AMD FX-8350 - "Piledriver" for AMD Socket AM3+

[blibba]

How about a 6300 review ? I think it is a good budget gaming CPU.

I think the 4300 is the pick of the bunch for gamers, as long as you don't care about the power use. Certainly I'd give it some strong consideration if I was replacing my CPU/mobo tomorrow, but as it stands it's too small an upgrade over what I have.

 

[Fourstaff]

Nice improvements, but still not enough to cover the power bills deficit :/

 

[NC37]

See Anandtech/Techreport.

Anand has some on it but they didn't test overclock potential. Thanks anyways, hopefully they'll post something later.

 

[Melvis]

What kind of response is this?

The 8350 is slower than much cheaper Intel chips in a lot of the benchmarks that some people actually care about - see the 99th percentile Skyrim graph above. In addition, it uses far more power than any recent competitive Intel offering of similar performance. Particularly when overclocked, using more power translates to getting hotter.

I happen to agree that the 8350 is not impossible to recommend, but instead is only recommendable to a certain type of buyer (one who does not prioritise games, who does prioritise certain highly threaded tasks, who does not stress the CPU enough for the electricity bill to eliminate the savings). But when you put forward an argument like that, you destroy any chance of persuading anybody of its merits.

Sarcasm at its finest

Link? as from what im seeing its the opposite as shown here> http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/amd_fx_8350_processor_review,1.html Skyrim? are you serious? your going to base what your saying on a game? o dear god.

Over here in the land of mega ass expensive (Australia) a 2600K will cost you $300, so if this 8350 is at $200 ish then to ME that's alot cheaper for the same performance don't you think?

I agree its not for everyone but for alot of PII users or even the odd i5 users might jump to this.

FYI regardless if the CPU uses more power doesn't mean it will run hotter, the review shows 53c maxed out on all 8 cores, a 2600K will hit 70c plus. (Stock coolers of course)

 

[blibba]

Sarcasm at its finest

Link? as from what im seeing its the opposite as shown here> http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/amd_fx_8350_processor_review,1.html Skyrim? are you serious? your going to base what your saying on a game? o dear god.

I feel like you didn't read my post. "The 8350 is slower than much cheaper Intel chips in a lot of the benchmarks that some people actually care about...". For a lot of people, me included, the only time the CPU ever gets a real work out is in gaming. So I couldn't really care less how it performs elsewhere, as long as it's adequate and sips power.

Over here in the land of mega ass expensive (Australia) a 2600K will cost you $300, so if this 8350 is at $200 ish then to ME that's alot cheaper for the same performance don't you think?

I agree its not for everyone but for alot of PII users or even the odd i5 users might jump to this.

It's going to be quite a small upgrade from either of those, or even a sidegrade, unless you do a lot of encoding. But sure, depending on your workload, it might well be the same performance as a 2600K for you.

FYI regardless if the CPU uses more power doesn't mean it will run hotter, the review shows 53c maxed out on all 8 cores, a 2600K will hit 70c plus.

Well, of the electrical energy that any CPU uses, >99% is converted to heat. If the 8350 runs cooler than a chip using less power, that's likely to be to do with a superior stock cooler, or better interface between the chip and IHS.

Anand has some on it but they didn't test overclock potential. Thanks anyways, hopefully they'll post something later.

Apologies, I misunderstood your query. I thought you just wanted to see how the architecture with clockspeed.

 

[DaC]

Sarcasm at its finest
I agree its not for everyone but for alot of PII users or even the odd i5 users might jump to this.

This is a point much missed here on TPU..... remember PC industry is not all about us enthusiasts all the time...

AMD is keeping backward compatbility for a long time which is great... a pure WIN over Intel...

sckt 1156.... sckt 1155.... and yes, there's another one coming....
Put one pin.... take one pin and there you go.... new motherboard needed...

 

[blibba]

This is a point much missed here on TPU..... remember PC industry is not all about us enthusiasts all the time...

AMD is keeping backward compatbility for a long time which is great... a pure WIN over Intel...

sckt 1156.... sckt 1155.... and yes, there's another one coming....
Put one pin.... take one pin and there you go.... new motherboard needed...

As a Phenom II user, I have no upgrade options beyond 1100T on my motherboard. But I agree that in general AMD manages this better. Long may it continue.

 

[NC37]

I agree its not for everyone but for alot of PII users or even the odd i5 users might jump to this.

I'd say more PII. If your on an i5 I don't see a reason to switch unless you really need the multithreading. For that matter, it is cheaper to upgrade to i7 since you don't need to buy a new board to go with it.

I'm a gamer but I also do video encoding enough where I'll get use out of these. Piledriver performance is where Bulldozer should have been. Since I'm a PII user I'll jump on this. Hold over till Excavator then weigh in Intel's picks post Haswell.

