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I want to go with AM3+

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What should I buy (CPU, RAM, MoBo)?
Is there any sense to make this upgrade? Is this a better choice than Phenom 960T upgrade?
 
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it would be a decent upgrade i would think, but im no expert lol. anyway heres what i would get:

  • Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 AMD 990X
  • AMD Bulldozer FX-8 Eight Core 8120 OR a AMD Phenom X6 1100t or 1090t. still great CPU's
  • Samsung Green 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual Channel Kit (MV-3V4G3D/US)

Going intel would be a good choice too, with something like a 2500/2600K/Z68 platform
 

brandonwh64

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Have you thought about 2500K/Z68/2x4GB DDR3?? More performance for around the same price?
 
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What should I buy (CPU, RAM, MoBo)?
Is there any sense to make this upgrade? Is this a better choice than Phenom 960T upgrade?

Go straight for the Bulldozer, about the same single threaded performance as Phenom II and much better multi threaded performance. You'll get a much better maximum overclock yeild. 3.9GHz vs 4.6GHz typical.

Me personally, I'd go Ivy Bridge or wait for Piledriver.
 
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I would say with AM3+, go 960t (or another Phenom II X4) until Piledriver shows up, then upgrade the CPU. DDR3-1600mhz RAM is enough, AMD even has some rebadged and certified RAM. (basically just has an AMD sticker on it and gets an extra set of QC.) And motherboard is up to you, the AsRock Fatal1ty Professional looks nice, Gigabyte and Asus boards are always good, and the AsRock Extreme4 990fx motherboard isn't bad either.
 
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What should I buy (CPU, RAM, MoBo)?
Is there any sense to make this upgrade? Is this a better choice than Phenom 960T upgrade?

upgrade your Motherboard and ram to am3+ and ddr3 and use the phenomII you have (oc'd more 1.4V;) ,im at 1.53 for 4.07Ghz) for 4-6 months longer, it Will be a bit quicker anyway with a better chipset and memory and you will save money by hanging on for piledriver to be released Q3.:D big joy time

for me, near end of life cpus are for smashing prior personel best benches with:) ,i did kill my Q6600 this way though lol

imho 2600 or ivy is a BAD choice as a 2600K has no future upgradeabillity and its only upgrade path, Ivy Bridge looks like a side grade, and the X79 chipset has pciex3 issues

in all the 1155 socket chipset motherboards are dead after This year so if you have Any mind of a future upgrade stear clear, if not and your buying for a five year as is stint, go Intel 1155, 2500K
 
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I would suggest keeping your CPU and just upgrading the board and ram so you can jump to Bulldozer when Piledriver shows up.

Since you already have a Gigabyte board, I might suggest the GA-990FXA-UD3. It's $135 after rebate on Newegg and you can get two way SLI on that.

If you have a Microcenter near you (can't tell since there is no location listed) you can get $40 off a AM3+ board when purchasing any of the FX processors.
 
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So, itz better to wait on Piledriver CPUs and than purchase MoBo, RAM and Piledriver CPU?
 
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Probably, or if you cannot wait, you could already buy the mobo and RAM, since your current processor will fit in the new mobo aswell:)
 
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So, itz better to wait on Piledriver CPUs and than purchase MoBo, RAM and Piledriver CPU?

If you have already decided on Piledriver, I'd wait before buying a motherboard and ram so the prices are really low. The last thing you want is to have components sitting unused.

Saying that, you could get the AMD 990FX or another AM3+ compatible motherboard and some DDR3 memory and drop in your current Phenom II X3 720 and then swap the CPU with the Piledriver in a few months.
 
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brandonwh64

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Have you tried to unlock your 720? If it unlocks and atleast OCs to 3.4ghz then I would just stay with what you have until piledriver. The 720 unlocked is still a good CPU
 
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If you are dead set on AMD build, then wait till Piledriver. Sadly estimates of performance increase over Bull are not great. Shame because it originally looked to be a nice CPU. Oh well, someday they'll figure out they created the 7450 of x86 CPUs, then create the 7447 of x86 CPUs to counter it.

If you can't wait, then do as they say.

