AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE build

cpf27

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Jan 18, 2015
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Hi all,

I own a PC with an AMD Phenom II x4 955 BE CPU, I'd like to upgrade it.

I had bad luck with this PC, this was around 2010, first the people who sold me this gave me a crappy PSU and it stop working after like 2 days of bought. I took it to the store and they apoligize and replace it with a better PSU (not really), in the meantime the integrated audio did not work because of the PSU breakdown, I bought a PCI Sound card. After that, I get tired of fighting with these guys and get a Cooler Master 550w PSU, but a friend of mine that was supposed to be a HW tech screw it because the switch of the PSU was in 110v when we have 220v here in my country. It seems this time only the PSU got damaged. I put the old less crappy PSU back, because at the time I had not money to get a new one. The thing is it worked, but if I needed to use more than 1 core, I got a blue screen and the PC shut off (this still happens if I use more than 1 core.) For reasons of work I had to travel to other state and left the PC at home. Now, my sister use it, she only uses it for working with MS-Office and for surfing the web, so no problem except the Sound card died and I haven't replaced it.

Yesterday, I went to a PC store market and ask if there is a Motherboard for the CPU but most of them told me there was not a MB for it, until I find a store and the guy who work there told me the ASUS M5A78L-M was compatible with the CPU. He also told me it was compatible with FX 6300 and FX 8350, in the case I want to upgrade it. Is this true?
Actually, I don't want to spend too much money on this, only the necessary to see how it goes.

He recommend the following build:

CPU: AMD Phenom II x4 955 BE
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper EVO 212
MB: ASUS M5A78L-M
RAM: Kingston Fury Hyper X 4GB (I already have 4GB, so with this I would go for 8)
HDD: Seagate SATA III 1TB (I had a 240GB HDD)
SSD: Kingston 240GB
Case: Mid tower Thermaltake w/ 600W PSU

Not very interested in video cards, cause I don't play too much or do graphic design. The only game I play from time to time is Diablo II.

Other thing to have in mind is that the prices here are like +-20% more expensive than abroad.

What do you think? Is it any good?

Thanks in advance,

Carlos

PS: Sorry for my english, it is not my mother language.
 

delaro

Judicious
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Where is here? To find a upgrade in your budget your location is helpful, The guy that suggested a AM3+ board is correct it will give you upgrade potential albeit there isn't anything in the FX line that I would consider a massive upgrade for what you do.
 

cpf27

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Jan 18, 2015
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Lima, Perú. As I wrote, things here are +-20% more expensive than the prices online. I don't want to spend more than $500.

Thanks for your help.
 

delaro

Judicious
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$500 US I hope.

The shipping from US will damn near equal the prices you will find locally, if you would have ordered say a month ago you could have got a nice deal and half the cost on International shipping.

Amazon Shipping from US to Chili $14 + $5 per pound. a motherboard will be 5 pounds with extra packaging so add another $25

http://www.wei.cl/
https://www.bip.cl/ecommerce/index.php
https://www.pcfactory.cl/

Using a service like http://www.eshopex.com/Paises.aspx may cut down on shipping a little.

Here is a comparison on prices.

Gigabyte AMD 970A-UD3P (AM3+)
http://www.amazon.com $88 + Shipping $127
www.pcfactory.cl $123 US


ASUS M5A78L LE AM3+

http://www.amazon.com $57.01 + Shipping $96
http://www.wei.cl $90.33
www.bip.cl $88



 

cpf27

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Jan 18, 2015
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Yes US $ 500

These guys offers me the ASUS MB for US $ 67. But what is your opinion about the overall build? Is the case (with psu incorporated) good enough? Is the CPU cooler right? The RAM should be 1600 MHz?, because these guys told me they'd sell the 1800MHz by the same price.
 

delaro

Judicious
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Your ram is probably 1333mhz, not much slower than the 1600mhz. If you can get 1866mhz CL 9 for a decent price go for it but you will need to buy 2 sticks of it as it wont work with what you have if you plan on 8gb. If your running a 32bit version of Windows it wont read more than 4gb btw. $67 for that motherboard isn't bad and you should be fine there. Everything else looks fine but what is the Make and Model of the Power supply? Also the Video Card as long as it is a PCI-E it should be good for the intended use, I remember when the Phenom II 955 came out there were still selling low end motherboards using AGP Graphics as long as you don't have a Card on that slot you should be good.
 

cpf27

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Jan 18, 2015
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I sent them an e-mail regarding the Case/PSU model and also about the RAM. OTOH, I was looking at the ASUS M5A78L-M specs and saw it only supports SATA 3Gb/s, so the SSD would only work at that speed in spite of being 6GB/s.

1) Could you recommend a good case and psu for my build? I am not convinced by Thermaltake.
2) Do you know of other MB compatibles with the Phenom II X4 and also support SATA 6GB/s storage.

About the work I plan for this PC besides the basic stuff (Internet, Office, play from time to time, etc.) is analyze chess games with engines that can handle many cores at the same time, so I need a good cooler system, psu and case. Please, have this in mind.