Phenom II vs. FX-8350

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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Sorry if this has been posted before, but I didn't see anything on the topic in a quick forum search.

Anyway, my dad's starting to debate what he should do for a CPU upgrade. He wasn't sure if he'd be willing to go Intel (been an AMD person for probably 15 years), so he asked me about the FX-8000 series, and how it stacks up against the Phenom II. I think he has the 965, maybe the 955, but I was wondering if there had been any bench tests comparing the two or not. He asked if I knew how the FX octas compared to the Phenoms, and I hadn't seen anything, so I figured I'd check if any of you guys had seen them.

He was also considering waiting to see what (if anything) comes from the FX series for Excavator. He'd also thought about going Vishera now, then Excavator later, but I told him there's almost no chance AMD would keep that AM3+ socket for Excavator (it might be 4 years old and have taken a year off for Steamroller by then).

The suggestion I gave was to just take the Intel route (I did), because he'll probably end up needing a new board on his second upgrade, no matter what, and Intel's far ahead of AMD now. However, just a side question, do we know if there's any hope Broadwell stays on the 1150 socket or not? It'd be another notch in the Intel belt for this is a new board wasn't needed next year, but I know Intel's not a fan of saving consumers money on board.
 

VirtualLarry

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Aug 25, 2001
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However, just a side question, do we know if there's any hope Broadwell stays on the 1150 socket or not? It'd be another notch in the Intel belt for this is a new board wasn't needed next year, but I know Intel's not a fan of saving consumers money on board.
Broadwell-K will require an updated 1150 socket, and a new 9-series chipset. However, those new 1150 boards will be backwards-compatible (should be) with Haswell and Haswell-refresh.

From what I've seen thus far, current 1150 boards should support Haswell-refresh with just a BIOS update. Haswell-refresh, is just more Haswell 22nm CPUs, with a slight multiplier bump, and possibly a Pentium with an unlocked multiplier.
 

zir_blazer

Golden Member
Jun 6, 2013
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If his Motherboard supports Visheras so he can buy a FX-8300 as a drop-in replacement, it could be a useful upgrade. An FX-8300 should be an huge upgrade for Multitasking and Multithreaded applications, but on Single Thread is barely justificable above a Deneb. If he fits where Vishera may shine, possibily its worth it. If not, and he as some extra budget to spend, go Intel.
 

Gikaseixas

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Jul 1, 2004
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FX 8350 is a beast compared to that Phenom, if his motherboard supports one, then get it.
If not, consider also Intel (i5 quad)
 

AtenRa

Lifer
Feb 2, 2009
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What is the rest of his system ??
What is he using the PC for ?? Browsing ? video playback ? gaming ? Video/photo editing ?? etc

Depending on his usage, i would consider Kaveri and FM2+ mobo with an SFF Slim case.
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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Right now, he's not using it for anything but litecoin mining. The main reason he wants to look into a new CPU is he needs a new board because his current one only supports 16 GB of RAM, but he bought 32 GB (even though he doesn't need it). So, keeping this board's not in the cards. He hasn't really said anything about a budget because he's not dead-set on upgrading yet, but price won't be the issue here.

Long-term, he'll use it for the general everyday stuff (browser and such), along with some gaming. I'm not sure which games he'll play, because the only thing he's played semi-recently is Black Ops II. He could get Ghosts, he could wait until the Sledgehammer CoD. However, he also got BF4 with his video cards, so he might give that a go, I'm not all that sure.

Truth be told this is probably more of a "my PC is old, I want new stuff" upgrade than anything.
 

zir_blazer

Golden Member
Jun 6, 2013
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Then he is going to waste money in a meaningless way. If he needs a new Motherboard, he may as well jump to a Haswell for a bit more money.
Also, if he already has the RAM, why he doesn't try it? Don't pay attention to how much the Motherboard says that it supports. During early Phenom II era, 4 GB RAM modules were new, so the max manufacturers could try was 16 GB (4 * 4 GB). 8 GB modules weren't even on the horizon. Yet still I was able to run 32 GB (4 * 8 GB) on an Athlon II X4 (Deneb RB-C2) in an ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO.
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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He did try it, that's what brought this all about. I know, my old board said it was a 16-GB max board, but it took the 32 GB of RAM I have. Not sure why mine did but his didn't, since his was a higher-end board, but that seemed to be the case. IDK if he checked all the sticks or not, I know I told him to.

