$250 budget, what route to go?

[Ben_Upde]

It's apparent that my FX is limiting my experience, at least slightly, and I would like to improve my system. I'm pretty confident my MB is limiting my overclockability of my processor, due to its 6+2 VRM supply. 

Within my budget what would be the option you would choose? Get a better MB and just run the FX for all it's worth until I can do a complete system refresh in a couple of years, or source a used Intel cpu/mb combo that may be lower end than my 8350 but will likely perform similar/slightly better? Do I just live with what I have (just built the stupid thing a couple months ago) and save more for new future releases?

If I do jump over to the Intel side, I can probably increase my budget ~$150 from selling my current CPU/MB. Where will that put me in the Intel lineup?

 

[Gabrishl]

New AMD FXs are fairly cheap, and Asus has some good AMD mobos.

[MageTank]

10 minutes ago, Ben_Upde said:

It's apparent that my FX is limiting my experience, at least slightly, and I would like to improve my system. I'm pretty confident my MB is limiting my overclockability of my processor, due to its 6+2 VRM supply. 

Within my budget what would be the option you would choose? Get a better MB and just run the FX for all it's worth until I can do a complete system refresh in a couple of years, or source a used Intel cpu/mb combo that may be lower end than my 8350 but will likely perform similar/slightly better? Do I just live with what I have (just built the stupid thing a couple months ago) and save more for new future releases?

If I do jump over to the Intel side, I can probably increase my budget ~$150 from selling my current CPU/MB. Where will that put me in the Intel lineup?

 

If you can spare the money, here is a cheap i3 setup that would be faster than the FX for gaming:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor  ($123.88 @ OutletPC) 
Motherboard: MSI Z170-A PRO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($82.98 @ Newegg) 
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory  ($67.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $274.85
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-20 15:42 EST-0500

 

If you can find an archived BIOS, and you have windows 10 Pro, you can overclock that i3 with the stock cooler fairly easy. You just have to have the proper bios, and disable windows update with Group Policy Editor. I can also walk you through overclocking this ram to 2800mhz, and getting some extra performance out of that i3.

 

If you can sell your current setup for that extra $150, get this:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($249.89 @ OutletPC) 
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($29.44 @ Amazon) 
Motherboard: MSI Z170-A PRO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($82.98 @ Newegg) 
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($34.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $397.30
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-20 15:46 EST-0500

 

This allows you to overclock, and you can buy another 8gb stick of ram later on once you get the money. 

[Ben_Upde]

MageTank, I just listed my CPU/MB/RAM combo on craigslist for $250, hopefully I can sell it for near there as I was kinda dreaming about picking up a setup like This, same MB as you listed but I stepped up the CPU a notch (1,2?) to an I7 6700K hoping for future-proofness for quite some time. I also went with some RAM that would fit my color scheme (and is more aesthetically pleasing to me) but runs the same specs.

If I don't sell my current stuff within a decent timeframe I will probably go with the first option you listed, which will still give me a solid upgrade path in the future.

 

Thanks for the time and info!

[Ben_Upde]

1 hour ago, Gabrishl said:

New AMD FXs are fairly cheap, and Asus has some good AMD mobos.

The only 'better' FX AMD offers is the 9xxx series, which are really just binned 8xxx series chips. Getting one of those would require me to purchase a new motherboard anyway as my current one cannot support more than the TDP of my current 8350BE. No use spending that kind of money to side step a bit when I could probably buy a better MB and overclock to the same performance of the 9xxx series chips.

[RawLobster]

I definitely recommend either waiting or selling your current set up before upgrading. An i3 will provide minimal benefits over an 8350 on single threaded games and may actually give you worse performance on some multi threaded games, and will likely give decently worse performance on multi threaded non-gaming applications. An i5 or i7 would be a decent upgrade, but even then, I personally would probably wait to see what Zen has to offer before upgrading. 

 

Is your CPU actually bottlenecking the GPU or anything? Because the FX 8350 is still a decent CPU. There are plenty of applications that will benefit a lot from an i5 or i7, but your front end user experience will likely not change much for how much you have to spend.

[MageTank]

4 minutes ago, RawLobster said:

I definitely recommend either waiting or selling your current set up before upgrading. An i3 will provide minimal benefits over an 8350 on single threaded games and may actually give you worse performance on some multi threaded games, and will likely give decently worse performance on multi threaded non-gaming applications. An i5 or i7 would be a decent upgrade, but even then, I personally would probably wait to see what Zen has to offer before upgrading. 

 

Is your CPU actually bottlenecking the GPU or anything? Because the FX 8350 is still a decent CPU. There are plenty of applications that will benefit a lot from an i5 or i7, but your front end user experience will likely not change much for how much you have to spend.

