Which budget gaming CPU?

[PigeonSwag]

Hey. So my friend is looking to get into PC gaming but doesn't have that much money. I heard that you can get decent performance using an AMD 5350, but I was wondering if there was anything better for the £40GBP and under bracket. I was looking at an Athlon II x4 635 second hand. the 635 seems to be better on synthetic benchmarks but I don't know how that translates into gaming performance, and its socket does have a much better upgrade path, but its an older architecture.

 

I was also looking at a Q6600. I've seen it perform well enough, but its super old. Could I base a system around it?

 

 

Also, is the 635 AM3 or FM2+?

 

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

 

[Aniallation]

@PigeonSwag

 

The 635 is AM3. It is the best performer out of all three of the chips you mentioned and as you said there is an upgrade path if you get a decent AM3+ board.

[CydiaDash]

 

Hey. So my friend is looking to get into PC gaming but doesn't have that much money. I heard that you can get decent performance using an AMD 5350, but I was wondering if there was anything better for the £40GBP and under bracket. I was looking at an Athlon II x4 635 second hand. the 635 seems to be better on synthetic benchmarks but I don't know how that translates into gaming performance, and its socket does have a much better upgrade path, but its an older architecture.

 

I was also looking at a Q6600. I've seen it perform well enough, but its super old. Could I base a system around it?

 

 

Also, is the 635 AM3 or FM2+?

 

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

 

See if you can get an extra 10 quid and get the pentium G3258. You can overclock it quite a lot - mine is at a stable OC @ 4.5GHz. I hope many people will back me up on this: it is a brilliant chip for the money

[Swisscheesy]

What about an LGA1150 Pentium? That would give you an excellent upgrade path and decent performance for the price.

[CydiaDash]

 

Hey. 

 

Follow your posts bro.

[PigeonSwag]

@PigeonSwag

 

The 635 is AM3. It is the best performer out of all three of the chips you mentioned and as you said there is an upgrade path if you get a decent AM3+ board.

An AM3 processor will work in an AM3+ board?

 

See if you can get an extra 10 quid and get the pentium G3258. You can overclock it quite a lot - mine is at a stable OC @ 4.5GHz. I hope many people will back me up on this: it is a brilliant chip for the money

There isn't all that much money in the budget for a PSU and an aftermarket cooler, so any overclock will be pretty weak. Plus neither of us know that much about overclocking.

 

 

What about an LGA1150 Pentium? That would give you an excellent upgrade path and decent performance for the price.

While an upgrade path is nice, an upgrade wont happen for some time and my friend really wants to game as soon as he can without spending too much.

 

 

Follow your posts bro.

Sorry.

[Aniallation]

An AM3 processor will work in an AM3+ board?

Yes, it will.

 

 

See if you can get an extra 10 quid and get the pentium G3258. You can overclock it quite a lot - mine is at a stable OC @ 4.5GHz. I hope many people will back me up on this: it is a brilliant chip for the money

What about an LGA1150 Pentium? That would give you an excellent upgrade path and decent performance for the price.

 

G3258 is great single-threaded but in AAA games it struggles. Some won't even run at all.

[CydiaDash]

Yes, it will.

 

 

 

G3258 is great single-threaded but in AAA games it struggles. Some won't even run at all.

Not true. It runs fine as long as you have a decent GPU

[Aniallation]

Not true. It runs fine as long as you have a decent GPU

It already starts bottlenecking at 270X level, what do you mean a decent GPU... There's a reason I returned my G3258 to go back to my Phenom II X6, in AAA titles performance was actually worse when considering the lag spikes and stuttering.