Upgrading and Steamroller future-proofing

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
E

ezikiho

Honorable
May 17, 2013
9
0
10,510
Hello community, Looking at upgrading now for steamroller "future-proofing", and was considering an AMD 970 chipset (socket AM3+) MOBO, as I don't plan on OC'ing or cross-firing or SLIing. Bit limited for options here and the MSI 970A-G46 is a pretty decent price, will stick an athlon II X3 450 CPU in till steamroller ...rolls out. Is there any reason for not getting the 970 chipset, like for instance steamroller will not be on socket AM3+ or only be supported by 990fx or new 1xxx chipset or I should get a higher Phase count (4+1) vs (8+2)? Any help would be appreciated and I'm not totally opposed to switching to Intel's IVB or Haswell.
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
S

sedativechunk

Honorable
Apr 24, 2012
55
0
10,660
Honestly if you're looking for the latest and greatest you may want to go to Intel. AMD's future with the Steamroller is very grim. Last I looked, Steamroller was delayed till 2014 and many engineers at AMD were laid off. I was gonna wait for it myself but I just bought the FX8350. I plan on hanging on to this for several years before upgrading again but knowing me I always want "the best" so I may switch back over to Intel some day.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
E

ezikiho

Honorable
May 17, 2013
9
0
10,510
Hey, thanks for your reply, thought maybe AMD might be running into a good patch with the whole PS4 and xbox720 component manufacturing thing. Not that intent on getting the latest and greatest, just wanted to upgrade MOBO now and know if future CPU's might fit with current AM3+ socket and current chipsets, don't mind waiting for Steamroller CPU's. I think if you could upgrade say every two years then you could go for Haswell then Steamroller when it eventually comes out.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest
That is a great motherboard ^.^ It is the one i use, but it also says it is not able to handle the 8 core so go for the MSI 990 and if i was you i would wait until they release new motherboards as those will be fully compatible and with new features or the 990/970 boards will drop in price
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Tradesman1

Tradesman1

Legenda in Aeternum
Jun 5, 2013
67,883
40
126,960
Or look to Intel, we heard all kinds of great things about DullDozer and how it would beat the 2500K (miserable failure), then again all the hype on the VileDriver, which could barely take on the 2500K and except for video rendering was way behind the 3570K in gaming and everything else, the next will prob be about on a par w/ the current 3570K, behind the 4670K and by the time it hits, Intel will prob have it's next desktop line out and it will be far behind that
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest

Bulldozer was bad! Yes, (more like bullshiter) but the 8350 is on par with the 3570k in gaming and in games like BF3 and Crysis (expect more games to make use of more cores soon also) it beats it, also while streaming the 8350 kills the 3570k. Talk about hype... all the hype about Hasfail was oh how it will take so much less power, run cooler, be so much faster and better clock for clock then Ivy, when really all Intel did was give it better IGPU and lets face it, no PC gamer is gonna be gaming on an IGPU and if so AMD APU's got that covered. If going Intel OP will be fine with Ivy (Ivy-E is coming :D) and better off putting more money in the GPU because all in all it comes down to the video card, spend as much as you can on a video card and that is what will matter in games. 5-10 mores frames because of your CPU won't make a difference, hell OC your video card if you want 5-10 more frames.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Tradesman1

Tradesman1

Legenda in Aeternum
Jun 5, 2013
67,883
40
126,960
And Ivy is what I would suggest, the Haswell is slightly better performance wise, which is what was advertised, does pull less power, etc. I'll be building one for support purposes but will prob stick w/Ivy as my main rig. Games using more cores is way down the line still, that's the same they said about DullDozer, and we still aren't seeing them as far as gaming, yes I've seen all the reviews and benchmarks also, and I find the biggest flaw with them being they normally show the 8350 stock4 and OCed to the max 4.8-5 and then compare it to the 3570K AT STOCK 3.4, on the other hand I've had a number of pumped 8350s in my shop (most up at 4.8-4.9) and when I put them head to head with my 3570K at it's 24/7 settings of 4.7, the 3570K leaves the 8350s in the dust, and crank it higher, it's even more laughable, and most ALL 3570Ks can hit and run 4.7
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest


Well there are a few games that use the more cores and more will be coming with game devs developing for an 8 core now that the new consoles will be 8 core. True overclocking the Ivy would be better as of now but we are talking steamroller and regardless of the faildozer and pileshitter (there is a reason i stuck with my Phenom :D) we have no idea what SR will be like, don't have my hopes up as i think it will be a refresh like AMD did with trinity to richland (nothing new just clocked higher) but i am waiting to see what steamroller will be like... all in all i think the OP would be better waiting on that motherboard purchase to see what steamroller is like, if not worthy he can go Ivy or Hasfail either way i still think he would be better saving that money for either CPU and mobo and getting a video card now and wait to see what SR will be like.. i am waiting for SR but more importantly waiting for Haswell-E, an 8 core Intel is gonna be sooo sweet and im willing to give an arm and leg along with a few months rent for it :D but for his "future-proofing" motherboard purchase for steamroller now is a bad idea as it is not 100% AMD will stick with the AM3+ i know i would prefer maybe AM4 and a better architecture rather then just a slighty faster rebrand to go into my rig
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest

