[SOLVED] Overclock AMD 6300 or upgrade to 8350 +/- overclock

clemsontigerblah · Nov 17, 2018

I am an occasional gamer (XCOM 2, HITMAN, MGSV, Witcher 3) and sometimes do some video editing (VideoPad) and seems CPU may be my main bottleneck at times and am looking to get better performance.

My current system...
Mobo ASUS M5A97 R2.0 AM3+
CPU AMD FX-6300 Black Edition
CPU Cooler Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo
RAM G.SKILL Ares Series 8GB DDR3 1866MHz
Video Card MSI GAMING Radeon RX 480
SSD drive for OS, HDD for games/apps/etc

I have never done any overclocking in past and am somewhat intimidated (I know there is a lot of support out there and have actually found a step by step for the 6300, but again, just anxious due to inexperience). I also just don't want to have to do a lot of on the fly tweaking to get a MAX OC, so a set it and forget it OC is what I would be shooting for.

The question is, which of the following would you recommend to someone like me who is looking to get better CPU performance but doesn't want to spend a whole lot of time managing an OC'd CPU

1.) Do nothing, performance not much better w/ OC of 6300 or upgrading to 8350
2.) You should OC 6300 and forget about 8350
3.) You should swap out the 8350 for your 6300, don't bother w/ OC of the 8350
4.) Swap out to 8350 and OC

A brief explanation of your recommendation would be appreciated. Thanks for your help!

Dunlop0078 · Nov 17, 2018

In my opinion number 2, though that motherboard will prevent you for OCing very far safely. It doesn't have the greatest VRM. Somewhere around 4.0-4.2ghz should be attainable. I can recommend an OC guide for it, it doesn't really take a lot of management.

The 8350 does not perform that much better than an FX6300 when at the same clock speed. I personally would not recommend you spend any more money on the AM3+ platform. If you want a new CPU save for a switch to ryzen or a modern intel platform. Which would require a new CPU, RAM, and motherboard.

anotherdrew · Nov 17, 2018

The 6300 and 8350 are both made using the Vishera core. That means they the exact same CPU, but they have been setup differently. One the 6300, 2 cores were disabled (maybe there was a flaw in one) and the speeds are slightly different. That means that if you can overclock the 6300 to 4000MHz, then you will basically have a 6 core 8350. That is the incentive of overclocking. Now, unless you are very lucky, the overclocked 6300 will run hotter and it can shorten it's life. If you are planning to upgrade in 2 years, then who cares. If you are planning to use this computer in 10 years ... well ...

Now the 8350 has 2 more cores. For applications that make use of all 8 cores, that will mean more performance (usually) and it is faster out of the box. Those are reasons to go with the 8350.

My opinion ... the FX line is dead. It runs hot and the new platforms perform a lot better. Try to overclock and save the $100 for bigger upgrade down the road.

Darkbreeze · Nov 17, 2018

Actually, the M5A97, M5A97 EVO, M5A97 Pro and M5A97 r2.0 boards are among only a small handful of 970 chipset motherboards that CAN handle overclocking from FX6 or FX8 CPUs. If you had the M5A97 LE, which is the light edition, then that would be a totally different story as that board isn't fit to be used with an 8 core Bulldozer or Piledriver FX processor at ALL, much less when overclocking.

If you have an actual M5A97 non-LE board, of any revision, it SHOULD be good enough although to be honest we'd REALLY prefer to see a higher end 990 or 990fx board for overclocking FX8 to any significant degree at all.

That being said, it should go WITHOUT saying that if you can overclock FX8 on that board, you should be able to get a really decent overclock with FX6 on that board considering that fewer cores generally means more overclocking headroom.

I would not hesitate to configure at least a medium-ish OC with an FX 6 chip on that board. 4.5Ghz should be easily attainable IF you have a good CPU cooler, plenty of good case cooling via sufficient number and size of case fans and a power supply that is capable enough to handle the increased electrical stress and capacity requirements.

Obviously, an 8 core CPU gives you more muscle than a 6 core, but that's really your decision. To be quite honest I have to agree that unless you can obtain a good FX-8320, 8350 or 8370 (Do not use any 9xxx series FX processor on that, or any board really) used for a really good price, then it is money that would be better spent being stashed away to put towards an upgrade that will actually bring you some real increases in performance and efficiency like pretty much any platform that has been released for the last four years, but primarily, something from the Ryzen lineup.

geofelt · Nov 17, 2018

I like option 2.
It costs nothing.
Few games can effectively use many threads.
That makes the FX-8350 update likely not very effective.
The single thread performance is similar to the 6300.

You can test out how many threads are useful to you with this experiment:

You can do this in the windows msconfig boot advanced options option.
Set the number of threads to less than you have.
You will need to reboot for the change to take effect.
Run your games.
This will tell you how sensitive your games are to the benefits of many threads.
If you see little difference, your game does not need all the threads you have.