What? An i3 would absolutely demolish an FX 8350 in single threaded games. That is where it would shine the most. Even in heavily threaded games, an i3 with fast memory will still outdo an FX CPU. 

 

 

Notice that in AC:U, a game that can utilize 8 threads quite easily, the 6 core FX 6300 is losing against the 2 core, 4 thread i3? Those 2 extra cores might slightly push the 8350 ahead of the i3 in that game, but even then, its minimum FPS would still be worse, due to the terrible IPC combined with the terrible IMC of FX CPU's. It is a challenge to even get them to run beyond 1866mhz, with most people topping out at 2133mhz on the most expensive boards.

 

Simply put, for gaming, the Core i3 6100 is better in every regard when compared to the FX 8350. 

31 minutes ago, Ben_Upde said:

MageTank, I just listed my CPU/MB/RAM combo on craigslist for $250, hopefully I can sell it for near there as I was kinda dreaming about picking up a setup like This, same MB as you listed but I stepped up the CPU a notch (1,2?) to an I7 6700K hoping for future-proofness for quite some time. I also went with some RAM that would fit my color scheme (and is more aesthetically pleasing to me) but runs the same specs.

If I don't sell my current stuff within a decent timeframe I will probably go with the first option you listed, which will still give me a solid upgrade path in the future.

 

Thanks for the time and info!

No problem. If you live near a Microcenter, you can get the 6600k for $220, if you still needed to save money. The 6700k is a really great CPU, it's just too expensive for my tastes. However, if you can afford it, It is the best that Skylake has to offer so far.

[RawLobster]

3 minutes ago, MageTank said:

 

Notice that in AC:U, a game that can utilize 8 threads quite easily, the 6 core FX 6300 is losing against the 2 core, 4 thread i3? Those 2 extra cores might slightly push the 8350 ahead of the i3 in that game, but even then, its minimum FPS would still be worse, due to the terrible IPC combined with the terrible IMC of FX CPU's. It is a challenge to even get them to run beyond 1866mhz, with most people topping out at 2133mhz on the most expensive boards.

My point was that spending an extra $250 isn't going to be worth what you get out of it. If there's still some loss, is it really worth double the money originally spent? I'm just saying that going to an i5 or i7 would be vastly more worth it. Yeah the experience will be better in some instances on an i3, but also worse in some, and to me that's not worth the price. Just my opinion, though.

[MageTank]

Just now, RawLobster said:

My point was that spending an extra $250 isn't going to be worth what you get out of it. If there's still some loss, is it really worth double the money originally spent? I'm just saying that going to an i5 or i7 would be vastly more worth it. Yeah the experience will be better in some instances on an i3, but also worse in some, and to me that's not worth the price. Just my opinion, though.

That depends entirely on OP's intentions. Using an i3 as a stopgap is still not a bad idea, because they can be obtained for roughly $100-$120, and will still be useful to have as a spare diagnostic CPU. For strictly gaming, going with the i3 will yield no losses at all. The only area where the FX 8350 will dominate is in heavy compression and video rendering. Where more cores prevail. There are only a few gaming titles where the FX 8350 comes out ahead, such as RAGE, and maybe AC:U (Again, its minimum FPS will suffer from slower ram, due to the FX series weak IMC) but far more will notice a vast improvement with the i3.

 

I do agree though. An i5 or i7 is definitely the best bet for long term. However, OP's goal of "future proofing" is an impossible dream. Nothing lasts forever, especially in the computer world. However, going with a 6700k will last him several years, if he can afford it. While the i3 on the other hand, might only buy him a year or two before the demand of games phase out 2 cores, 4 threads, like they have with the current dual core CPU's. 

[DunePilot]

Any of the recommendations with the budget Intel setups, but I wouldn't get any ram unless you go Skylake and have to swap to DDR4, if you go 1150 I would just reuse the 16GB you have now. Good thing is that it looks like you have a decent setup and just switching motherboard/cpu/ram(if skylake) you should have a major perf upgrade. Then next time you get some money swapping in a new GPU will have you set for a long time.

[Guest]

I'm running 4.7 ( and can get 4.8) on 6+2 power phase... 

 

Don't spend more money on the FX.

 

I'd wait for new architecture and wishful thinking for DX12 performance boost. 

 

If upgrading now I'd go haswell xeon. (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/FRL96h)

[Ben_Upde]

Well now, that was fast. I'll have my FX stuff sold first thing tomorrow for $200 plus a brand new gigabyte fx motherboard to sell. Add that $200 to my existing $250 and now I'm in a mental battle. I had been wanting to have the ability to add an m.2 drive, which isn't an option with the MSI board. On Amazon I can get an i5 6600K bundled with an Asus Z170A motherboard for ~$400 and adding 8gb of Kingston Hyper FuryX for $38 should tide me over until I can throw another 8gb later on as funds allow. 

