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should i get an i5 2500k or amd fx 8120 8 core??

BD requires a REALLY BIG heatsink, from what I understand. I'm having trouble cooling my 95W Thuban X6, and the FX chips are worse, especially if you overclock.
 
TakeNoPrisoners said:
I have no idea what you are going to do with it
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So why are you offering senseless advice? 🙄

OP, it depends on what you're doing, how much energy consumption matters to you, and how much the chips are going to cost you.

There is an extremely valuable comparison of the FX-8120 and the 2500K over at OC.net. That should help you make up your mind. Essentially, they're similar performers, with the 2500K having a single-threaded advantage and the 8120 having a multi-threaded advantage (in workloads that use all eight cores). You can see from the specific benchmarks how they trade blows. The major drawback of the AMD chip is that its power consumption is substantially higher.

If you live near a Microcenter, you can get a higher-end board for free with an 8120 - that alone would make me go AMD if budget was a concern.
 
Gigantopithecus said:
So why are you offering senseless advice? 🙄

OP, it depends on what you're doing, how much energy consumption matters to you, and how much the chips are going to cost you.

There is an extremely valuable comparison of the FX-8120 and the 2500K over at OC.net. That should help you make up your mind. Essentially, they're similar performers, with the 2500K having a single-threaded advantage and the 8120 having a multi-threaded advantage (in workloads that use all eight cores). You can see from the specific benchmarks how they trade blows. The major drawback of the AMD chip is that its power consumption is substantially higher.

If you live near a Microcenter, you can get a higher-end board for free with an 8120 - that alone would make me go AMD if budget was a concern.
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You're kidding, right?
 
Or you could go even bigger w/an i7-2600k .... for $100 I'd say it's worth it, not just the HT, it also has a 2MB bigger cache. I'm seeing threads about how BF3 is CPU limited w/a 2500k where it is not w/a 2600k -- appears HT does actually improve performance! (gasp!)
 
As mentioned they seem to be fairly evenly matched in heavily threaded tasks, but the FX-8150 will be much slower in single/lightly threaded situations (emulation, more CPU limited games, etc.), it uses more power (especially when overclocked), and currently they're more expensive than the 2500K, it's difficult to find them at or below the $245 MSRP due to limited supply. Whereas you can pretty easily get a 2500K for $180, go to NCIX US and price match the 2500K they sell with Micro Center's in store price listed on their website. NCIX will match these in store prices and it seems like people have had success getting the $180 price match on the 2500K to go through. Or if you have a Micro Center in your area you could just buy one in store.

For a gaming system, 2500K is hands down the better CPU. But if the system will be used for number crunching and other heavily threaded stuff and you can get your hands on one for a good price, BD would be worth checking out IMO. The Micro Center FX-8120 and motherboard combo Gigantopithecus mentioned, for example, is a great deal.
 
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Yeah I think if you buy in store at Fry's they'll price match Micro Center's in store price. They just won't price match if you buy online, NCIX is the only computer parts store I think that matches online prices with in store. It's a pretty cool service they offer.
 
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I will be getting an FX6100 tomorrow. If you want to hold off this week, I can overclock it and run some tests on it to show you its performance/power consumption. I am really curious to see if this CPU is really as bad as others perceive it to be, plus it will give you an idea where FX sits. I can even run a side by side against my 2500k.


Did I mention this CPU can be found on Superbiiz for $135? 😉
 
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SLK said:
I will be getting an FX6100 tomorrow. If you want to hold off this week, I can overclock it and run some tests on it to show you its performance/power consumption. I am really curious to see if this CPU is really as bad as others perceive it to be, plus it will give you an idea where FX sits. I can even run a side by side against my 2500k.


Did I mention this CPU can be found on Superbiiz for $135? 😉
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Nice. I am interested in this, especially at maybe 4Ghz or wherever the Performance/PowerConsumption trade off really happens. I figure (roughly) that a BD core needs to have a ~20-25% clock speed advantage to beat a Thuban. So, that would put it squarely in the realm of the 1090t/1100t w/no OC. If it can do that without needing a bajillion watts of power then I can feel better about missing out on all the sweet x6 deals at MC over the past few months. I just finally get going on it and the best deals are over 🙁

If you have some tests you'd like run on a 1045t @ stock speeds for a comparison of AMD's ~$130 95W CPUs, let me know and I'll gladly spend some time running them. My gut feeling is the 6100-FX is pretty close to it...

Put me down as "subscribed to your thread" 🙂
 
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blckgrffn said:
Nice. I am interested in this, especially at maybe 4Ghz or wherever the Performance/PowerConsumption trade off really happens. I figure (roughly) that a BD core needs to have a ~20-25% clock speed advantage to beat a Thuban. So, that would put it squarely in the realm of the 1090t/1100t w/no OC. If it can do that without needing a bajillion watts of power then I can feel better about missing out on all the sweet x6 deals at MC over the past few months. I just finally get going on it and the best deals are over 🙁

If you have some tests you'd like run on a 1045t @ stock speeds for a comparison of AMD's ~$130 95W CPUs, let me know and I'll gladly spend some time running them. My gut feeling is the 6100-FX is pretty close to it...