If you don't mind Intel, I'd wait till Ivy Bridge is completely out. Might be some decent drops on Sandy stuff. I'm honestly seriously looking to switch to Intel. I was excited about Piledriver till I saw the performance expectations of it. Bull not being a true 8 core CPU, yet advertised as one, irked me some too. AMD's prices also haven't been very competitive. At this point, I've got a 6yr old mobo and my confidence in AMD's outlook past Piledriver is dim aside from APUs. Might as well play with the dark side a little even though I know 1155 is likely a dead end for future upgrades.
 

brandonwh64

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If you are dead set on AMD build, then wait till Piledriver. Sadly estimates of performance increase over Bull are not great. Shame because it originally looked to be a nice CPU. Oh well, someday they'll figure out they created the 7450 of x86 CPUs, then create the 7447 of x86 CPUs to counter it.

NC is right, You maybe better off just finding a used 1090T or 1100T and use your 790FX board. The thubans actually performed better that bulldozer in a lot of tests
 
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NC is right, You maybe better off just finding a used 1090T or 1100T and use your 790FX board. The thubans actually performed better that bulldozer in a lot of tests

I half agree, half disagree.

There isnt any Piledriver estimates, we have no clue how it'll perform. Only measurement we have is a low end $99 APU which outperforms the Bulldozer with 4 less cores and minimal cache.

Thurban is a good choice if he keeps his current board.

If he changes boards Bulldozer is the better choice as Thurban will win a lot of tests, but it will still lose a lot more. Plus Bulldozoer OC's a lot further and easier.

Saying that Thurban is a good choice, nice efficient upgrade on a limited budget :)
 
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If you are dead set on AMD build, then wait till Piledriver. Sadly estimates of performance increase over Bull are not great. Shame because it originally looked to be a nice CPU. Oh well, someday they'll figure out they created the 7450 of x86 CPUs, then create the 7447 of x86 CPUs to counter it.

If you can't wait, then do as they say.

If you don't mind Intel, I'd wait till Ivy Bridge is completely out. Might be some decent drops on Sandy stuff. I'm honestly seriously looking to switch to Intel. I was excited about Piledriver till I saw the performance expectations of it. Bull not being a true 8 core CPU, yet advertised as one, irked me some too. AMD's prices also haven't been very competitive. At this point, I've got a 6yr old mobo and my confidence in AMD's outlook past Piledriver is dim aside from APUs. Might as well play with the dark side a little even though I know 1155 is likely a dead end for future upgrades.

If you are for a change, just wait to see top Trinity APU 100W...
 
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Any one heared sth abt Piledriver performance? Would it be much better than Phenoms II?
 
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just go with what you feel would make you sleep IMO a amd phenom II x4 960T a friend of mine has one with a sapphire hd 6850 and he can play bf3 at quarter the price of my system >.<
 
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Any one heared sth abt Piledriver performance? Would it be much better than Phenoms II?

There is no benchmarks available for Piledriver.

At best you can wait for the official Trinity APU reviews in a few weeks as they are based on a cut down Piledriver. But even that is not a definite indication of performance.
 
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If you are dead set on AMD build, then wait till Piledriver. Sadly estimates of performance increase over Bull are not great. Shame because it originally looked to be a nice CPU. Oh well, someday they'll figure out they created the 7450 of x86 CPUs, then create the 7447 of x86 CPUs to counter it.

If you can't wait, then do as they say.

If you don't mind Intel, I'd wait till Ivy Bridge is completely out. Might be some decent drops on Sandy stuff. I'm honestly seriously looking to switch to Intel. I was excited about Piledriver till I saw the performance expectations of it. Bull not being a true 8 core CPU, yet advertised as one, irked me some too. AMD's prices also haven't been very competitive. At this point, I've got a 6yr old mobo and my confidence in AMD's outlook past Piledriver is dim aside from APUs. Might as well play with the dark side a little even though I know 1155 is likely a dead end for future upgrades.

Umm... would you like to tell me where these "low expectations for piledriver" are? 20-30% faster than BD clock-for-clock, with 20-30% higher clocks, and being more power efficient, with a DDR3-2133mhz RAM controller... umm... yeah... so being overall 50% faster than BD, and less power hungry= disapoimting how? (Speculation based on current supposed Trinity leaks. 95wCPU+GPU quad core at 3.8/4.2ghz.)
 
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