Good budget APU from AMD?

[step1041]

Hey Everyone,

 

My grandmother has a computer that I built out of odds and ends parts a few years ago but she is complaining about it being slow to boot up. My first thought was SSD, which I will probably do, but the system has parts from around 2008 so it might be best to upgrade the whole thing and reduce any bottleneck with an SSD. I'm looking to upgrade the current AMD Athlon II X2 240 to something really cheap and new, but still have some kind of a performance upgrade. I just need the most basic integrated GPU as the system is mostly used for email and web browsing.

 

I have a very good idea of Intel's offerings, but know almost nothing about AMD CPUs/APUs except about the current sockets (FM2+ and AM3+). I was wondering if someone could possibly give me a brief idea of which are the most popular current chips today (including the higher end ones) and which may be good for this project on a small budget? I just need a CPU, RAM (4GB), a very basic Motherboard, and a cheap 120GB SSD for under $300. It doesn't need to be anything special, just to stop my phone from ringing about the system speed (I hope some of you understand that).

 

Thanks a lot!

[Meetchell]

Don't know a whole lot about AMD but i can suggest this for a cheap 120Gb ssd

https://au.pcpartpicker.com/part/samsung-internal-hard-drive-mz7te120bw

[step1041]

Don't know a whole lot about AMD but i can suggest this for a cheap 120Gb ssd

https://au.pcpartpicker.com/part/samsung-internal-hard-drive-mz7te120bw

I've got a Kingston V300 120GB sitting in an old MacBook Pro. My laptop and desktop have standard 250GB 840s. The SSD will probably come down to whats on sale that week for around $75 CAD

[DigitalHermit]

The A8 is a sweet spot... But for just web browsing and other stuff, an A6 would suffice...

 

You can also try to get a cheap Pentium...

[step1041]

The A8 is a sweet spot... But for just web browsing and other stuff, an A6 would suffice...

 

You can also try to get a cheap Pentium...

I actually just priced out parts with a Pentium G3258, some 4gb stick of DDR3, a cheap $70 Gigabyte 1150 board, and a Kingston 120GB v300 SSD for around $255 no tax which might work nicely. 

[harrynowl]

Well I think the SATA 3GB/s won't really bottleneck the 120GB SSDs. Most of them only just go above the (I think it's ~375MB/s) limit of SATA2 on the read speeds. 

 

The X2 240 is about as good as any dual core APU from AMD (actually a bit stronger). If the GPU (760G/880G?) is doing fine don't bother buying another one.

 

I'd probably grab an SSD, give it a nice bit of TLC with Malwarebytes etc and it should be just fine.

[step1041]

Well I think the SATA 3GB/s won't really bottleneck the 120GB SSDs. Most of them only just go above the (I think it's ~375MB/s) limit of SATA2 on the read speeds. 

 

The X2 240 is about as good as any dual core APU from AMD (actually a bit stronger). If the GPU (760G/880G?) is doing fine don't bother buying another one.

 

I'd probably grab an SSD, give it a nice bit of TLC with Malwarebytes etc and it should be just fine.

I think what we will end up doing is buying the SSD and seeing what happens. Even with an HDD the computer isn't that slow, but it might have been nice to update it to something released in the last year or two. 

[step1041]

Well I think the SATA 3GB/s won't really bottleneck the 120GB SSDs. Most of them only just go above the (I think it's ~375MB/s) limit of SATA2 on the read speeds. 

 

The X2 240 is about as good as any dual core APU from AMD (actually a bit stronger). If the GPU (760G/880G?) is doing fine don't bother buying another one.

 

I'd probably grab an SSD, give it a nice bit of TLC with Malwarebytes etc and it should be just fine.

That is probably what I will end up doing. The system runs fine it would be nice to have some extra speed when doing the disk IO, my hope would be to bring it to 2014 parts at the same time, but it is probably not really worth it if it does everything it needs to do with the current parts. Thanks a lot for your help! 

 

Edit: didn't see the last post and typed out a new reply thinking it errored - oops!

[A10-FTW]

Hey Everyone,

 

My grandmother has a computer that I built out of odds and ends parts a few years ago but she is complaining about it being slow to boot up. My first thought was SSD, which I will probably do, but the system has parts from around 2008 so it might be best to upgrade the whole thing and reduce any bottleneck with an SSD. I'm looking to upgrade the current AMD Athlon II X2 240 to something really cheap and new, but still have some kind of a performance upgrade. I just need the most basic integrated GPU as the system is mostly used for email and web browsing.

 

I have a very good idea of Intel's offerings, but know almost nothing about AMD CPUs/APUs except about the current sockets (FM2+ and AM3+). I was wondering if someone could possibly give me a brief idea of which are the most popular current chips today (including the higher end ones) and which may be good for this project on a small budget? I just need a CPU, RAM (4GB), a very basic Motherboard, and a cheap 120GB SSD for under $300. It doesn't need to be anything special, just to stop my phone from ringing about the system speed (I hope some of you understand that).

 

Thanks a lot!

350.$ with out windows

 

450.$ with windows

 

 

here is my build

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/zpJ7sY

 

(with blu-ray) B)

[asusfan]

have you looked into getting a refurbished laptop / netbook? then you could do a HDD swap with an SSD or SSHD and it will be faster than the old thing and do the job if she just needs for basic work / internet / email etc. unless she is a gamer granny.

lots of AMD APU out there and yeah will make a cheap build if you just liek the idea of a build for your grandmother, look into m-itx with onboard wifi, i think Gigiabite make a good one and slap in an A8 or A10 APU and a SSD and your good to go.

[A10-FTW]

have you looked into getting a refurbished laptop / netbook? then you could do a HDD swap with an SSD or SSHD and it will be faster than the old thing and do the job if she just needs for basic work / internet / email etc. unless she is a gamer granny.

lots of AMD APU out there and yeah will make a cheap build if you just liek the idea of a build for your grandmother, look into m-itx with onboard wifi, i think Gigiabite make a good one and slap in an A8 or A10 APU and a SSD and your good to go.

a couple weeks back, a friend buy a laptop with the (old) A10 5750M apu (4 cores with the HD 8650G) for work

 

and he absolute love it, he moved a lot, and work anywhere with his A10

 

soo... i think is a great buy on laptops (any A8 and A10)

 

but in low netbooks i still recommend intel

 

http://cpuboss.com/cpu/AMD-A10-5750M