Put me down as "subscribed to your thread" 🙂
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Do you have some thuban results at any realistic clockspeeds? We can compare some of those too.

EDIT: Should of read your 2nd paragraph... I need to quit scanning posts! :\1045t would be a good comparison.
 
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SLK said:
I am really curious to see if this CPU is really as bad as others perceive it to be
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My 6100 runs at 4200MHz with turbo enabled up to 4700MHz - it seems pretty common for these to run at 4700MHz - so it should just about hit the 20% extra clock speed you mentioned.

I don't have a clue how to measure the power usage you mentioned (watts). My voltage is set to 1.375 and fluctuates between .984 and 1.512.

That $135 seems like a good price over at Superbiiz on the FX6100- I am buying from them on a regular basis these days.
 
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If you have to ask which one, you probably don't need either. Get a 2100 or a 2400 i5. For general computation = 2500K; for specialized or highly-threaded applications that BD has been shown to excel in (there are some) BD.
 
TakeNoPrisoners said:
Get the i5. I have no idea what you are going to do with it but avoid BD.
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This. doesn't really matter what you do, the i2500k is the better choice. The few niche areas were the AMD is actually better, it is only marginally better while when it's worse it is a lot worse and consumes a lot more power. (Well if you live in a cold place the power is not lost as you will need less heating. 😉 )

Ignore Gigantopithecus. I don't know why he constantly keeps to recommend fx 8120 and the linked site is a joke. AFAIK he doesn't work for AMD.

Also note that the i5 has lower platfrom cost as AM+3 motherboards (the ones you need for fx) are more expensive than the ones for i5 and also there is a lot less choice.
 
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Newegg carries 56 AMD3+ m/bs ranging in price from ~$55-300 depending upon chipset and features. I am sure there are other sites you can go to find other AMD3+ m/bs that newegg does not carry.

Newegg carries 216 Intel 1155 m/bs ranging in price from ~$60-340 depending upon chipset and features. I am sure there are other sites you can go to find other Intel m/bs that newegg does not carry.

Got to wonder how many boards are duplicates of each other, the only difference being the brand.😕

Boils down to what your budget allows and what features are most important to you and where you are willing to compromise if budget is tight. Gaming vs HTPC vs casual user vs budget
 
If you have a Microcenter near you, then i'd go for the FX 8120 w/free motherboard.

I'd pick the GA-970A-UD3 Socket AM3+ 970 ATX AMD Motherboard personally.

Think about how much power you are getting for the price......that motherboard is normally $109, so that means you are getting an 8-Core FX cpu for essentially $90.

I'm not a huge BD fan, but damn a $90 8-Core processor sure sounds good 😉
 
daveybrat said:
Lol, really? So Newegg should change their description then?

AMD FX-8120 Zambezi 3.1GHz Socket AM3+ 125W Eight-Core Desktop Processor FD8120FRGUBOX
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It's an eight integer core processor and a quad floating point unit processor. An eight-core or a quad-core depending on how you look at it, but each of those cores is mindbogglingly slow for a Performance market product. That's the reason you have this:

efficiency_single-runtime.png


efficiency_multi-runtime.png
 
beginner99 said:
Ignore Gigantopithecus. I don't know why he constantly keeps to recommend fx 8120 and the linked site is a joke. AFAIK he doesn't work for AMD.
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Because the data speak for themselves. The i5-2500K is not that much faster than the 8120 in single-threaded applications, the two trade blows through most benchmarks, and the 8120 isn't that much faster in multi-threaded apps and workflows. As I said, aside from power consumption, the 8120 is not a completely inferior CPU.

Again, as I said, if you live near a Microcenter, right now you can get an 8120 + a nicer board for $200. A 2500K + a nicer board are going to set you back at least $250-300 depending on what sales you can get. That's a cost increase of 25-50%. The 2500K is not 25-50% faster.

Many of this forum's posters need to put the Kool-aid down. If you can't interpret benchmarks, then you're just bleating like sheep.
 
Gigantopithecus said:
Because the data speak for themselves. The i5-2500K is not that much faster than the 8120 in single-threaded applications, the two trade blows through most benchmarks, and the 8120 isn't that much faster in multi-threaded apps and workflows. As I said, aside from power consumption, the 8120 is not a completely inferior CPU.

Again, as I said, if you live near a Microcenter, right now you can get an 8120 + a nicer board for $200. A 2500K + a nicer board are going to set you back at least $250-300 depending on what sales you can get. That's a cost increase of 25-50%. The 2500K is not 25-50% faster.

Many of this forum's posters need to put the Kool-aid down. If you can't interpret benchmarks, then you're just bleating like sheep.
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What about the overclocking? Both chips can OC to about the same speed (I'd say 8120 a little more: 4.8 vs. 4.5 GHz) - the 2500K with it's IPC advantage and power advantage should win handly with both chips overclocked. That is something also to consider.
 
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