Build: Pile-Driver or Bulldozer worth it?

B

BioInclined

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 23, 2011
Messages
332
I am going to build a PC for a friend, average budget $700-800. I'm an AMD guy since I think the average user gets plenty for the cost and reliability.
My question is...
Should I be looking to BD or PD for his build? I use a Px4 955 BE, never had any issues, and 3 other builds for people with 955 or 965 also never any complaints.
He won't be OCing and will play games casually but will enjoy watching lots of HD content (I understand this is more GPU side)

So save a bit and go with a Phenom x4 955/965 or start researching the newer models...since I don't even know which one I should be comparing to.
Thank guys.
 
Don't diminish his experience by saddling him with a BD chip - get a Piledriver.
 
If he's just watching 1080p stuff and light gaming, I wouldn't even build a desktop. I would just get a mid-range Trinity laptop, monitor, mouse, and keyboard.

Most people sooner or later need a laptop, or will want to have one.
 
Do you have an MC near you? I think the best bang for buck these days is the FX-6300 or FX-6350. If he doesn't game, maybe grab a 95w 1045T at microcenter for $79.

if he does very light gaming get an A10-5800k or A10-5700....
 
I really like the sub $100 thuban deals or if you have a microcenter close FX6300 would be a good sweet spot.

A10-5750m laptop or A10-5800k would do the trick too.
 
Centauri said:
Don't diminish his experience by saddling him with a BD chip - get a Piledriver.
Click to expand...

I agree with this point except that getting the BD chip will not saddle his experience. However, since the PD chips cost about the same and he will not be overclocking, an 8350 would be the best. That said, if you find a 8120 or 8150 at a severe discount, I would go for that.

For example: FX 8150 with closed looped cooler for $179
 
buttons said:
I really like the sub $100 thuban deals or if you have a microcenter close FX6300 would be a good sweet spot.

A10-5750m laptop or A10-5800k would do the trick too.
Click to expand...

FX6300 comes with a free motherboard also at MC. It's a 760G with no SATA3, but it's still free and it keeps the price down.
 
Thanks guys,

He does not want a laptop, he has a tablet and he just knows he won't need a laptop. He needs the storage space more, ability to hook up to a TV and know it will handle to output required. He wants a larger monitor too, like 32"-37" for the PC. He had a laptop and that was one of his biggest issues was the screen size.

Casual gaming in regards to games like BF3, he's not a GFX "whore" but he doesn't want crappy frame rate for sure and shudder.

He will not be

I'll check out some of the PD CPUs and if in the next month or two when he's ready I'll we'll grab one. If not, maybe there will be some smokin' deals on the Phenom X4 or X6.

He knows how fast tech moves and he may not utilize it all now, but he'd rather know he can in the future.
 
Since it's a new build, I would look at the i5 3570k instead. With that budget, you can probably get a 3570k with a 7950, small SSD and a 3tb drive.

Screen size doesn't matter, only resolution. From the PC's perspective, a 1080p 72 in display is the exact same thing as a 22 in 1080p display.
 
Tsumi said:
Since it's a new build, I would look at the i5 3570k instead. With that budget, you can probably get a 3570k with a 7950, small SSD and a 3tb drive.

Screen size doesn't matter, only resolution. From the PC's perspective, a 1080p 72 in display is the exact same thing as a 22 in 1080p display.
Click to expand...

I see everyone recommend the "k" edition procs. In my opinion this is a bit wrong. Most k chips don't include Vt-D, which in my opinion is a valuable option. If for instance later on this guy wants to build a ZFS based system (OI using napp-it) and/or some virtualization, Vt-D is a nice feature to have. Plus, it's doubtful he'll be overclocking.

So why not recommned a 3550?
 
I am not familiar with ZFS but a just glanced at a info article on Chicago Micro and it seems interesting.

