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Radeon 8400 HD upgradable?

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  • Systems
  • HD
  • Radeon
Last response: in Systems
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October 14, 2014 10:55:43 AM

Hello!

I recently built a little form factor system for a friend. I just used a bundle being ShellShocked on the Newg.

The system is.

CPU/GPU: AMD Athlon 5350 Kabini Quad-Core 2.05GHz AM1 25W AMD Radeon HD 8400
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Mobo: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

That's all fine and dandy. PC runs great and you can't even hear it lest your ear is right up to it. Now, he wants to play some games on it... (New request)(First one was make it cheap)

So as a bench test I pulled out the mobo and threw a GTX 750Ti 2g in it and attached a 500w PSU (Mid range card but I've need it play a few games on high and some older on Ultra.) just to see what this thing could do, but even after all had been wiped and updated I couldn't get any increase in Frame rates. I was testing With WoW btw. (There were no AMD video drivers in device manager but right clicking the background I still have CCC option)

I have like 0 exp with integrated GPUs. I used DDR to wipe the old AMD drivers but is there something else needed to manually switch from the integrated? Or is it just completely bottlenecked by the CPU?

Lastly! Is there any crossfire option here? I know the 8400 can put out a little with its 120 stream processors but is there anything that I could just add on to it and work together for a slight boost? Is it even worth it? The 750Ti made no difference, not even a little but I feel like that' could be my fault by the system not switching to the GPU? (which I was plugged into.... Just sayin)

More about : radeon 8400 upgradable

October 14, 2014 11:52:46 AM

I don't understand your question.

The Radeon HD 8400 iGPU in the Athlon 5350 is not very powerful, as you might already see. iGPUs increase performance when combining them with high bandwidth RAM, but that APU only supports up 1600MHz in single channel.

The only way to get better performance in games is with a discrete GPU. You already tested it with the GTX 750 Ti which is great, but at some games there will be bottlenecks because of the CPU part. It's to weak.

At PCPer there is a great review of that Athlon with the GTX 750 TI and what can they do:
http://www.pcper.com/reviews/General-Tech/AMD-AM1-Platf...
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October 14, 2014 2:02:45 PM

Thanks for the reply, I wrote this at work and had limited time to do so.

To maybe better clarify, By upgrading to a 500W PSU and adding the 750Ti (which is definitely great for the $$) I had literally no improvement. 0.

The game I was testing was WoW as that was the game in question by my friend. I went from 18fps @ 1080p in a crowded city (No GPU) to 18fps @ 1080p in a crowded city (750Ti) with the settings on as low as possible. Elsewhere the fps can be anywhere from 20-60 depending on whats around

Thank you for that video! That basically answers my question.

It was obviously something I failed to do with my system
I do understand this CPU is not meant gaming by any means and with 25watts I never expected much. But not getting any improvement with a dedicated GPU made me wounder if the CPU was really so under powered that it would be pointless.

I doubted it, but was wondering if any cards out there would crossfire just to add a small boost. (Even something like $30 just to double the power.) But I suppose that the 8400 is so weak they didn't see a valid reason to.

I'll probably go with on R7 260x per that videos mention. He seemed pretty convinced that'd be a good choice.

Thanks again.
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October 15, 2014 7:51:11 AM

With the Athlon + GTX 750 Ti and the rest of the system, i expect up to 200W of power consumption.

WoW is a CPU intensive game, so even when you keep upgrading the GPU, the CPU will be stopping you from getting better frame rates. The CPU part is causing a bottleneck.
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