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A budget for a friend.

Toothless

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So a friend of mine is trying to get a motherboard/CPU combo on a budget. I was looking at the MSI H81M-P33 for the board and an i3 for the CPU, but as my friend plays a CPU-heavy game. (Old, horrid graphics engine, feeds on clocks but not cores) and has up to 5 browser tabs open with Skype calls going on. I was thinking an i3 wouldn't be enough.

She used to have an FX-6100 but that and the board died with the thermal fail-safe failed to go off and fried everything. Was going to go with a FX-6300 and some 970-chipset board (I used to use the same CPU with a ASUS 970 chipset but board failed. M5A97 R2.0) but I'm thinking that it might be a tad overkill as a FX-6XXX wouldn't be fully used.

No overclocking.

Everything else she already has. (GPU, PSU, case, memory. Blahblah)

Cooling is going to run with a Hyper 212 EVO.

Budget at $250.
 
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Stay away from AMD. I built a machine for my dad using a Phenom 2 940 and it's slow as fuck compared to my i7 2700K.

Go with an Asus board and you can even get a Pentium and overclock, I'd just stay away from AMD.
 
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Comparing a PII 940 to a 2700K.... thats just..... just.... wrong?? :shadedshu:



@OP: For your budget, your choices are fine. :toast:
 
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Comparing a PII 940 to a 2700K.... thats just..... just.... wrong?? :shadedshu:

I'm not talking about heavy gaming performance, right in Windows the Phenom gets way higher CPU usage and you can clearly feel it's slowness.
 
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Stay away from AMD. I built a machine for my dad using a Phenom 2 940 and it's slow as fuck compared to my i7 2700K.

Go with an Asus board and you can even get a Pentium and overclock, I'd just stay away from AMD.

No disrespect, but I don't think you are qualified to contribute to this thread. Just read the thread and learn instead.

The Phenom II X4 is a late 2008 to early 2009 processor aimed at the Intel Core 2 Quad.

The 2700K is a 4th Generation i7, supposed to be compared with the AMD's FX range.

Its like saying don't buy a Ford Focus, all Fords are crap, well slow compared to my Ferrari

---

So a friend of mine is trying to get a motherboard/CPU combo on a budget. I was looking at the MSI H81M-P33 for the board and an i3 for the CPU, but as my friend plays a CPU-heavy game. (Old, horrid graphics engine, feeds on clocks but not cores) and has up to 5 browser tabs open with Skype calls going on. I was thinking an i3 wouldn't be enough.
She used to have an FX-6100 but that and the board died with the thermal fail-safe failed to go off and fried everything. Was going to go with a FX-6300 and some 970-chipset board (I used to use the same CPU with a ASUS 970 chipset but board failed. M5A97 R2.0) but I'm thinking that it might be a tad overkill as a FX-6XXX wouldn't be fully used.
No overclocking.
Everything else she already has. (GPU, PSU, case, memory. Blahblah)
Cooling is going to run with a Hyper 212 EVO.
Budget at $250.

You said your friend's board died? Is the CPU still alive. If its still alive use the old FX-6100 and buy a new board.

What video card is she running?
 
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I'm not talking about heavy gaming performance, right in Windows the Phenom gets way higher CPU usage and you can clearly feel it's slowness.
You should NOT be comparing a CPU that came out when C2D/C2Q was in service to a 4c/8t 2700K.

The PII 940, at best, should be compared to a Q9400 or maybe a Q9550 if youre feeling generous..... if you want to compare it to the 2700K youre either deluded, misinformed or a total fanboy.... none of these things really allow you to contribute much in the way of useful thoughts to the OPer.



@OP again: You could also go low-end i5 and H81 board and get somewhat similar performance.... have you thought much about this?
 

Toothless

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Stay away from AMD. I built a machine for my dad using a Phenom 2 940 and it's slow as fuck compared to my i7 2700K.

Go with an Asus board and you can even get a Pentium and overclock, I'd just stay away from AMD.
1. As the i7 has double the threads and was better at the time anyway.. My FX-6300 worked wonders compared to my friend's i7 2700 given the performance difference. I hit a GPU-bottleneck before the CPU did.

2. No overclocking as pointed out in the first post.

3. A dual-core won't supply enough power for what my friend does.
 
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No disrespect, but I don't think you are qualified to contribute to this thread. Just read the thread and learn instead.

The Phenom II X4 is a late 2008 to early 2009 processor aimed at the Intel Core 2 Quad.

The 2700K is a 4th Generation i7, supposed to be compared with the AMD's FX range.

