you read from others because of so many variables. The 8150 Bulldozer reviews for the most part were correct in their comparisons to Intel based on my observation and to some extent even to the 1090/1100Thubans. However, some of the vitrol that has spewed out calling this the worst CPU to ever be put out doesn't match up with my findings. It all depends on what CPU you are coming from. I honestly don't know what "improvements" the PileDriver will have to make a big difference. I hope they are significant. I'm concerned that the Steamroller marketing might be a hint that they are not that great over the Bulldozer so AMD is going to "redesign" the internals of the CPU. We shall have to wait and see. For now, I'll happily chug along with the 4.5Ghz Bulldozer 8150 with dual 5850s in CF.