FX-6300 vs Phenom II x4 965 BE

[Mullac]

Hi there,

After much consideration I've decided I'm going to build my own PC. On a budget of £500 - £600 I'm having to go with an AMD processor and am stuck whether to choose the FX-6300 or the Phenom II x4 965 BE.

Also, are either of these bad to have with a AMD 7850 GPU, would one of them bottleneck?

On a side note, how difficult is it to wire a PC? I understand all the components you need but am wondering if you need to buy certain cable separately. Also, do most motherboards come with an on-board sound card and CPU cooling unit?

Thanks in advance.

 

[BuddiLuva]

Hi,

I am going to make this quick and simple:

Both the 965 and FX6300s are great CPUs, however the FX6300 is a bit better, plus overclocked will make good use of your GPU. The 965 may bottleneck but if you overclock that it should be fine too, just keep in mind the FX6300 is a bit better.

It is not difficult to wire your PC, just make sure you wear a static wristband or touch the unpainted metal area of the case to remove static from your body (to avoid damaging the components)

Motherboards do come with onboard sound, however they do not come with a CPU cooling unit

The CPU Cooling unit comes together with the CPU you buy.

 

[Mullac]

Thanks for the reply very helpful!

 

[langley8]

Neither CPU will bottleneck the GPu I am currently using the 965 in my system over clocked to 3.8ghz with a gtx 660ti and it doesn't bottleneck I would recommend getting the fx6300 if you can afford for the performance increase. All cables should be included with the product boxes. I would recommend getting an aftermarket CPU cooler as in my experience with amd stock cooler the CPU will run hot and the cooler will make a lot of noise

 

[Ruffstuff77]

Hi, just throwing my hat into the ring here as an experienced Phenom II 965 BE owner for 2 years. It's been a great CPU and overclocks quite easily (research overclocking on air cooling before you make final decision on the CPU cooler). It's only just starting to bottleneck now with games that use a lot of shadows (i.e. Skyrim). A POINT TO CONSIDER FOR LONGEVITY: If you get the FX 6300, it's an AM3+ socket, which AMD say they will be the socket of choice for the next 2 major CPU releases, so you can then easily upgrade the CPU when the time comes. If you go with the 965, that is Socket AM3, which will not be as upgradeable. For that reason, and the reported overclocking results of the FX 6300, my advice is to go with the FX 6300. FINALLY, you have 6 cores, so future games that support more than 4 cores (they are beginning to emerge) will make best use of it.

 

[twelve25]

You can get an AM3+ board and use the AM3 Phenom x4, so future upgradability is not a concern.

fx-6300 is about 10-20% faster than the Phenom, so if you have a choice the newer 6300 is the way to go.

 

[iceclock]

6300 of course. newer architecture. hands down better.