I'm with you, he's likely wasting money because he doesn't do a whole lot, but he tends to keep his processors for several years, so putting $300 or so into a new board and processor now's not the worst thing in the world. He had just been asking if there was anything to make going AMD worth it, but I can't think of a case where it would. It eats a lot more power, the single-thread performance is significantly worse, and given the age of the socket, the board likely wouldn't be reusable for his next CPU.

Really, the excuse to go AMD at this point is pretty tiny, IMO.
 

Yuriman

Diamond Member
Jun 25, 2004
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I don't think you ever mentioned what video card he's using. You might be able to justify an APU if he's on something very low-end currently, and/or if you wanted to move to a SFF with half-height cards or no room for expansion.
 

SlowSpyder

Lifer
Jan 12, 2005
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I'm probably kind of like your dad, an i5, i7, or FX all would have fit my needs and do what I need. I also had a Phenom II, a 1090T @ 4GHz. I went with an FX and do not regret it at all. But, I would likely be just as happy had I gone with an Intel CPU, too. The only thing that I can think of that should concern him is power use if he will leave the machine on non-stop for mining. But any of the CPU's I mentioned will be spending most of their time with a light load if mining, but still something to consider.
 

NTMBK

Lifer
Nov 14, 2011
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I don't think you ever mentioned what video card he's using. You might be able to justify an APU if he's on something very low-end currently, and/or if you wanted to move to a SFF with half-height cards or no room for expansion.

He's using it for Litecoin mining...
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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I don't think you ever mentioned what video card he's using. You might be able to justify an APU if he's on something very low-end currently, and/or if you wanted to move to a SFF with half-height cards or no room for expansion.

As I said, he's using it for litecoin mining, which doesn't occur on a low-end GPU, of course. Right now, he's got a pair of 290X cards in his computer (pre-ordered them for $500 each on Newegg before the prices got outrageous).
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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I'm probably kind of like your dad, an i5, i7, or FX all would have fit my needs and do what I need. I also had a Phenom II, a 1090T @ 4GHz. I went with an FX and do not regret it at all. But, I would likely be just as happy had I gone with an Intel CPU, too. The only thing that I can think of that should concern him is power use if he will leave the machine on non-stop for mining. But any of the CPU's I mentioned will be spending most of their time with a light load if mining, but still something to consider.

Well, the main thing is trying to justify the cost, I think. He just spent the $1100 or so on video cards and a PSU, plus he's spending money on his car, so this might not happen in the near-future, we'll see. Thing is, the AMD stuff isn't significantly cheaper, but Haswell IS significantly faster and efficient. It's mostly about finding out if there is value in getting an FX processor, and I don't really see it.

As a side note, what's with the FX-9000 series? Is there anything different between the 8000 series, besides the clock?
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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My dad and I were looking around for a decent amount of time last night about those 9000-series FX processors. For the life of us, we couldn't figure out why they are what they are. Why do they take 95W more than the FX-8350? Why do they need water (I'm guessing that's related to the befuddling power consumption)? The only differences we could find were the clock and wattage, then the 9000-series CPUs supported two extra instructions sets, FMA3, and I think the other was called ABM.

That didn't seem like a big deal. Does anyone know WHY the 9000-series takes the asinine wattage? I mean, why wouldn't you get the FX-8350 (of even 8320), then overclock it to the FX-9000 series levels? Is it that the extra wattage allows for better overclocking on the same cooling than the FX-8350 or something?

And last, slightly-off-topic side question: I see that the AMD stuff is PCIe 2.0, awhile the Z87 stuff's PCIe 3.0. Is there a meaningful difference in them, in terms of GPU performance? My dad's running the 290X, would it run better on 3.0 than 2.0?
 

AtenRa

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Feb 2, 2009
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The FX9000 series is meant for extreme Overclockers and High-End users that doesnt want to OC. Also for people that just like to have the fastest FX SKUs.