So true lol as IVY-E will be out and Haswell-E on the way with broadwell around the corner... who knows what AMD is doing... maybe it really will be worth it to get SR but i don't have my hopes up that high as seen with trinity to richland i strongly think it will be a rebrand at higher speeds but who knows? Maybe with SR AMD will get its act together and come out with something as great like as with the Phenoms and i will finally have a reason to upgrade but as stated before the best option for OP would be to save his money and not buy an AM3+ board now in hopes for SR since we have no idea what AMD will be doing and would be better off with a Video card upgrade unless a CPU upgrade is truly needed?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Tradesman1

Tradesman1

Legenda in Aeternum
Jun 5, 2013
67,883
40
126,960
I agree, haven't built AMD in a few years, would be nice to have an alternative, but when I look it sort of make me ill, I got an 8150 and sold it off at a loss to get rid of it, got a pre-release 8350 (thankfully free) and it was good for a lot of laughs, dumped it off also
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest


Yup as i said their is a reason i stuck with my Phenom II x6 1045T and just OCed it :D ...but we are kinda getting off topic here as the OP asked about a mobo for SR... he said also that Ivy or Haswell is not off the table but i think it would be best for OP to wait and see what SR brings (if it ever comes out :p) but if a CPU upgrade is needed as of RIGHT NOW... well i would say skip haswell and get Ivy and save the extra cash for a better video card also the 8350 while not good in single threaded performance but in multi and games where more cores are used as said before like BF3 and Crysis the 8350 is also cheaper and that would be money better spent on a video card, but to answer the OP's question no do not get an AM3+ board and wait for steamroller. Either wait for SR and the new mobo, or if you must have a new CPU Get Ivy or get the Am3+ and 8350. Regardless since i assume you will be gaming your money should go into the video card... please dont get the 8350 or i7 and get a 7750 or 650/750 :p
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
E

ezikiho

Honorable
May 17, 2013
9
0
10,510
Thanks for all your input everyone, but ordered the components and received them almost three weeks ago, must say just upgrading from an ASUS M3N78-VM mobo to an ASRock 970 Exteme4, going from 2 GB DDR2 memory to 8GB DDR3 memory and going from Win XP (32 bit) to Windows 8 (64 bit), made a huge difference even though still using the same AMD Athlon II X3 450 CPU. I know it was a bit of a gamble not waiting for news from AMD on the Steamroller socket, but have to say PC is running very quick now, boots up from power button to Windows login screen in 20 seconds.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest

nice :D yea i didn't know if you needed an upgrade and oh boy you sure did now its time for a new cpu and video card :p
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
E

ezikiho

Honorable
May 17, 2013
9
0
10,510


Seems like AMD has only used AM3+ for bulldozer and piledriver, so hopefully they will keep AM3+ around for a bit longer like they have previously done with older sockets and introduce "AM4" when they switch to DDR4 and PCI Express 3.0.

Ya will probably only upgrade CPU and GPU when news of steamroller socket compatibility surfaces, but will probably have to get a new PSU as well, if steamroller is not on AM3+, will probably get an AMD FX-6300 and the 460GTX GPU I have can handle what its needed for right now, will see what GPU's come out at the same time steamroller comes out.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

Guest

Guest


The 6300 would be a NICE upgrade from that Athlon :p Yea im waiting to upgrade from my Phenom II X6, maybe to steamroller but not sure yet... and waiting for the new Radeon HD 8000 series cards :D Glad you got your new mobo and hope it serves you well and from the sounds of it, it has been a good upgrade.

/request to close thread

 
Upvote 0 Downvote
N

nitroexplosion

Honorable
Jun 1, 2012
65
0
10,640
If you going for a new CPU after your Mobo and RAM upgrade, I would say skip the FX-6300 and go for the awesome FX-8350 Chip, I have the FX-6300 OC to 4.8GHz at 1.55v(I had to buy a Phantek PH-TC14CS cooler about a month ago to get it stable, My crappy Antec H20 620 AIO liquid cooler wasn't cooling it), Dunno if I got a bad Chip out of the batch but it really pisses me off that I can only get it stable at 1.55v, I messed around with everything else incl. NB, HT, FSB, And seems to piss off the FX-6300 to the point that it gives up and crashes, I should have saved up some more cash and went with the FX-8350, Plus the FX-8350 requires less voltage to reach higher Clocks seen one at 5.2GHz on like 1.45v Simply an Amazing 8 Core chip!!!!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom