Upgrading FM2 A10-5800K / DDR3 rig?

[VirtualLarry]

My friend has been talking to me about upgrade possibilities.

Was talking about G4560 and some DDR4, but prices have been rising on both of those.

So, now he was contemplating "upgrading" to FM2+, and then re-using his CPU / RAM, and dropping in a next-gen FM2+ APU when he felt the time was right.

His current APU is running just fine, but the VLIW4 iGPU graphics are officially unsupported, at least in Windows.

He multi-boots.

Suggestions? When I suggested getting a Ryzen 5 1600, he told me that he didn't want to spend more than $115 on a CPU.

Edit: His current board, and case, are ATX.

Edit: I've tried to sell him my G4560, Biostar B150 mATX board, and 2x4GB DDR4-2400 RAM, but he wasn't that interested. I suppose I could offer him a G3258 and a different Biostar H81 board that he could OC with. He didn't want to OC his A10-5800K, because the temp sensor was borked on those chips, and he was afraid of overheating it.

We did dabble in some OCing on his prior Core2Quad rig, and was actually rather successful, in pushing his Q8400 up to 3.0Ghz or so. (450 FSB)

Edit: Oh yeah, NO GAMING.

 

[scannall]

Well, this combo is pretty close to his price, perform better in both the CPU and GPU.

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod..._re=amd_athlon_x4_860k-_-19-113-410-_-Product
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814137139

Overclocks really well if he is into that.

 

[Centauri]

At this point, I'd wait to see what Ryzen 3 brings.

 

[amd6502]

I think the officially unsupported VLIW4 GPU drivers are a non-issue. They should be totally mature by now. If actually problematic, pick up any used old GCN card (eg R5/R7) or nvidea equivalent for a few dollars and run discrete graphics.

With decent cooler and case cooling I wouldn't worry about overheating the CPU (overheating the VRM's transistors would be more of a problem). Most AMD cpu's don't report the temperature in standard units, Celsius. It's some weird formula that only approaches celsius value when the CPU is at hot coffee temps. Some motherboards and software try to adjust for this (and sometimes screw up). In open-hardware monitor you can check what AMD equiv of room temp is if u resume from (a long) suspend and see what minimum temp open-hardware monitor recorded.

If you disable the iGPU that should lower the APU wattage and spare the VRMs in a mild OCing setup.

I think the best solution is to overclock; spend $25 on a good cooler and do some worry free mild overclocking. Run discrete graphics if the graphics aren't keeping up (doubtful).

Or like you say, swap him your G3258 motherbird combo. If his loads are lite threaded he should see a good improvement (assuming iGPU performance isn't an issue).

I don't see the point of upgrading only the board from fm2 to fm2+. Wait for RR APUs and switch to AM4 then (2018).

 

[NTMBK]

Just drop in a 1030.

 

[kwalkingcraze]

I'm at 4.8GHz with A10-5800K, almost just as fast as Ryzen non-overclocked.

 

[Torn Mind]

Your friend doesn't "get it" and likely never will. He is side grading and has no idea he is contemplating it. All because the model name increased by increments of 2000. Never mind that Richland was a process optimized bump in clockspeed but otherwise exactly the same as Trinity. Kaveri was better, but Steamroller was just a super optimized Bulldozer.

A mobo and CPU upgrade would set him back about 200 dollars. For that, one can buy a refurbished i5 system and get a much faster system.

 

[NostaSeronx]

If your friend wants an exact half-ish downgrade. There is always the pre-overclocked A9-9430.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q="a9-9430"

 

[Insert_Nickname]

So, now he was contemplating "upgrading" to FM2+, and then re-using his CPU / RAM, and dropping in a next-gen FM2+ APU when he felt the time was right.

Forget it. Best case is a side-grade to a dead platform. Not worthwhile anyway you view it. Wait and save for RR.

Side note; the "best" CPU for for FM2+ is either the 845 for efficiency or the 880K (7890K w/ IGP) for absolute performance. But neither is going to provide any major performance increase versus the 5800K.

Edit: Oh yeah, NO GAMING.

If it just multimedia capability that is lacking, NTMBK has pretty much covered it:

Just drop in a 1030.

If your friend wants an exact half-ish downgrade. There is always the pre-overclocked A9-9430.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q="a9-9430"

Fitting it in a desktop socket might be a little tricky though...

 

[SPBHM]

if the problem is "unsupported" IGP, just buy a 1030, it's going to be supported for a long long time, and it accelerates decoding current video formats , also uses typically uses less than 30W.

 

[kwalkingcraze]

A10-5800K is the longest-lasting processor I've seen that doesn't show its age at all, even for 2018 next year. Graphics is still faster than Kaby Lake. Even i7-2600K Sandy Bridge is starting to show its age a little now, mostly due to slower graphics.

 

[Jan Olšan]

I'm using an A10-6800K and don't get any issues due to drivers either. (Also no gaming.) True that I haven't tried to update to W10 Creator Update, but it will probably work too.