You dont need Water Cooling for the FX9000 series, a High-End Air Cooler will do the same job.
The FX9370 + WaterCooling Kit is cheaper than a Core i7 Ivy/Haswell. It uses more power but in Multithreaded or MultiTasking is very competitive (especially in Multi-Tasking).
Also, FX9000 + WC will be able to maintain a 5GHz OC without throttling even in warm conditions (40c Ambient) when Core i7 Ivy/HW paired with the Default heat-sink will only work at the default frequency. (comparing at the default prices)

Current Graphics Cards doesnt get a performance hit from PCIe Gen 2.0. The difference is 2-3 frames at the top even with Dual Cards is CF/SLI.
 

zir_blazer

Golden Member
Jun 6, 2013
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The FX-9000 series are a "factory overclock", parts which have to be binned because they're above of what the architecture is usually capable of. To get to these high Frequencies, you need more Voltage, more cooling, a Motherboard with beefy VRMs for the outrageous power consumption, and the end result is that you just match a Haswell in performance.
Seriously. Go for a Core i5 4670 or 4770. Chances are that you are not going to regret it.
 

SlowSpyder

Lifer
Jan 12, 2005
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The FX 9xxx CPU's use a higher voltage from the factory, that's why they use more power. And of course the faster clock speed. I think other Vishera chips run at 1.35 volts, the FX 9xxx CPU's run at 1.49 volts. My FX 9370 does 4.9GHz at the factory voltage setting, so I could look into undervolting if I really wanted, but I didn't really buy this CPU for efficiency in the first place. :)

From what I've seen there is no meaningful difference in performance between PCIE 2.0 and 3.0. At least not yet, not with single cards (and probably two cards?). But maybe in a system using three or four cards it would be a problem, where there is less bandwidth to split between them. But most rigs with multiple high end cards are running Intel anyway.
 

TreVader

Platinum Member
Oct 28, 2013
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The 9590 Will go to 5Ghz on 1 module stock. They're great chips, but I think the 8000 series is the better deal. Cheaper than a 4570 non-K and overclockable.


If you need bleeding edge everything you should be on socket 2011 anyway.
 

Ferzerp

Diamond Member
Oct 12, 1999
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I'm not going to go in to any opinions on the whole "mining" thing, but it *does* tell you exactly what you need.

You don't need these power guzzlers. You need the slowest, most efficient CPU you can find that can keep your GPUs fed for what you're doing. AMD's current offerings (at least the ones you are asking about, I don't know the efficiency on the lower end ones) are pretty much the opposite of what you want. I don't know how much it takes to keep GPUs going, but account for that, and not much more. Then take the part that can do that cheapest factoring in your power costs, because this thing runs 24/7.
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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I'm not going to go in to any opinions on the whole "mining" thing, but it *does* tell you exactly what you need.

You don't need these power guzzlers. You need the slowest, most efficient CPU you can find that can keep your GPUs fed for what you're doing. AMD's current offerings (at least the ones you are asking about, I don't know the efficiency on the lower end ones) are pretty much the opposite of what you want. I don't know how much it takes to keep GPUs going, but account for that, and not much more. Then take the part that can do that cheapest factoring in your power costs, because this thing runs 24/7.

Well, he's not buying a new CPU for mining. He's buying a new CPU for a long-term gaming option. He's just had the Phenom for a few years and is looking into his next CPU now. He only intends to keep the mining up for another 6 months or so, because he figures the difficulty on LTC will lose profitability by the end of the year. This isn't a mining CPU, mining's not a CPU-intensive thing. He's looking at a general-use/gaming CPU for the next few years.
 

Lil Frier

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The FX9000 series is meant for extreme Overclockers and High-End users that doesnt want to OC. Also for people that just like to have the fastest FX SKUs.

