Upgrading to FX8320 in 2 days

[Toilet_pepper]

I'm planning to upgrade my CPU in 2 days as I currently have an Athlon x4 640. (Experienced the bottleneck everyone's talking about but everything is playable) Does the 8350 have a big difference than the 8320 or could I achieve the same speed with some mild overclocking?

I have a Cooler Master V8 inside a Storm Scout which I have to ghetto mod (handsaw the drive bays ) to make the 7950 fit. Is the V8 enough to cool the 8320 with a little overclock maybe around 4.0-4.2ghz. If yes, I'll get a bigger case and keep the v8. If not, I'll get cheap water cooling like the h60 or a CM Seidon then keep the case and with that I could use the top fan of the side panel to blow fresh air in.

[Norton]

I would go with the 8350 as it's only about $20 more, in the US, not sure about anywhere else.

The CM V8 should do fine- that said... it's always nice to put a new chip under a nice new cooler

[Durvelle27]

a FX 8320 would be fine and oc fine to the 8350 level. Yes the V8 would be fine for a mild overclock like 4.4GHz or lower without worrying about temps.

[Toilet_pepper]

Thanks. I thought about getting the 8350 but if could achieve the same thing with an 8320 I could get maybe a fan to replace the v8 stock and a decent thermal paste. They cost around the $20 more here as well but $20 is a lot in this place.

Now for the next question. What to look for in a monitor? Anything outside 1080p here cost an arm and a leg. I'm currently using a crappy 24" LCD at 1080p and colors are really bad and washed out but they turn out somewhat decent when gaming. Should I buy a decent 24" 1080p monitor or save up/sell a kidney to get a 27" 1080p monitor. I'm not much of a heavy gamer and usually watch movies on it from afar.

[Durvelle27]

Originally Posted by Toilet_pepper

Thanks. I thought about getting the 8350 but if could achieve the same thing with an 8320 I could get maybe a fan to replace the v8 stock and a decent thermal paste. They cost around the $20 more here as well but $20 is a lot in this place.

Now for the next question. What to look for in a monitor? Anything outside 1080p here cost an arm and a leg. I'm currently using a crappy 24" LCD at 1080p and colors are really bad and washed out but they turn out somewhat decent when gaming. Should I buy a decent 24" 1080p monitor or save up/sell a kidney to get a 27" 1080p monitor. I'm not much of a heavy gamer and usually watch movies on it from afar.

Someone else would have to chime in as i really don't know much on the monitor end. I use a 32" 1080p 3D Tv and 110" 1080p 3D Projector but no monitors

[asadian]

OP I actually got a really good LG LED 27' 1080p monitor from Best Buy a few moths ago and I LOVE it. I was using a 1680x1050 before and now I use the 1680 as a second monitor.

When I firts took the LG out the box it was overly brighty and saturated. But after I calibrated the display I was amazed at the color accuracy and contrast ratio this thing produces.

I would get an LED and or IPS monitor as they look better for gaming than a regular LCD in my opinion. You can get much more vivid colors from an LED while still mainaining descent accuracy.

LG makes really good mid range monitors and I only paid $260 for my new 27" display. Im a stickler for display quality and notice imperfections quite easily if that helps at all.

Going anything higher thana 1080p display in your case would not be a wise choice in my opinion because with higher resolution your going to need a way more powerful GPU to get the benefit.

[Fourstaff]

8320 can be clocked to 8350 levels, but then the 8350 can be clocked way higher (in general). I would get the 8350 if its only $20 more (maybe add 5% to total upgrade cost for 10% gain in performance -> better value for money).

[terrastrife]

No one is mentioned that the OPs motherboard will throttle that CPU at stock speeds, let alone overclocked (All ASRock 970 and the low end 990FX have throttling issues, even the 4300/6100 included).

You will be able to clock it, it will be stable, but get used to it downclocking to 16x under full load because the VRM circuitry isn't up to spec for Piledriver (even if it worked with Bulldizer). The new VRM input of the CPUs mean that boards which were perfectly fine with huge X6/8150 overclocks are now throttling with the new CPUs.

There are only a very select few non 900 series 990X/990FX boards that don't throttle with a Piledriver in it, and even less 880G/890X/890FX boards.

You will not have a problem with an X6,

[RCoon]

Originally Posted by asadian

Going anything higher thana 1080p display in your case would not be a wise choice in my opinion because with higher resolution your going to need a way more powerful GPU to get the benefit.

7950 is capable of 1200 res.

Back to the original choice, 8320 and 8350 are similar, i just found my 8350 would clock to 5ghz ten times easier (the 8320 isnt likely to come close in overclocking headroom). 8320 is a perfectly reasonable choice for very mild overclocks. You need a 990FX mobo though. ASRock have some decent ones knocking around, and msi has become a new favourite of mine. (All my AMD cpus (4100, 6200, 8350) have run on Asus mobos just fine)
As for monitors, 1080p is a good choice if you want to max out your games, any higher resolution is mere preferene and costs a lot more.
Asus have some decent 1080p gaming monitors, and i've had good experiences with BenQ, but i find monitors are always down to personal preference.
Most 1080p 27" monitors are perfectly good.

[Mindweaver]

I agree with everyone else and say get the 8350. I hear they clock to 5ghz fairly easy, but you may need to get a better cooler to get to 5ghz. I'd pick up a aio water cooler like the h80 or the h100. I'm still running a h50 and it runs really well and the extra space to get to ram and stuff is amazing. If you don't have the money for a aio water cooler then I'd pick up a Cooler master hyper 212 and do a push/pull. I have a few of those on my crunching rigs and they are great coolers.

[RCoon]

Originally Posted by Mindweaver

I agree with everyone else and say get the 8350. I hear they clock to 5ghz fairly easy, but you may need to get a better cooler to get to 5ghz. I'd pick up a aio water cooler like the h80 or the h100. I'm still running a h50 and it runs really well and the extra space to get to ram and stuff is amazing. If you don't have the money for a aio water cooler then I'd pick up a Cooler master hyper 212 and do a push/pull. I have a few of those on my crunching rigs and they are great coolers.

+1
Since going AIO for my processors back when they first came out, I've never bought a tower fin stack unit since, but the Hyper 212 comes damn close performance-wise.

[ivicagmc]

You have some great choice these days when it comes to monitors. IPS monitors are very fast and overall much better than any TN monitor. VA also very good... I have Dell U2312HM, do a lot of gaming and having no issues with response times. I recommend something like this:
Dell S2240M Black 21.5" 7ms (GTG) Widescreen LED B...
Dell S2740L Black 27" 7ms (GTG) IPS-Panel HDMI Wid... 27' beauty and not to expensive
Dell S2440L Black 6 ms (GTG) HDMI Widescreen LED B...