Issues with FX-8320

[UnbendingNose]

I've been noticing my FX-8320 holding my R9 290 back for some time now. It's starting to get pretty annoying so I'd thought I'd share my experience with the LTT community.

 

I originally purchased the FX-8320 last fall when I was noticing my athlon II x4 455 was causing major bottlenecks in all games with my newly purchased GTX 760. So I got the fx8320 on sale instead of going intel because it was a great option at the time and it worked flawlessly with my GTX 760, no bottlenecks. The motherboard I got for free from a friend, an Asrock 970 extreme 4. I was worried the board wouldn't be able to handle the 8-core amd so I opted for the 8320 over the 8350 figuring it would be easier on the 4+1 phase VRM. All was well. I then purchased an R9 290 this summer for $199 after the mining crash, couldn't pass up such a good deal, and sold off my GTX 760. I started to notice the R9 290 was only running at 60% to 70% in games like BF4 DX11, BF3, Witcher 2, Skyrim, COD Ghosts, and Metro: Last Light. I thought that maybe the r9 290 was thermal throttling because of temps issues so I purchased an AIO water cooler and and a kraken g10 along with VRM heatsinks. The card doesn't get over 55C now and the vrms never go over 60C, I turned off powertune control in msi afterburner to force a constant core clock and no issues, the card is running the way it's supposed to. If I play BF4 in mantle api it runs beautifully and I get around 80fps avg. with my settings and gpu usage is at 99% most of the time. If I play BF4 in dx11 I get around 50 to 60fps with the same settings with dips down to the 40's and the 290's gpu usage never goes over 70%. I thought maybe the motherboard was throttling the fx8320 but cpu-z shows constant clocks and hwmonitor shows stable vrm temps and cpu temps. CPU never goes over 50C in games thanks to CM hyer212 evo. 

 

I'm starting to get fed up with the performance of this cpu. Some say the fx8___ series are great chips that won't bottleneck until you have 780ti's is SLI or something as powerful. However, I have come across others, mainly a guy named jkteddy77 on youtube who was having the same issues with an FX 8350 and his r9 290. He had an ASUS 990fx board so I know it's not crappy 970 motherboards causing this issue. He and I have tried overclocking, underclocking, undervolting, disabling all power saving and throttle features in BIOS all to no avail. He eventually cracked and bought an intel system with 4790k and now all of his issues are gone and he's getting over 100fps in BF3 at 1080p ultra with an R9 290 like he should. Meanwhile I'm stuck here getting 40 to 70fps with stutters and frame dips. Turning the settings to all low doesn't help either which is another sign of a CPU bottleneck. All signs point to a cpu bottleneck, yet when I tell people they call BS and say "780ti's SLI won't get bottlenecked by an FX 8320, it's a great chip, you're wrong!" Well, I'm not wrong, I've experienced first hand just how bad these AMD CPU's can be and I'm so ready to jump to Intel when I graduate.

 

Here's some proof. Sorry for recording with my cell phone. Didn't want any performance loss using recording software.

 

Mantle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaVyEebZEUs&list=UUXCCTRgeCJmWaLsa30Hhh5A

 

DX11: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SBEaj318iY&list=UUXCCTRgeCJmWaLsa30Hhh5A

 

As you can see, in Mantle the system has no problem holding 60fps in a 64 player match. DX11 on the other hand has dips all the way down to the 40's. Pretty clear evidence of CPU bottleneck right there.

[Priller]

Couple of things. BF4 has had massive issues since the July 8th patch.

 

4+1 VRM with a small heatsink on the power phases will cause issues. It is possible for the CPU to throttle without dropping core clock speeds one bit. That usually happens due to power delivery/VRM temp/high core temps.

 

Something is wrong as I've gotten 38 FPS in BF4 on a locked voltage 7770 at 5760x1080 and DX11.

 

Also if you google Asrock 970 Extreme 4 Throttling you will be surprised by how many you will find. 

[Joshyy]

ASRock extreme 4

 

There are all your issues. 

 

That is a 970 chipset, it was never supposed to run the FX-8350, you need the 990FX to run the 8350 properly. 

 

I'm running a near identical setup and my GPU always gets pinned before the CPU, even in BF4 on DX11. 

[UnbendingNose]

Couple of things. BF4 has had massive issues since the July 8th patch.

4+1 VRM with a small heatsink on the power phases will cause issues. It is possible for the CPU to throttle without dropping core clock speeds one bit. That usually happens due to power delivery/VRM temp/high core temps.

Something is wrong as I've gotten 38 FPS in BF4 on a locked voltage 7770 at 5760x1080 and DX11.

Also if you google Asrock 970 Extreme 4 Throttling you will be surprised by how many you will find.