 

[Melvis]

I feel like you didn't read my post. "The 8350 is slower than much cheaper Intel chips in a lot of the benchmarks that some people actually care about...". For a lot of people, me included, the only time the CPU ever gets a real work out is in gaming. So I couldn't really care less how it performs elsewhere, as long as it's adequate and sips power.

Ok fair enough i get what you mean there and i can understand that, if its mainly gaming then yes it would be alot wiser to go to an Intel chip. For me personally as ive already purchased the motherboard months and months back this is realy the only chip i can upgrade to easly that will show me the biggest gains in games, trans-coding etc

It's going to be quite a small upgrade from either of those, or even a sidegrade, unless you do a lot of encoding. But sure, depending on your workload, it might well be the same performance as a 2600K for you.

I agree its not going to be massive but at this time its your best bet IF you wanted to upgrade? and for me to have the performance around a 2600K is good enough for me.

Well, of the electrical energy that any CPU uses, >99% is converted to heat. If the 8350 runs cooler than a chip using less power, that's likely to be to do with a superior stock cooler, or better interface between the chip and IHS.

True and i do honestly think it might come down to the stock cooler as AMD's stock 4 copper pipe heat sink is far better then intels stock cooler that's for sure. Guess the only way to really tell is to swap coolers and find out?

@NC37 I totally agree with you man

 

[Fatal1ty39]

will be there a cpu scaling review for FX-8350 like Wizzard did before for the AMD FX-8150 ?

 

[nt300]

This is very good release from AMD. In some games the new CPU gains over 60% performance improvement in some games. I think I found my upgrade

Its good that the 8350 finally manages to beat the Intel 2500k and in most cases is similar to the 2600k. (not in gaming though )

But those processors are really old. Is there any advantage (feature wise / besides 8 cores) to AMD's alternative now? (being it a bit late but finally overcoming those intels)

Also sad to see that memory performance is still lower than the 2500/2600.

http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/amd_fx_8350_processor_review,17.html

Can someone explain whyyyyy

It because AMD needs to completly redesign its IMO. By the time Excavator comes out they will have it done accroding to rumours.

 

[blibba]

This is very good release from AMD. In some games the new CPU gains over 60% performance improvement in some games. I think I found my upgrade

I think you're better off sticking with your existing CPU or getting an FX4*** for games.

 

[EarthDog]

Excellent review... though some things to note:

* In the conclusion, Intel is on a 22nm process not 28nm
* in the conclusion, you mention 3770k is almost twice as much. Its $330 vs $219 (newegg). Thats not even close to twice as much (to me anyway). If you want to compare MSRP its $195 vs $313. Closer to 33% more.

If anyone would like to see this CPU under LN2, you can find that HERE.

EDIT:

No, it's a typo, will fix in a moment.


EIDT: FIX'd.

Still shows 28nm in the conclusion....

 

[MasterInvader]

It´s time to sell my 8150

The next objective, get a good sample [8350] to push the OC beyond 5Gz´s 24/7

 

[os2wiz]

Excellent review... though some things to note:

* In the conclusion, Intel is on a 22nm process not 28nm
* in the conclusion, you mention 3770k is almost twice as much. Its $330 vs $219 (newegg). Thats not even close to twice as much (to me anyway). If you want to compare MSRP its $195 vs $313. Closer to 33% more.

If anyone would like to see this CPU under LN2, you can find that HERE.

Except ,your wrong, dead wrong. The Newegg price is $25 above MSRP and is only there for perhaps 2 weeks before they will be forced to lower it to $195. They pulled the same crap when Bulldozer was released. That is why at that time I bought my cpu from Amazon for $30 less. $195 will be the price when the dust settles and the supply chain is full. You can bet your undies on that.

 

[os2wiz]

I think you're better off sticking with your existing CPU or getting an FX4*** for games.

Disagree , better off getting the 8350 FX for gaming. Off with Turboboost, run all 8 cores. It will do quite well in all but the most finicky settings in the poorly coded single-thrreaded games.
Overclock to 4.8-5.0 GHZ if you have a decent liquid cooler.

 

[Hillbilly]

If anyone would like to see this CPU under LN2, you can find that HERE.

Thanks. 7.3GHz and under 2V. Looks like fun.

 

[EarthDog]

Except ,your wrong, dead wrong. The Newegg price is $25 above MSRP and is only there for perhaps 2 weeks before they will be forced to lower it to $195. They pulled the same crap when Bulldozer was released. That is why at that time I bought my cpu from Amazon for $30 less. $195 will be the price when the dust settles and the supply chain is full. You can bet your undies on that.