You dont need Water Cooling for the FX9000 series, a High-End Air Cooler will do the same job.
The FX9370 + WaterCooling Kit is cheaper than a Core i7 Ivy/Haswell. It uses more power but in Multithreaded or MultiTasking is very competitive (especially in Multi-Tasking).
Also, FX9000 + WC will be able to maintain a 5GHz OC without throttling even in warm conditions (40c Ambient) when Core i7 Ivy/HW paired with the Default heat-sink will only work at the default frequency. (comparing at the default prices)

Current Graphics Cards doesnt get a performance hit from PCIe Gen 2.0. The difference is 2-3 frames at the top even with Dual Cards is CF/SLI.

Yeah, but the comparison I was really looking at with the FX-9000 was an overclocked FX-8320/8350. I mean, will the FX-9000 stuff overclock any better than the FX-8300 stuff? I'm just wondering why you wouldn't get the FX-8350 and overclock it to those speeds yourself, if not the FX-8320.

But also, the Newegg FX-9000s don't come with coolers, do they? It's not really a fair comparison to take the FX-9000 with an aftermarket water cooler, then compare it to what Haswell does on stock air cooling. Plus, when you're talking about stock FX (3.5-4.0 GHz) not keeping up with stock Haswell (3.4-3.5 GHz), just saying "5 GHz" doesn't hold the same weight.

Over in the Cinebench thread, it showed the stock 4770K scoring almost the same as the FX-8350 up at 5.09 GHz, so wouldn't that indicate that the upper limits of Vishera's clocking just gets it on-par with stock Haswell? Of course, the i7's another $140. The 4670K was a bit further behind in those tests at 4.88 GHz, but I think it's pretty rare to get an OC that high on that chip, isn't it?
 

AtenRa

Lifer
Feb 2, 2009
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Yeah, but the comparison I was really looking at with the FX-9000 was an overclocked FX-8320/8350. I mean, will the FX-9000 stuff overclock any better than the FX-8300 stuff? I'm just wondering why you wouldn't get the FX-8350 and overclock it to those speeds yourself, if not the FX-8320.

Obviously the FX8320 is the best bang for the buck if you want to OverClock. It will easily get to 4.6-4.8GHz if you have a good motherboard and Cooler. The FX9000 is not for people looking for the best bang for the buck deal. But that doesnt mean there is no market for such CPUs.

But also, the Newegg FX-9000s don't come with coolers, do they? It's not really a fair comparison to take the FX-9000 with an aftermarket water cooler, then compare it to what Haswell does on stock air cooling. Plus, when you're talking about stock FX (3.5-4.0 GHz) not keeping up with stock Haswell (3.4-3.5 GHz), just saying "5 GHz" doesn't hold the same weight.

There was a FX9370 WaterCooling Kit at $250-270 (currently out of Stock). But even today you can have the FX9370 + Corsair H80i at $317 total (there is also a $12 off promo) or $335 with the Corsair H100i(+ $10 off AR) , when Core i7 4770K alone cost $340 (Newegg prices). So at the same price the FX9370 can be OCed to 5GHz even in a warm climate of 40c without throttling when Core i7 4770K can only be used at default settings.
Not to mention you can get the FX8320 + Corsair H80i for $235 total and OC to 4.6-4.8GHz easily. That is only $5 more than the Core i5 4670K alone.

Over in the Cinebench thread, it showed the stock 4770K scoring almost the same as the FX-8350 up at 5.09 GHz, so wouldn't that indicate that the upper limits of Vishera's clocking just gets it on-par with stock Haswell? Of course, the i7's another $140. The 4670K was a bit further behind in those tests at 4.88 GHz, but I think it's pretty rare to get an OC that high on that chip, isn't it?

Comparing only in one benchmark doesnt show the entire performance of each CPU. Yes the Core i7 4770K is the better product no question about that but there are applications/workloads that the FX9000 is faster(PovRay, powerdirector, Multitasking etc).
 

Lil Frier

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Oct 3, 2013
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Yeah, I know, it's just it was the only readily-available bench where I could compare the OC on the FX to a stock i7.

My thing is, I don't see the market for the FX-9000 series. The only POSSIBLE scenario I could see it as the winning choice is if someone was super-loyal to AMD but wasn't willing to learn to overclock, but that's got to be a super-small sample, one I wouldn't even expect to deserve a market.