Good points, however this doesn't just happen in BF4. I get better fps in BF4 mantle than I do in BF3. Which isn't supposed to happen because BF3 is a less demanding game.

jkteddy had an ASUS 990fx and overclocked his fx8350 to 4.8ghz and he was still having the same issues I'm having which is low gpu usage. Asus boards are supposed to be some of the best for the FX 8350 and it was still having trouble.

Read comments.

ASRock extreme 4

There are all your issues.

That is a 970 chipset, it was never supposed to run the FX-8350, you need the 990FX to run the 8350 properly.

I'm running a near identical setup and my GPU always gets pinned before the CPU, even in BF4 on DX11.

Look at these videos posted by jkteddy77. He's having the same issues with an FX8350 and a an ASUS 5A99FX board. It's not just the 970 board. It's the CPU.

[Clyne]

ASRock extreme 4

 

There are all your issues. 

 

That is a 970 chipset, it was never supposed to run the FX-8350, you need the 990FX to run the 8350 properly. 

 

I'm running a near identical setup and my GPU always gets pinned before the CPU, even in BF4 on DX11.

It's not the chipset that you need to run the fx 8350, as long you have good vrm cooling and a power phase that can handle a fx 8350 cpu then it's okay.

[iSuzak]

i have a similar setup and i don't really feel any bottleneck from the Cpu, my gpu go at 100% way before my cpu. My games runs butter smooth except for when i played arma 3(the alpha or something like that)

[UnbendingNose]

I'm about to give up and go intel, but I can't 100% justify the cost with mantle and dx12 around the corner. My 8320 runs beautifully with mantle, so if more more games come out with direct gpu access API's then I won't really need a super fast intel chip. Unless someone on this forum wants to buy the 8320 and motherboard 

[Priller]

Good points, however this doesn't just happen in BF4. I get better fps in BF4 mantle than I do in BF3. Which isn't supposed to happen because BF3 is a less demanding game.

jkteddy had an ASUS 990fx and overclocked his fx8350 to 4.8ghz and he was still having the same issues I'm having which is low gpu usage. Asus boards are supposed to be some of the best for the FX 8350 and it was still having trouble.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaVKMNL-aS4&list=UU4WCRSsuAr931g1sycgcDgg

Look at these videos posted by jkteddy77. He's having the same issues with an FX8350 and a an ASUS 5A99FX board. It's not just the 970 board. It's the CPU.

 

Looks like an unstable Overclock to me. He is limiting the FPS to 65 to "Stabilize the CPU". I wonder what else he has in his config file. 

[Faa]

I'm about to give up and go intel, but I can't 100% justify the cost with mantle and dx12 around the corner. My 8320 runs beautifully with mantle, so if more more games come out with direct gpu access API's then I won't really need a super fast intel chip. Unless someone on this forum wants to buy the 8320 and motherboard 

Mantle works on Intel CPU's as well. Regardless of BF4, the improvement of a 4670K will be massive in BF3/Skyrim (can't take advantage of 4+ cores). Up to 100% though.

Anyways most 8350 owners won't admit their CPU can bottleneck like fuck, even in their advice theyre mixing fanboyism in there though. Besides a i5 4430/H81 board is just 210$ atm, no reason these days going with the 8320 when it can't even touch a stock i5 at all.

 

 

Good points, however this doesn't just happen in BF4. I get better fps in BF4 mantle than I do in BF3. Which isn't supposed to happen because BF3 is a less demanding game.

jkteddy had an ASUS 990fx and overclocked his fx8350 to 4.8ghz and he was still having the same issues I'm having which is low gpu usage. Asus boards are supposed to be some of the best for the FX 8350 and it was still having trouble.

Look at these videos posted by jkteddy77. He's having the same issues with an FX8350 and a an ASUS 5A99FX board. It's not just the 970 board. It's the CPU.

Yeah I agree it's not the board.

AMD drivers on DX have far more CPU overhead than nvidia drivers though. 

With that huge driver overhead wouldn't surprise me a 8350 doesnt cut it anymore.

I have more of these tests, testing AMD/Nvidia GPU's with the CPU being a bottleneck to find out which driver has less cpu overhead, can link them later if you like.

[Priller]

Just tried it. 

 

1 R9 280X got a low of 66 FPS at 5760x1080 with the medium preset on DX11. On High is was in the 50s with small dips into the high 40s.

 

So either my R9 280X is stronger the an R9 290 running 3 monitors or something is up with the rig.

 

It loads the GPU to 100% just fine. You will notice the second GPU is turned off completely.

 

I attached the CPU-Z tabs that show core speed, ram speed, timings, etc.

[UnbendingNose]

I'll show you my gpu usage when I get home tonight. Won't be pretty.

 

Also, is that in a 64 player server? Definitely takes a higher toll on CPU's

[Faa]

I'll show you my gpu usage when I get home tonight. Won't be pretty.