I think he would if at all benefit from the extra cores, be it 6 or 8. He doesn't do any heavy editing or rendering video or pictures. It really is a system that I will have to focus on multi-tasking (web browsing, HD Video, chat stuff, file transfers) It would almost boil down to a HTPC but he will only be using this one so it'll have a better GFX card and more RAM than a common HTPC.
I checked out the ones ManofGod mentioned, the 8350 does sound like it'd be ideal for the application and maybe in a couple months I will catch it on sale for him. After market cooler will be n problem.

Are they power hogs? I will most likely go with a 6950, 7870, 7950 for GFX to avoid any extra heat or energy from an Nvidia card.
I saw an XFX 550W on sale recently and was thinking play it safe and go to a TX650W Corsair.
 
They are more power hungry than the Intel chips if you're concerned about it.
 
For value, its really hard to beat the Phenom II line. The X4 965 can be had for a song and dance right now ($85 shipped) and while it wont win all the benchmarks, slap a solid overclock on that thing and it'll be enough horsepower to handle any load he'll throw at it aside from multi GPU, ultra high res gaming. For anything single card and 1920x1080, that's the best processor you can get dollar for dollar. Get him a solid AM3+ motherboard and then he can upgrade to Steamroller later.
 
ManofGod said:
I agree with this point except that getting the BD chip will not saddle his experience. However, since the PD chips cost about the same and he will not be overclocking, an 8350 would be the best. That said, if you find a 8120 or 8150 at a severe discount, I would go for that.

For example: FX 8150 with closed looped cooler for $179
Click to expand...

Which is only a deal if you want water cooling because you intend to do heavy overclocking. Otherwise the 8350 goes for the same price, the 8320 even less, and both come with plenty beefy coolers for stock speeds - speeds which a Bulldozer would have to be overclocked by significantly in order to match the performance of.

Keep in mind the 15% or high IPC performance improvement of PD, particularly in gaming. You'd need to nose bleed a BD chip to match an 8350 and by then you'd be drawing some crazy wattage. It's not worth it, IMO.
 
Thing is, the 8350's multithreaded performance is at best equal to that of the 3770k, and single threaded performance is way behind. Your friend, for what he's doing, would be better suited with a 3770k or 3570k than he is with an 8350/8320. His tasks are mostly single threaded ones, multiple single threaded ones, but still single threaded ones. And yes, Piledriver uses more power than Ivy Bridge for the same workload. Overclocking Ivy Bridge is so easy and practically idiot proof. You can easily clock it to 4.2 just by simply changing the multiplier.

The only time the FX-8320/8350 can catch up to the 3770k and surpass the 3570k is in video encoding and rendering, which is exactly what your friend is not doing.

VT-D has such limited usage that I wouldn't recommend buying a non-K model unless he knows he specifically needs VT-D.

The nVidia GTX 6xx cards are significantly more power efficient than their AMD counterparts. You are misinformed on so many levels.

Get the XFX. It'll be more than enough to power any single GPU system.
 
Except that an 8xxx AMD option is undeniably more futureproof going forward as developers continue taking further advantage of multicore capabilities.

Regardless, why are you trolling the AMD forum by suggesting somebody who asked for suggestions on an AMD build go with an Intel setup?
 
Yep Intel will be faster but AMD will be plenty fast enough and for what your friend will be putting this rig thru, he wont be able to tell the difference so why pay more? If he is wanting to game on multiple monitors with multiple GPU's, then Intel all the way. But anything at 2560x1600 and below and on a single GPU, a AMD chip will be just as capable as an Intel chip. So for the moderate gaming youre talking about this rig being used for, an AMD chip will work just fine. If he can spring for the Intel that's fine but don't feel like all your games will crash if you have a 8320 in the socket.
 
So trying to steer the OP to what I think is a smarter decision trolling? I support AMD, but I'm not blinded by preferences.