If he wants to upgrade that for cheap, he either needs to wait for some really cheap Zen in the future, or grab something second hand (Core i7 or some faster i5*). No FM2+ or FM2 CPU/APU is going to be enough faster to be worth putting in money.

I wouldn't get any Pentium-level stuff, that only upgrades the single-thread performance but the overall performance will be just as weak or likely worse - total waste of money. Personally I might be willing to switch to an octocore FX if it was really cheap, but never to Intel dualcore.

*Just a note - if he wants to use the IGP, probably make sure to go at least Ivy Bridge. Intel cut support for Sandy Bridge and its IGP seems to be much more problematic. It works in W10 64 for office work but I was getting screen corruptions in software. Even just scrolling images in XnView, the GPU would screw up the displayed image very often (every day occurence, you can reload the image to get rid of it but it gets annoying).

 

[VirtualLarry]

if the problem is "unsupported" IGP, just buy a 1030, it's going to be supported for a long long time, and it accelerates decoding current video formats , also uses typically uses less than 30W.

The thing is, this person basically "hates gaming", so much that he is totally opposed to getting a dGPU, even if he isn't gaming on it.

He was also talking about getting a G4620 or i3-7100.

Edit: He also thinks that Mhz==Speed. So much so, that when I brought up the Ryzen 3 CPUs coming out, that are 4C/4T, he told me that his current CPU was faster.

 

[scannall]

The thing is, this person basically "hates gaming", so much that he is totally opposed to getting a dGPU, even if he isn't gaming on it.

He was also talking about getting a G4620 or i3-7100.

Edit: He also thinks that Mhz==Speed. So much so, that when I brought up the Ryzen 3 CPUs coming out, that are 4C/4T, he told me that his current CPU was faster.

My condolences. I've dealt with customers like that. After over 40 years in the industry, sometimes you run into 'That Guy' who thinks they know more than I do, with 0 years experience.

 

[daveybrat]

The thing is, this person basically "hates gaming", so much that he is totally opposed to getting a dGPU, even if he isn't gaming on it.

He was also talking about getting a G4620 or i3-7100.

Edit: He also thinks that Mhz==Speed. So much so, that when I brought up the Ryzen 3 CPUs coming out, that are 4C/4T, he told me that his current CPU was faster.

He really doesn't deserve a better system. Some education in computers might be more beneficial for him.

 

[Torn Mind]

Well, it does take quite a bit struggle to understand the essentials on what constitutes speed for a CPU. It took me quite a bit of reading and time for that Eureka moment. But for those stuck in their ways, they likely would reject the knowledge being presented to them.

Even though it is simple multiplication to get MIPS or FLOPS, it is still too much information for some people.

For me, I understand it as every second 3 billion waves pass through a screen. In that second, A certain number of instructions are executed. Hency, the difference in performance with CPUs that have the same clock speed. There are variations in benchmark performance, and even questions about accuracy, but it's better than feel, since there will be somebody who thinks their E8400 is faster than a G4560.

If he rejects the Wikipedia page on IPS, he really deserves to lose his money on his sidegrade.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I mean, *I* think that he would be plenty happy with a G4560, and upgrading to an M.2 PCI-E SSD (which is one of the reasons that he wanted a newer, more advanced FM2+ board). And I don't think that the G4560, or the CFL equivalent, if there is one, will be much cheaper than it already is. (That is, if you can find it at list price, or lower. Most places are gouging because of lack of availability.)

Or, if he were more willing to spend, consider a Ryzen 5 1600 CPU. Or maybe a 1400 and OC.

Thing is, though, he is on a tight budget. (Retirement income.) He's cheaper than I am, when it comes to PC parts. If he saw the G4560 for $56 shipped once, on Superbiiz.com after a coupon code, then by golly, he's never going to pay more than $56 for it, ever, pretty much.

He signed up for frys.com e-mails, and he's telling me about all of these "deals". I had to tell him that those deals are pretty-much all in-store only, and they don't have stores on the East Coast.

Maybe I should get him to look at Microcenter deals more. We have one around here, within an hour's drive.

Edit: I've offered him some of my previously-built custom G4560 rigs, but he doesn't want a pre-built, he wants to "build it himself".

He did build his current FM2 / A10-5800K rig himself, with a little help from me over the phone, and his prior Core2Duo (later upgraded to Core2Quad) I showed him in person how to build it.

So, he knows enough about PCs to build one himself, and can install various OSes, and stuff, although he gets confused with BIOS settings still somewhat, and has issues booting UEFI versus legacy, on his current board.

 

[amd6502]

The thing is, this person basically "hates gaming", so much that he is totally opposed to getting a dGPU, even if he isn't gaming on it.