 

Also, is that in a 64 player server? Definitely takes a higher toll on CPU's

He runs 5760x1080 that will raise the loads up obviously.

[Faceman]

AMD 4 LYFE! 8 Core future proof Jetson Lifestyle!

[-rascal-]

 

Mantle works on Intel CPU's as well. Regardless of BF4, the improvement of a 4670K will be massive in BF3/Skyrim (can't take advantage of 4+ cores). Up to 100% though.

 

 

 

Hmm...you got me curious now. Can you give me the source for that graph by any chance?

I want to some experiments...with a i5-4690K system that I have available and my FX-8350.

[Faa]

Hmm...you got me curious now. Can you give me the source for that graph by any chance?

I want to some experiments...with a i5-4690K system that I have available and my FX-8350.

http://vr-zone.com/articles/amd-fx-8350-vs-intel-core-i7-3770k-4-8ghz-multi-gpu-gaming-performance/17494.html

Game doesn't need more than 4 cores apparently, so yeah 4 AMD cores are basically nothing compared to 4 Intel cores.

[HippY]

@UnbendingNose

 

do not believe to 1 guy on youtube, it can be a faulty chip or something individual, or the unstable OC mentioned before

 

what does the cpu-id shows, what are the frequencies? 4+1 phase might be the problem here

[Faa]

what does the cpu-id shows, what are the frequencies? 4+1 phase might be the problem here

A P9X79 Pro is a 4+1 phase with an IR3598 doubler, which easily does 5GHz on a 3930K that consumes up to 50% more power a 9590 consumes. Mosfet quality is far more important than how many pwm phases you have. I've already explained why the frames are so horrible in DX mode, google amd vs nvidia driver overhead benchmarks or I'll link them.

Apparently the OP made a while ago a thread asking advice between the 8320 & 3570K: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/79053-fx-8320-vs-i5-3570k-and-new-mobo/

Still wondering why people recommended it when they can google it in 5secs time to see it performing way worse than an Intel equivalent. This is what I found from a guy who actually owned a 780Ti with a 8350 at 4.4GHz and later on upgraded to a 4770k;

At 7:28 loads were dropping all the way down to 55%

Can't see his loads ever dropping down below 97% with a 4770k.

[HippY]

A P9X79 Pro is a 4+1 phase with an IR3598 doubler, which easily does 5GHz on a 3930K that consumes up to 50% more power a 9590 consumes. Mosfet quality is far more important than how many pwm phases you have. I've already explained why the frames are so horrible in DX mode, google amd vs nvidia driver overhead benchmarks or I'll link them.

 

However the Asrock is a low end board, it is well under £100, so do not expect it to have 4+1 high quality VRMs

 

yes, we get that a chip that cost 2x/2.5x another is better, but not everyone can afford them

[Faa]

However the Asrock is a low end board, it is well under £100, so do not expect it to have 4+1 high quality VRMs

 

yes, we get that a chip that cost 2x/2.5x another is better, but not everyone can afford them

8320's MRSP is 150$, cheapest board that would go with it are around 70$. I5 4430's/H81's are 210$ which is only 5-10% slower than a regular 4670K and a 4770k is pretty much equal to a 4670k.

[HippY]

8320's MRSP is 150$, cheapest board that would go with it are around 70$. I5 4430's/H81's are 210$ which is only 5-10% slower than a regular 4670K and a 4770k is pretty much equal to a 4670k.

yeah, but no overclockability, and i do not like low end boards (although this is a personal view)

 

I am not saying that the i5 is bad, all I want to say is that the 8320 is still competent for its price

[Faa]

I am not saying that the i5 is bad, all I want to say is that the 8320 is still competent for its price

It's not when it isn't any cheaper. Why would you go with a 130-150$ board for a 8320 when you could have gotten a 4670K/70$ Z97 for it? On AMD's side you're paying for fx 4300 performance when it comes down to gaming.

 

yeah, but no overclockability, and i do not like low end boards (although this is a personal view)

High-end boards and low-end boards aren't that much different except VRM is mostly better and packed with more features but that's all about it. They're pretty much equally reliable though. Although you get Realtek nic, which is quite shit compared to Intel nic.

[nokturrduk84]

I've been noticing my FX-8320 holding my R9 290 back for some time now. It's starting to get pretty annoying so I'd thought I'd share my experience with the LTT community.