Darkbreeze · Nov 17, 2018

IDK that I fully agree with the idea that few games can effectively use many threads. Two years ago, I would have agreed. Now, the fact that Ryzen keeps up with or exceeds the performance of a similarly equipped but less threaded Intel system on a good number of titles leads us to believe that a LOT more games ARE sensitive to higher multithreading capabilities than before, since we know that even an old Haswell refresh CPU has better single core performance, still, than any of the Ryzen CPUs.

And I only see that going UP as a metric, not staying the same. The fact that Intel has jumped on the MOAR cores bandwagon shows to some degree that they are seeing this become a trend as well. Certainly there are still a lot of games and applications that perform better with one strong core, but in these days of heavy multitasking, running many things along WITH the game engine, plus the games themselves being better optimized for threading, I think it's silly to not give weight to having that capability.

That being said, having 8 really weak cores or threads is not going to offer a lot compared to a medium number of very strong ones.

anotherdrew · Nov 17, 2018

I have to agree with darkbreeze. I am amazed a how the newer games are effectively using multithreading. I remember a couple years ago when WoW was using 1 core for the game and 1 for audio and they called that multicore support (eyeroll). That said, the games the OP mentioned are all from around 2015 and unless they have been updated the OP might not see a performance increases going from 6 cores to 8 for those games. The video editing software, on the other hand, may have a more perceptible performance increase.

m30067 · Nov 17, 2018

The FX series overclocked make little in return for performance, that entire architecture is just not good.
Ryzen or even an older generation intel platform would give you more for your money.

Darkbreeze · Nov 18, 2018

How would they give him more for his money, when overclocking the configuration he already has, with the cooler he already has, on the motherboard he already has, costs him nothing at all? That makes no sense.

Yes, a newer platform will give him better performance in anything he does. No argument there.

However, overclocking his current CPU will also give him better performance than he currently has, for free.

Not as good of performance as with a newer and better platform, but the cost effectiveness of anything you gain, for free, can't be argued against.

Plus, you can easily hit 4.5-4.7Ghz on that board with that cooler, with only a six core chip.

What kind of case cooling he has might actually be a factor, as well as whether or not the power supply is up to the task, so those are unanswered questions that probably need to be resolved before making a decision one way or the other.

m30067 · Nov 18, 2018

Darkbreeze :

It makes perfect sense when you have an architecture slower than the previous stars cores AKA "Deneb" but it can clock higher to negate it's problems, does not mean those problems go away.

FX barely gains any performance from overclocking.

FX 8 stock clocks.

FX9590 (8350 @ 5.0ghz)

All the while gaining tremendous heat and electricity usage.

Darkbreeze · Nov 18, 2018

If you say so. I saw plenty of performance differences with all of the FX systems I have overclocked in the past. I wouldn't waste my time with it NOW, for MYSELF, but I don't have to so it's a moot point. For the OP, it might not be a moot point and there IS ALWAYS something to be gained, whether it is a big gain or a small one, by increasing the core frequency so long as you can avoid thermal or VRM throttling. Not worth arguing though, so let's not wander any further off the original topic than we already have.

m30067 · Nov 18, 2018

Darkbreeze :

I can definitely agree with you there, there are gains.
My perspective is quality & what you get for your money vs not how much you are spending. Quality of life and experience are what i mix in with my decisions and my thinking.

Thank you.

Ilijas Ramic · Nov 20, 2018

Why not upgrade to like 4770k its still using ddr3. and it would be a better upgrade then going for 8series on fx

Darkbreeze · Nov 20, 2018

Because it would be significantly more expensive. The Haswell CPUs are not cheap, even used, compared to the FX processors which are practically a dime a dozen, but MORE importantly, the z87 and z97 motherboards, even used, are a lot more expensive now than they used to be if you want one in worthwhile condition AND he already has a motherboard that will work with an FX 8 core, so he really doesn't have a need to buy one at all if he sticks to his current platform.

Overall, not worth it at all. Either upgrade to a newer, current platform, or spend as little as possible to upgrade the current one.

Ilijas Ramic · Nov 22, 2018

Depends really on what you are after. If you are doing like rendering or other Mod Edit: Keep it clean please.you would better benefit from ddr4 and new intel platform. But if you are at gaming. Just go for 2600k its cheap and better then any fx8 series cpu

Darkbreeze · Nov 23, 2018

It's not cheap. They'd need a motherboard as well and finding a Sandy or Ivy compatible motherboard that isn't already mostly used up will be neither easy nor inexpensive. If they already had a lower tiered CPU from that same platform and didn't need a motherboard, then sure. But that's not the case.

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[SOLVED] Overclock AMD 6300 or upgrade to 8350 +/- overclock

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