I didn't say AMD sucks, buy Intel. I said that he should buy Intel, and gave my reasoning for it. You are the one blinding yourself by trying to say multicore this, multicore that, when in fact Piledriver's 8-core performance only matches that of Ivy Bridge's 4-core hyperthreaded performance. OP has a large enough budget, there's almost no reason to choose AMD over Intel. And if you looked at my very first post in this thread, I recommended a Trinity laptop. How's that for trolling?

If OP has a big enough bias for AMD that he simply just feels better buying AMD, that's his choice, and I won't condone it. However, from a logical point of view, there's absolutely no reason to go with AMD for what he plans to use the computer for, and an Intel build would definitely be better for just a few dollars more.
 
I vote for 955 ...solid performer.
faster single-thread than new FauX chips
You could squeeze an Intel build in, too..but with say....a TA99FXE and 955..you would have more budget for GPU.
There's also some m4a89 gtd pro's on ebay.
I haven't looked @ Geeks lately.
 
Tsumi said:
So trying to steer the OP to what I think is a smarter decision trolling? I support AMD, but I'm not blinded by preferences.

I didn't say AMD sucks, buy Intel. I said that he should buy Intel, and gave my reasoning for it. You are the one blinding yourself by trying to say multicore this, multicore that, when in fact Piledriver's 8-core performance only matches that of Ivy Bridge's 4-core hyperthreaded performance. OP has a large enough budget, there's almost no reason to choose AMD over Intel. And if you looked at my very first post in this thread, I recommended a Trinity laptop. How's that for trolling?

If OP has a big enough bias for AMD that he simply just feels better buying AMD, that's his choice, and I won't condone it. However, from a logical point of view, there's absolutely no reason to go with AMD for what he plans to use the computer for, and an Intel build would definitely be better for just a few dollars more.
Click to expand...


I dont think youre trolling and you have a valid point in power consumption but for value, which seems to be what OP is looking for, AMD is still a very viable option with Piledriver or the Phenom II I linked to. Ill never deny that Intel is faster but Ill always maintain that you can still have a perfectly capable rig with an AMD chip at the helm and in the vast majority of cases, would never notice a difference in real world use. ;)
 
I appreciate all the guidance guys, Intel or AMD. I came here in hopes of sticking with AMD and getting info on the newer series. I am open though to all options.
I will of course be selecting the traits mentioned on chips and investigate to the best of my abilities too.

I would have no issues doing an OC for him, testing it and leaving it, a light one though, one of those ones I know most disagree with because there will be little difference in the end.
I only am OC'd on my 955BE to ~3.75 from 3.4 stock.

An 8xxx series was mentioned, future proof is great, but not being in a perfect world he does have a budget. I am sure we will have room to flex some but we haven't talked exactly how much yet.
 
As I said several times already, there is no "future proofing" with the more cores of the 8350, because those 8 cores are only equivalent to 4 hyperthreaded cores of the 3770k, while the 3770k keeps the much superior single threaded performance. If you want more cores "future proof," your only option is the i7 3930k, but that's $600+$200 motherboard minimum. Buying the 8350 in hopes of "future proofing" for when applications might use more cores is stupid, and anyone else trying to tell you otherwise is either an AMD fanboy or severely misinformed. I'm trying to make sure you don't make a purchase for the wrong reasons, because there's absolutely no "future proofing" to be had with the 8350.

Also, most of what you listed he will be doing won't even use more than 10% of one IB core. Cumulative, they might use 25-40% of one core, but that's really pushing it. The single most processor intensive task you listed was gaming, and strong single-threaded performance benefits that a lot more.

However, as MacLeod pointed out, you're not likely to notice the difference at all with 1080p gaming. If you want to save a few bucks, don't even consider the 8350, go with the 8320. But just remember, you're not buying it to future proof because of the 8 cores, although AM3+ can be upgraded to Steamroller in 2014.

Edit: @ Centauri. Piledriver did not have a 15% IPC improvement from Bulldozer. It had a 15-20% IPS improvement from a combination of 5-10% higher IPC and 10% higher clocks.
 