 

Any thoughts to interject before I pull the trigger? I'm not wanting to buy again for a long time lol. I made my mistakes with the AMD setup. 

[MageTank]

13 minutes ago, Ben_Upde said:

Well now, that was fast. I'll have my FX stuff sold first thing tomorrow for $200 plus a brand new gigabyte fx motherboard to sell. Add that $200 to my existing $250 and now I'm in a mental battle. I had been wanting to have the ability to add an m.2 drive, which isn't an option with the MSI board. On Amazon I can get an i5 6600K bundled with an Asus Z170A motherboard for ~$400 and adding 8gb of Kingston Hyper FuryX for $38 should tide me over until I can throw another 8gb later on as funds allow. 

 

Any thoughts to interject before I pull the trigger? I'm not wanting to buy again for a long time lol. I made my mistakes with the AMD setup. 

Sounds like a pretty good plan. Just make sure you are getting 8GB sticks, instead of 2x4gb kits. 8GB sticks are dual rank, and can use Rank Interleaving, while 4gb sticks are single ranked, and cannot. You will get more performance in the long run with 2x8gb, than 4x4gb. Aside from that, sounds very solid. Pretty nice price to sell your old setup btw. 

[Ben_Upde]

15 minutes ago, MageTank said:

Sounds like a pretty good plan. Just make sure you are getting 8GB sticks, instead of 2x4gb kits. 8GB sticks are dual rank, and can use Rank Interleaving, while 4gb sticks are single ranked, and cannot. You will get more performance in the long run with 2x8gb, than 4x4gb. Aside from that, sounds very solid. Pretty nice price to sell your old setup btw. 

Thanks for the info on the ram. I'll make sure to do that. Besides it will allow me to upgrade to 32gb if the need ever arises. 

[Ben_Upde]

This Intel thing gives me a headache lol. 

I have located a 4820K and Asrock x99 extreme6 for about $400, components are all advertised as new. 

It takes DDR4 and seems to have all the goodies I want.

 

Will I seek a massive performance increase from my old FX setup? Is this setup comparable to a Skylake i7 6700K/z170 for slightly less money?

 

At least AMD is easy lol. Find the fastest processor you can afford and get a motherboard with the power phases you need to support it. 

 

[runit3]

2 hours ago, Ben_Upde said:

This Intel thing gives me a headache lol. 

I have located a 4820K and Asrock x99 extreme6 for about $400, components are all advertised as new. 

It takes DDR4 and seems to have all the goodies I want.

 

Will I seek a massive performance increase from my old FX setup? Is this setup comparable to a Skylake i7 6700K/z170 for slightly less money?

 

At least AMD is easy lol. Find the fastest processor you can afford and get a motherboard with the power phases you need to support it. 

 

I'm assuming you mean 5820k. Yes, anything X99 is a massive upgrade from any FX offering. Setup is better in any productivity suite than Skylake, slightly less performance in gaming depending on how far you OC.

 

AMD is easy!? Counting power phasing on a board is a PIA compared to, Am I overclocking? yes, Z board, no H board. Put CPU in socket. Job done.

Complexity is having an entire CPU line OC capable, and dealing with manufacturers who cut corners targeting the cheaper lower powered chips.

[Ben_Upde]

7 hours ago, runit3 said:

I'm assuming you mean 5820k. Yes, anything X99 is a massive upgrade from any FX offering.

No I meant the 'ivy bridge' i7 4820K. It's a 2011 socket to match the x99 I am looking at. 

 

Is the 4820K not going to perform well enough for me?

[runit3]

Just now, Ben_Upde said:

No I meant the 'ivy bridge' i7 4820K. It's a 2011 socket to match the x99 I am looking at. 

 

Is the 4820K not going to perform well enough for me?

X99 is 2011-3, not 2011. 4820k will only fit a 2011 socket, aka X79.

[Ben_Upde]

34 minutes ago, runit3 said:

X99 is 2011-3, not 2011. 4820k will only fit a 2011 socket, aka X79

 

 

Back to the drawing board.........

[runit3]

4 minutes ago, Ben_Upde said:

33 minutes ago, runit3 said:

X99 is 2011-3, not 2011. 4820k will only fit a 2011 socket, aka X79

I'm guessing there was some text to go along with the quote. If you're considering X79 as a platform the 4820k only has marginal improvement in the form of quad channel DDR3 and a larger cache in comparison to any Haswell i7. The 4820k is only 4c/8t. If you want X79 the 4930k is the chip to look for (6c/12t). Given the average price of used X79 parts it would probably be much more economical to go with Z97 and an i7-4790k or H97 and i7-4790.

