Bottleneck Processor for AMD HD 6850

[MrSmegzabush]

I am about to build my wife a computer for gaming, so she can stop playing on my Alienware M11x since it might choke a bit on BF3. I am using a lot of spare parts I have but one of them is the HD 6850 Video card, what is the cheapest CPU I can get that will not bottleneck this card gaming at 1080P, a Celeron, Pentium, i3?

 

[Phishy714]

Cheapest? well.. there is a difference between cheapest and cheapest one that will still give you a good invesntment for your money. Right now you can get a very good Phenom II x4 555 for about $110 which will not bottleneck that card.

Keep in mind that at 1080p, that card will only run BF3 at all low settings, and you definately want a quad core cpu for BF3 and future games.

 

[Spudsdude]

i3-2100 will work just fine (my son has a 6850 with his i3-2100 for 1280x1024 bf3), but for higher resolution BF3 go with a quad core or the i3-2130

 

[MrSmegzabush]

Also I should probably mention that its going to be in a Silverstone SG05 ITX case so heat might be a problem for any Quad that isnt 32nm. Also, are newer games going to start being more "four core" dependent?

 

[Arcygenical]

Also I should probably mention that its going to be in a Silverstone SG05 ITX case so heat might be a problem for any Quad that isnt 32nm. Also, are newer games going to start being more "four core" dependent?

Four? At least. Yes.

 

[Gordo74]

I built an i3 2100 with a 6850 in that exact case. Nice little powerhouse if you ask me.