Last edited:
The one thing I recommend is to read the reviews of real owners of cpu's, not benchmarking sites. That way, you can get a clearer picture of what a cpu can do, not what someones hand picked benchmarks tell you.

Amazon and newegg reviews work quite well in this regards. (I made the mistake 1.5 years ago with upgrading from a 945 to a 1090T. Boy, now that was a big waste of money. Now I have a 8120FX that I bought last year and works much better for me. (And the owner reviews are more spot on.)

Whatever he gets, I am sure he will be happy though.
 
ManofGod said:
The one thing I recommend is to read the reviews of real owners of cpu's, not benchmarking sites. That way, you can get a clearer picture of what a cpu can do, not what someones hand picked benchmarks tell you.

Amazon and newegg reviews work quite well in this regards. (I made the mistake 1.5 years ago with upgrading from a 945 to a 1090T. Boy, now that was a big waste of money. Now I have a 8120FX that I bought last year and works much better for me. (And the owner reviews are more spot on.)

Whatever he gets, I am sure he will be happy though.
Click to expand...

Upgrading from a 965 to a 1090T wasn't a waste of money for me, gave me significantly better GTA IV performance ;) But for everything else, it didn't matter one bit, and ended up blowing up my motherboard twice.
 
Tsumi: That was my mistake, I had my mind on 8xxx GFX cards, not the CPU. I understand there is no "future proofing" I guess simply, I'm trying to make sure he's set for as long as he can be in that budget, as we all do.

ManofGod: That is exactly what I do actually. I read them and look for temps, tasks used for, time used, the basics.
 
8xxx cards aren't supposed to be out until the end of this year. You'll be waiting a long time for next gen cards.

Frankly, what he does can be handled by a Phenom II or a Core2Quad from 2008. If his usage scenario doesn't change, he'll be set with any modern quad-core computer until something breaks.
 
Yea, we are going to get a new GPU first. He has problems running BF3, bad fram rate and shudder effect. His Dell is from about 2009/2010, when I check the specs it didn't make sense why he would have been having issues.
So the build will happen if we can't address the issues. I did mention to him a new build may be sort of un-needed right now.
I have to check the PSU and then have to decide if the GPU it can handle is regarded high enough to just tell him grab another HDD and wait it out for another year. Those Dell PSUs can be a real limiting factor though, at least in my minor experience.
 
Depends on the Dell. Usually, the power supply is just large enough for whatever the system is configured for, so expansion is limited.

Check the Dell's specs. What CPU and what GPU does it have?
 
Nothing wrong with a 8320.

Specially if you are playing BF3 the multi-player will make use of the extra cores. Crysis 3 is also a good game that can make use of the higher core count.

Remember a 8320 is 8 integer cores and 4 shared FPU cores.

3770k is 4 integer cores and 4 FPU cores + hyperthreading. They have higher IPC, but that higher IPC gets reduced when you add in the hyper threading.

You can see a reduction in IPC on the 8320 when all cores are being used, this is because of only 4 decoders to the 8 integers core. The IPC hit is not as big but the IPC is lower to start with.

generalized example:

Off the top of my head....if you are have a 3770k vs 8230 with an app only using two threads you may see 1.1 IPC for the AMD vs 1.8 IPC for the 3770k

When you use an app that can make use of 6-8 threads you see something like 0.8 IPC for the AMD and 1.1 IPC for the 3770k

When OpenCL takes off we will see FPU functions being offloaded to the gpu which can handle them better. AMD jumped the gun.

I like the AMD design more then the 3770k but it does eat a lot of power. Then again it has 4 more integer cores then the 3770k
 
Last edited:
There is a new AMD platform called FM2 and that is well worth looking at, if your friend is a casual gamer and doesn't need everything at max resolution and max framebuffer features turned on for every single game he plays, a A10-5800 or the new A10-6800 is worth considering

The only drawback is the cpu part being 2 modules (4 cores). But when doing gaming and HD video playback it is more then fast enough for that.