 

I originally purchased the FX-8320 last fall when I was noticing my athlon II x4 455 was causing major bottlenecks in all games with my newly purchased GTX 760. So I got the fx8320 on sale instead of going intel because it was a great option at the time and it worked flawlessly with my GTX 760, no bottlenecks. The motherboard I got for free from a friend, an Asrock 970 extreme 4. I was worried the board wouldn't be able to handle the 8-core amd so I opted for the 8320 over the 8350 figuring it would be easier on the 4+1 phase VRM. All was well. I then purchased an R9 290 this summer for $199 after the mining crash, couldn't pass up such a good deal, and sold off my GTX 760. I started to notice the R9 290 was only running at 60% to 70% in games like BF4 DX11, BF3, Witcher 2, Skyrim, COD Ghosts, and Metro: Last Light. I thought that maybe the r9 290 was thermal throttling because of temps issues so I purchased an AIO water cooler and and a kraken g10 along with VRM heatsinks. The card doesn't get over 55C now and the vrms never go over 60C, I turned off powertune control in msi afterburner to force a constant core clock and no issues, the card is running the way it's supposed to. If I play BF4 in mantle api it runs beautifully and I get around 80fps avg. with my settings and gpu usage is at 99% most of the time. If I play BF4 in dx11 I get around 50 to 60fps with the same settings with dips down to the 40's and the 290's gpu usage never goes over 70%. I thought maybe the motherboard was throttling the fx8320 but cpu-z shows constant clocks and hwmonitor shows stable vrm temps and cpu temps. CPU never goes over 50C in games thanks to CM hyer212 evo. 

 

I'm starting to get fed up with the performance of this cpu. Some say the fx8___ series are great chips that won't bottleneck until you have 780ti's is SLI or something as powerful. However, I have come across others, mainly a guy named jkteddy77 on youtube who was having the same issues with an FX 8350 and his r9 290. He had an ASUS 990fx board so I know it's not crappy 970 motherboards causing this issue. He and I have tried overclocking, underclocking, undervolting, disabling all power saving and throttle features in BIOS all to no avail. He eventually cracked and bought an intel system with 4790k and now all of his issues are gone and he's getting over 100fps in BF3 at 1080p ultra with an R9 290 like he should. Meanwhile I'm stuck here getting 40 to 70fps with stutters and frame dips. Turning the settings to all low doesn't help either which is another sign of a CPU bottleneck. All signs point to a cpu bottleneck, yet when I tell people they call BS and say "780ti's SLI won't get bottlenecked by an FX 8320, it's a great chip, you're wrong!" Well, I'm not wrong, I've experienced first hand just how bad these AMD CPU's can be and I'm so ready to jump to Intel when I graduate.

 

Here's some proof. Sorry for recording with my cell phone. Didn't want any performance loss using recording software.

 

Mantle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaVyEebZEUs&list=UUXCCTRgeCJmWaLsa30Hhh5A

 

DX11: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SBEaj318iY&list=UUXCCTRgeCJmWaLsa30Hhh5A

 

As you can see, in Mantle the system has no problem holding 60fps in a 64 player match. DX11 on the other hand has dips all the way down to the 40's. Pretty clear evidence of CPU bottleneck right there.

I always recommend Intel CPUs instead of that crap FX cpus, but no one listens to me, saying I'm fanboy, but as you see with your own experience, I'm right. The worse thing in this forum & in whole Internet is, that there are still those people who claim that FX cpus are great, like that HippY guy above me & they still keep brainwashing others (mostly those who are new in PC tech). They bring this damage, spread this misinformation all over here. And those who claim, they don't feel bottleneck, it's because they don't know Intel CPUs power & won't know until they get it, - thinking 60 fps is fine, my cpu is running cool, when with intel cpu they could fully use potential of their video cards & get higher fps.

[UnbendingNose]

A P9X79 Pro is a 4+1 phase with an IR3598 doubler, which easily does 5GHz on a 3930K that consumes up to 50% more power a 9590 consumes. Mosfet quality is far more important than how many pwm phases you have. I've already explained why the frames are so horrible in DX mode, google amd vs nvidia driver overhead benchmarks or I'll link them.

Apparently the OP made a while ago a thread asking advice between the 8320 & 3570K: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/79053-fx-8320-vs-i5-3570k-and-new-mobo/

Still wondering why people recommended it when they can google it in 5secs time to see it performing way worse than an Intel equivalent. This is what I found from a guy who actually owned a 780Ti with a 8350 at 4.4GHz and later on upgraded to a 4770k;

At 7:28 loads were dropping all the way down to 55%

Can't see his loads ever dropping down below 97% with a 4770k.

Beautiful evidence.

[Faceman]

Beautiful evidence.

Also, keep in mind that for gaming, i5 =/= i7.  The only game out that shows a tangible difference between i5 and i7 is Watch Dogs, everything else, the i5 and the i7 are the same.

[UnbendingNose]

Also, keep in mind that for gaming, i5 =/= i7.  The only game out that shows a tangible difference between i5 and i7 is Watch Dogs, everything else, the i5 and the i7 are the same.

I'm pretty sure I saw benchmarks where the i7 4770k was getting around 10fps more in BF4 than an i5 4670k.