Perhaps you want to look at my post again, since I compared both current pricing and MSRP but here it is again since you clearly missed it.

$313 MSRP(3770K) vs $195 MSRP(FX-8350) = 38% (still not what I would call close to 50%, its MUCH closer to 33%)

Current pricing - $330 (3770K) vs $220 (FX-8350) = 33%

 

[xenocide]

I think you're better off sticking with your existing CPU or getting an FX4*** for games.

If you wanted a quad-core AMD CPU a Phenom II would be better than an FX4xxx CPU in almost all situations. I'd say go for the FX8320 since it's unlocked anyway, OC it to 8350 speeds or better, and use the savings to buy a nicer cooler. Or if gaming go for an i5-3570K if you want the OCability or lower end IB-based i5's since the i5-3570 was able to go blow for blow with the 8350 in this review. If you wanted the best Price\Performance the FX-6300 seems pretty solid as well and is only $10 more than the equivalent FX43xx CPU.

Except ,your wrong, dead wrong. The Newegg price is $25 above MSRP and is only there for perhaps 2 weeks before they will be forced to lower it to $195. They pulled the same crap when Bulldozer was released. That is why at that time I bought my cpu from Amazon for $30 less. $195 will be the price when the dust settles and the supply chain is full. You can bet your undies on that.

Which he addressed but you chose to ignore. He said the price on Newegg for the i7 was $330 and the FX-8350 was $220. Then said the MSRP for both; $313 and $195 respectively. If you had read his whole post you would have seen he pointed out that Newegg was selling them for $25 over the MSRP--and I imagine more etailers will for the first few weeks.

 

[blibba]

Disagree , better off getting the 8350 FX for gaming. Off with Turboboost, run all 8 cores. It will do quite well in all but the most finicky settings in the poorly coded single-thrreaded games.
Overclock to 4.8-5.0 GHZ if you have a decent liquid cooler.

The FX4 are faster in nearly every low-FPS game at stock, and overclock further on any given cooler. I do not think that there are any circumstances in which an FX8 is good value in a gaming-focused build.

 

[TheLaughingMan]

Excellent review... though some things to note:

* In the conclusion, Intel is on a 22nm process not 28nm
* in the conclusion, you mention 3770k is almost twice as much. Its $330 vs $219 (newegg). Thats not even close to twice as much (to me anyway). If you want to compare MSRP its $195 vs $313. Closer to 33% more.

If anyone would like to see this CPU under LN2, you can find that HERE.

EDIT: Still shows 28nm in the conclusion....

Dave was not just talking about the CPU. He was talking about the total build which would be CPU and motherboard (keeping everything else the same). Motherboards for Intel with similar features and specs tend to be $40 to $70 more expensive in price. So you are looking at an AMD system for $379 for CPU/Motherboard and Intel for $550 which is then closer to +70% price difference.

 

[Ravenas]

I will be updating to this processor on release date. I have an AM3+ motherboard already, so I'm quite happy AMD decided to stick with the AM3+ stock.

 

[EarthDog]

Dave was not just talking about the CPU. He was talking about the total build which would be CPU and motherboard (keeping everything else the same). Motherboards for Intel with similar features and specs tend to be $40 to $70 more expensive in price. So you are looking at an AMD system for $379 for CPU/Motherboard and Intel for $550 which is then closer to +70% price difference.

Oh, he didnt mention that in PM. In fact he stated he used his LOCAL pricing compared to I'm guessing the MSRP (which isnt a fair comparison IMO - MSRP or big vendors or bust).

Also, I think your math is incorrect... 379*1.45= ~$550. So its 45% more than the AMD system, not 70% more as you stated = 379*1.7= $644.xx.

 

[os2wiz]

Perhaps you want to look at my post again, since I compared both current pricing and MSRP but here it is again since you clearly missed it.

$313 MSRP(3770K) vs $195 MSRP(FX-8350) = 38% (still not what I would call close to 50%, its MUCH closer to 33%)

Current pricing - $330 (3770K) vs $220 (FX-8350) = 33%

118/195 = 60 % more for the I7 3770K. They are both correct, but I think my percentage is the one someone who is deciding to purchase will look at. The 3770k is 60% more money with only an average 10-15% performance improvement. So I am not dense , perhaps some self-examination is in order on your part???

 

[cadaveca]

Dave was not just talking about the CPU. He was talking about the total build which would be CPU and motherboard (keeping everything else the same). Motherboards for Intel with similar features and specs tend to be $40 to $70 more expensive in price. So you are looking at an AMD system for $379 for CPU/Motherboard and Intel for $550 which is then closer to +70% price difference.

Nah, local at time of writing 3770k was 379, which is $10 short of double. OF course, I had no idea of actual retail pricing for the AMD chips when I wrote the review.