FM2 scales with faster memory, buying faster ram would mean better performance 1866 is good for the A10-5800, some mainboards support up to 2400.
 
ClariorHincHonos said:
I see everyone recommend the "k" edition procs. In my opinion this is a bit wrong. Most k chips don't include Vt-D, which in my opinion is a valuable option. If for instance later on this guy wants to build a ZFS based system (OI using napp-it) and/or some virtualization, Vt-D is a nice feature to have. Plus, it's doubtful he'll be overclocking.

So why not recommned a 3550?
Click to expand...
Because VT-D isn't going to help you in gaming.
The K allows OC, which will help you in games.

He made no mention of ZFS or needing to pass through anything.
 
Pieter3dnow said:
FM2 scales with faster memory, buying faster ram would mean better performance 1866 is good for the A10-5800, some mainboards support up to 2400.
Click to expand...


from what i have researched mobo's that support 2400 gives 10-15 more FPS over 1600 on average... that is pretty good for an additional $20 or so in price of 8GB (2x4GB) of RAM.
 
Tetrahedron said:
from what i have researched mobo's that support 2400 gives 10-15 more FPS over 1600 on average... that is pretty good for an additional $20 or so in price of 8GB (2x4GB) of RAM.
Click to expand...

The scaling is pointless if you use a discrete video card yes?

I mean that scaling only helps the gpu inside the APU and isnt actually helping the cpu to perform better.
 
Shadohh said:
The scaling is pointless if you use a discrete video card yes?

I mean that scaling only helps the gpu inside the APU and isnt actually helping the cpu to perform better.
Click to expand...

That was my first thought. I remember seeing how well they perform through the MoBo for HTPC/light gaming rigs.

He won't NEED max or ultra on games, but I know he'd like to. Thats why for GFX I am keeping an eye out for 2GB 6950, I have loved mined so far.
I would like to try to find him a 7950...but it may shatter the budget and as I said, he is not a live and die by the game type of PC person, he just wants to know when he goes to play it it'll be no issues. Once we talk I'll be able to explain price to performance and really see what he's expecting.
If he talks about getting about from PC games more then I'll be leaning on a good HD playback, rendering and multitasking CPU and maybe even drop a little lower in GFX to get him a better CPU.


I really like all that I'm learning I'm doing here and the leads I'm getting on looking into these CPUs.
 
I would get a FX-6300(if you're more budget based) over a Phenom II X4 or X6. I had an X6.

If you have some extra cash then get the 8350. It is a solid performer and AM3+ boards typically come with more features at a lower price then Intel boards.

It's all about what exactly you want to do.
 
If he's going to be gaming on a TV he won't need more than 1920 x 1080 resolution. A 6950 seems like overkill. A 7850/7870 should save some coin on both the GPU and by being able to get a somewhat smaller PSU. You can spend that on a 256 GB SSD to fit both the OS and a few of his more played games to improve load times.

And if he really doesn't care about high graphics settings I'd recommend the A10 series APUs without a standalone card. Bring him in under budget.

Spec out two builds. One with an 8350 and standalone card and one with an APU and no card explain the performance differences and let him pick how to spend his money.

Trinity APUs are supposed to drop in price in April as well.
 
Shadohh said:
The scaling is pointless if you use a discrete video card yes?

I mean that scaling only helps the gpu inside the APU and isnt actually helping the cpu to perform better.
Click to expand...

true, unless you use a 6670 in hybrid crossfire with the igp in the APU, the 6670 will use the system mem and not it's own gddr3 if i recall correctly which with 2400 speed RAM will make the crossfire setup effectively a 7870GE...

now with any other GPU like a 7950 it would use the GDDR on the card, but one would still want at least 1866 for the APU
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top