Its like saying don't buy a Ford, all Fords are crap, well slow compared to my Ferrari...duh

You clearly don't know how to come off, so I think you should take your own advice.

The older, lower end FX CPU's are barely better than the old Phenom's, in fact they're worse in some areas.

Your Ford analogy is silly BTW.

You should NOT be comparing a CPU that came out when C2D/C2Q was in service to a 4c/8t 2700K.

The PII 940, at best, should be compared to a Q9400 or maybe a Q9550 if youre feeling generous..... if you want to compare it to the 2700K youre either deluded, misinformed or a total fanboy.... none of these things really allow you to contribute much in the way of useful thoughts to the OPer.

@OP again: You could also go low-end i5 and H81 board and get somewhat similar performance.... have you thought much about this?

I'm just trying to point out AMD's slowness. The point here isn't 2700K vs 940 BE, the point is AMD being inferior. And no, I'm not a fanboy of anything. If I was I wouldn't have bought a Phenom on the first place.

More so, he can get much better performance with an i5.
 
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Yes... and while we're at it, lets point out that the FX6300 is milesssss quicker than an Atom from 2009 also.

Its got that beat hands down.... must be a relevant point of view. :shadedshu:
 
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Toothless

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i5 4570 (Non-K) - $200

MSI H81M-P33 - $50.38

Hyper 212 EVO $35 (Not included in original budget)
 
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Toothless

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Graphics power isn't really needed. She has a 7770 or a 7750, I forgot which. She plays CPU-heavier games so the only thing the GPU will do is output video since it was used in the AMD build.
 
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Toothless

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Well... you could also look at one of these two options...


http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboBundleDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1594324

FX6300 (again lol) - Asus M5A97 LE - 8GB Ripjaws @ 1600mhz

Or....


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157394&cm_re=amd_970-_-13-157-394-_-Product
+
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113284&cm_re=fx_8350-_-19-113-284-_-Product


The latter is quite a compelling option considering the amount of CPU horses you get.
We're both not too happy with ASUS with both of our boards failing in one way or another. Difference is I can get an RMA and she can't.

She already has 8GB of memory.

The FX-6100 she had wasn't fully used by cores, but the things she does uses more single-threaded power than multi-threaded. I figured Intel would be better for that's the case.
 

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I've had the MSI board...had power issues (wouldn't power on intermittently)... I would recommend no less than the Biostar B85S3+ HiFi @ ~ $64. Also, look into the Pentium G3220 if you don't need 4 cores right away and want a very snappy CPU on a budget. I've built some solid budget gamers off of those two items. 4-8GB DDR3-1600 and then a 750ti or 760 (or AMD equivalent GPU) and you're off to the races with an affordable EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze PSU. Seems she has a GPU.

Heck the onboard GPU on the 3220 and other newer Haswell-based CPU's is plenty for many light games, HD movies, etc. My kids were playing Minecraft and SupCom 2 @ 1080P on a SB i3.

I praise that 3220, I've used it for office builds, budget gaming/media builds, I will probably use one for my NAS/Linux Server in the future. You could get the 3258 too. Toss in a cheaper 120GB SSD for OS duties and have a 17 second or less boot time. Easy. Haswell-based pentiums run cool, fast, and efficient. AMD's not bad either if you need more media grunt for a tight budget....seeing she has a GPU I'd go B85 + Pentium and run it till she can afford an i5.

:toast:
 
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if you want to take i3 just take the highest and dont forget to maximize the ram, make it like 4 gig and just kill any apps and servica that he doesnt need
i3 is fast enough especially for basic needs
 

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i know you said no OC but if its core speed that matters why not Pentium Aniversary edition + some aniversary board with one click OC. Some boards offer 4,2 or even 4,5Ghz OC with one click.you dont need to push it to the limit. i'm sure your friend can push one button :) solid price solid performance for about 150$.
asrock z97 aniversary edition for example.
 
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You clearly don't know how to come off, so I think you should take your own advice.

The older, lower end FX CPU's are barely better than the old Phenom's, in fact they're worse in some areas.

Your Ford analogy is silly BTW.

The Phenom Agena was a fair bit slower than the Deneb. AMD went from be slower than a Kentfield Core 2 Quad to matching a Yorkfield Core 2 Quad. So that's a big improvement. but this has nothing to do with the issue.

More so, he can get much better performance with an i5.

What's your point? He can also get a AMD FX-9370 8-core!

I'm just trying to point out AMD's slowness. The point here isn't 2700K vs 940 BE, the point is AMD being inferior. And no, I'm not a fanboy of anything. If I was I wouldn't have bought a Phenom on the first place.