[Conan1600]

dude. 255.00 i5 6600k newegg

          115.00 msi z170a sli plus newegg (has m.2 x2 speed)

            72.00 16GB DDR4 2400 gskill v Ram newegg

         _________

            446.00

 

in budget and has everything you want

[Hailey-Ross]

On 2/20/2016 at 1:31 PM, Ben_Upde said:

It's apparent that my FX is limiting my experience, at least slightly, and I would like to improve my system. I'm pretty confident my MB is limiting my overclockability of my processor, due to its 6+2 VRM supply. 

Within my budget what would be the option you would choose? Get a better MB and just run the FX for all it's worth until I can do a complete system refresh in a couple of years, or source a used Intel cpu/mb combo that may be lower end than my 8350 but will likely perform similar/slightly better? Do I just live with what I have (just built the stupid thing a couple months ago) and save more for new future releases?

If I do jump over to the Intel side, I can probably increase my budget ~$150 from selling my current CPU/MB. Where will that put me in the Intel lineup?

 

I was using the same Motherboard and Processor on my main machine not too long ago. Ive noticed that its not very great for OC'ing as well as the stability would change week to week. I upgraded to the 4790k and  Gigabyte GA-Z97X-Gaming 5 ATX board. Overall it was a great performance upgrade, but definitely over the budget your looking to do. You might be able to get into a lower end MB and CPU (non K goes alot cheaper if you willing to not OC)

[Ben_Upde]

Thanks for the help and information everyone!

I got the cash from the sale of my FX setup so after much review searching I decided that the Z170/Skylake option was what I needed. I got an open-box i7 6700K for $350 shipped and an open-box Asus Z170-A for $138 shipped. After I get that gathered up I will see what kind of deal I can find on a stick of DDR4 locally. 

 

I went i7 because I wanted to keep at least 8 threads cuz MOAR threadz iz MOAR bettr!

Edited February 28, 2016 by Ben_Upde
I'm a tard...

[MageTank]

9 minutes ago, Ben_Upde said:

Thanks for the help and information everyone!

I got the cash from the sale of my FX setup so after much review searching I decided that the Z170/Skylake option was what I needed. I got an open-box i7 6700K for $350 shipped and an open-box Asus Z170-A for $138 shipped. After I get that gathered up I will see what kind of deal I can find on a stick of DDR4 locally. 

 

I went i7 because I wanted to keep at least 8 threads cuz MOAR corez iz MOAR bettr!

But an i7 is not "moar corez". It's more threads. There is a huge difference. Not only that, it's not always better. Some games actually do worse when hyper-threading is enabled *Cough* Final Fantasy *Cough*. Other than that, HT in most games that can utilize it, is only about a 10-15% improvement on average. For things outside of gaming, such as compression and rendering, having the extra threads is quite beneficial though. While I don't exactly trust open box/used CPU's that much, If it works, you will be very pleased with the upgrade. I highly suggest looking into 2x8GB sticks of memory though, for that Rank Interleaving. Even if you can only get 2133mhz, I can help walk you through manually overclocking it to 2800mhz at least, which will still offer a nice performance boost for your minimum frame rates.

 

Glad to see you got a nice price out of your old setup, and even happier to see you on a new platform. Good luck with your build.

[Ben_Upde]

2 hours ago, MageTank said:

But an i7 is not "moar corez". It's more threads. There is a huge difference. Not only that, it's not always better. Some games actually do worse when hyper-threading is enabled *Cough* Final Fantasy *Cough*. Other than that, HT in most games that can utilize it, is only about a 10-15% improvement on average. For things outside of gaming, such as compression and rendering, having the extra threads is quite beneficial though. While I don't exactly trust open box/used CPU's that much, If it works, you will be very pleased with the upgrade. I highly suggest looking into 2x8GB sticks of memory though, for that Rank Interleaving. Even if you can only get 2133mhz, I can help walk you through manually overclocking it to 2800mhz at least, which will still offer a nice performance boost for your minimum frame rates.

 

Glad to see you got a nice price out of your old setup, and even happier to see you on a new platform. Good luck with your build.

I meant to say threads, but cores sounded better. I do understand that there actually is only 4 cores, but the ability to have hyperthreading in case I can use it justified the extra expense over the i5. Either way I'm sure it will blow the FX out of the water. 

I have actually had good luck buying open box items. The i7 was listed as being taken out of the cardboard but not the plastic so we'll see. Either way it's guaranteed and waranteed so I figured it was worth the risk. The MB is supposed to be a 'new return' item, so either way it will have a warranty as well. 

If I can get this little side job done tomorrow I'll have enough to buy 16gb of ram as well.