Tell him cards like the 1030 are non-gaming multimedia video cards. Also tell him "unsupported" simply means that the drivers are so mature that they are no longer maintained, because there is no need to alter them in any way. If there is a completely new operating system (eg Windows 11) sometime in the future, only then would it be a problem.

Tell him to wait another 8 months or so and he can upgrade to a budget RR 2c/4t or 3c/6t AM4 APU. Hopefully memory prices will be more reasonable by then.

If Sata2 (which I assume is on most/all old fm2 boards) isn't fast enough maybe this is an option:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA6V85HC8902&cm_re=M.2_NVMe_SSD_NGFF_to_PCI_Express_3.0_x4_Adapter_Card_Support_M.2_NGFF_PCIe_Channel_SSD_NVMe_Type_2280,_2260,_2242-_-9SIA6V85HC8902-_-Product

If running windows, another consideration is that some windows licenses are not tranferrable to a new motherboard.

 

[daveybrat]

Well, i'd take him to Microcenter and buy these:

Intel Core i3-7350K Kaby Lake 4.2GHz LGA 1151 Boxed Processor.......$129.99

ASRock B250M-HDV LGA 1151 mATX Intel Motherboard.......$29.99 w/cpu purchase

So he'll get his high clock speeds and it's overclockable. $159.99 for a cpu and a motherboard should suffice.

 

[NTMBK]

I mean, *I* think that he would be plenty happy with a G4560, and upgrading to an M.2 PCI-E SSD (which is one of the reasons that he wanted a newer, more advanced FM2+ board). And I don't think that the G4560, or the CFL equivalent, if there is one, will be much cheaper than it already is. (That is, if you can find it at list price, or lower. Most places are gouging because of lack of availability.)

Or, if he were more willing to spend, consider a Ryzen 5 1600 CPU. Or maybe a 1400 and OC.

Thing is, though, he is on a tight budget. (Retirement income.) He's cheaper than I am, when it comes to PC parts. If he saw the G4560 for $56 shipped once, on Superbiiz.com after a coupon code, then by golly, he's never going to pay more than $56 for it, ever, pretty much.

He signed up for frys.com e-mails, and he's telling me about all of these "deals". I had to tell him that those deals are pretty-much all in-store only, and they don't have stores on the East Coast.

Maybe I should get him to look at Microcenter deals more. We have one around here, within an hour's drive.

Edit: I've offered him some of my previously-built custom G4560 rigs, but he doesn't want a pre-built, he wants to "build it himself".

He did build his current FM2 / A10-5800K rig himself, with a little help from me over the phone, and his prior Core2Duo (later upgraded to Core2Quad) I showed him in person how to build it.

So, he knows enough about PCs to build one himself, and can install various OSes, and stuff, although he gets confused with BIOS settings still somewhat, and has issues booting UEFI versus legacy, on his current board.

Show him some benchmarks It really isn't a gaming card. It's great for video decoding and supports the latest standards, should drive any monitor he attached to it smoothly, and should get drivers for years to come. And you can get a passive one with no fans.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Well, i'd take him to Microcenter and buy these:

Intel Core i3-7350K Kaby Lake 4.2GHz LGA 1151 Boxed Processor.......$129.99

ASRock B250M-HDV LGA 1151 mATX Intel Motherboard.......$29.99 w/cpu purchase

So he'll get his high clock speeds and it's overclockable. $159.99 for a cpu and a motherboard should suffice.

That sounds like the best idea yet. It would take a trip to MC, which is more time-consuming than just buying something from ebay or Newegg, and having it arrive at your door.

Edit: That's not the first time that I've seen that unlocked dual-core w/HT Kaby Lake CPU for that price. Newegg had it for that price as well, for a short while.

Is that Intel's new weapon against the Ryzen 3 CPUs?

 

[kwalkingcraze]

i3-7350K no longer has fan/heatsink included in box. Correct price is $139.99.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Tell him to wait another 8 months or so and he can upgrade to a budget RR 2c/4t or 3c/6t AM4 APU. Hopefully memory prices will be more reasonable by then.

If Sata2 (which I assume is on most/all old fm2 boards) isn't fast enough maybe this is an option:

Actually, his board has EIGHT SATA6G (SATA III) ports on it, native. It's an A85X-chipset board. That's another reason why he's been reticent to change, he uses like at least six of those SATA ports, and modern boards (except for X99 and X299), just seem to not have as many.

 

[daveybrat]

i3-7350K no longer has fan/heatsink included in box. Correct price is $139.99.

True, but it's only a 60Watt cpu and i'm sure Larry has plenty of spare stock coolers laying around

And the cheapest online right now is $154.99 (on sale) at Newegg.

 

[Jan Olšan]

Is NVMe versus SATA 3.0 really a meaningfull difference? Isn't SATA SSD enough already - particularly if you have very limited budget? Upgrading this element of the PC certainly isn't very effective compared to investing in actually faster CPU, or more RAM.

(FM1 chipsets and later have SATA 3.0 unless you have A55 or A58.)