Of course the Phenom II 940BE is inferior compared to the 2700k because they are NOT supposed to directly compete with one another.

There are many newer AMD processors that can compete with the 2700K in many areas, so why are you picking on the Phenom II 940?

Just because you're not happy with the 940 BE doesn't mean AMD are interior as a company. The 940BE is one of many models of CPU and doesn't represent AMD as a whole.

This is your logic in reverse:
Pentium D 820 vs Athlon X2 6400+......Intel is interior. Don't buy Intel.
 
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The point here isn't 2700K vs 940 BE, the point is AMD being inferior

The direct factual point you are making, is that an older, cheaper processor, is slower than a far newer, far more expensive processor. Congratulations, your deductive reasoning can only be described as sherlock-like.

You're clearly delirious from being able to afford the best possible hardware available to you. Everybody else is not so fortunate to have an i7 and 3 GPU's.

Now lets go back to actual real life where people have constraints and budgets.

6300+970 or an i3+H87/97 would be legitimate choices in any case. They directly compete with each other.
 
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back to title, just recommend processor with your reason.
personally i like processor with multi threads. it will give you more power when do multi tasking. dual core is fine but dual core processor with multi thread is better.
i dunno which one that you may buy, if you buy from local shop it may harder
 
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Toothless

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Answers to questions.

She lives WWAAAAYYYY up in Maine. Just about nothing tech-related up there.

I picked out a lower-end i5 because it has the clocks needed, and enough cores to not be overkill but to also be enough to do what she does.

She's already had 8GB of memory, a GPU, case, PSU. All that stuff.

I was looking at the i3 but I can see lag as I tried doing the same thing on a 2/4 i5 laptop chip. AND BEFORE THE "ITS NOT THE SAME HAPPENS. I know that I'm comparing a laptop chip to a desktop chip. But the only difference I saw was the clocks. Sure the layout was different but I just don't think an i3 could keep up with her strange level of multitasking.

As for GPU power. She has pretty much zero need for it. The only reason a GPU is there is because the rig was custom-built for her two years ago. Reason for keeping it is because the game (for the stupidest of reasons) loads up graphics power on the login screen. (My 660 was up to 60% usage) But in game, there isn't even 10% usage on the graphics load. Weird huh?

The H81 is cheap enough, but strong enough for her. She doesn't OC. She doesn't bench or crunch. She's just an everyday Facebook/Skype user that plays a really old and horridly coded game.

The reason for the budget is that since she can't get anyone to put all the parts together for her, she has to drop another $100 to get it all installed at a local shop. (Which is a one-man shop with just about nothing modern)

Honestly, if I could fly out there and build that rig for her, I would.

ALSO. The original plan was that I RMA'd my ASUS board and mail it out to her w/ my FX-6300 but she's been without a decent computer for months and can't wait any longer. I smell a new FS thread.
 
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You never really answered. Is her current FX 6100 blown too?

The difference between a FX 6100 to FX 6300 is small, sometimes virtually the same. Bulldozer to Vishera small architectural tweak. If her CPU is still intact it I would keep it and buy just a new board.

I wouldn't consider an i3 coming from an FX 6100. i3 may perform faster in most single threaded games but if you're getting 60FPS+ an extra few frames won't make any difference in the long run you might end up losing performance if her choice of games changes in the future.

The i5 seems like a good choice if the FX 6100 is blown, but also consider the FX-9370 8-core. It would give you better performance out the box. In games it performs anywhere from between the i5 2500k and i7 4770k depending on the game. On a dedicated chart its shows just 2-10 FPS behind the i7 4770k in gaming. In some non gaming tasks it can even compete with the i7 3960x which is a $1,000 Extreme Edition Chip.

Now the CPU itself is $220. So this would only work if you're willing to put in another $80 for the board, but you're getting i7 level performance on the cheap! - If this is an issue get the i5 or AMD FX 9370.

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/62166-amd-fx-9590-review-piledriver-5ghz.html
 
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MxPhenom 216

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Stay away from AMD. I built a machine for my dad using a Phenom 2 940 and it's slow as fuck compared to my i7 2700K.

Go with an Asus board and you can even get a Pentium and overclock, I'd just stay away from AMD.

So much fail in one post. Congratulations on that achievement.

1. Comparing a Phenom 2 940 to a 2700k is asinine. (Obviously the 2700k is faster. 940 was released to compete with Intels C2Q lineup)
2. OP Stated no overclocking
 
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