From Phenom to Piledriver for gaming

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Hi,

Currently I'm running an old AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE @ 4.1GHz paired with an MSI GTX 770 Lightning for gaming. I'm quite conscious I might be bottlenecking the 770 Lightning and want to upgrade.

I was looking at the FX-6300 but Amazon have recently dropped the price on the FX-8320 making it now only £10 more than the 6300.

I was speaking with my boss about this earlier and due to my PC being connected to a 50inch 60Hz (600Hz sub-field plasma) TV, he doesn't think I will actually notice any real world difference for gaming. What are the community's opinions?

Here is my current 3D Mark Vantage (http://www.3dmark.com/3dmv/4944753) and Firestrike (http://www.3dmark.com/fs/1710349) scores on my current configuration.

 

[jghaverty]

Your boss is a ...

Your boss is wrong.

You will notice a huge boost from an 8320 as long as you paired it up wtih the right motherboard.


For raw CPU power, lets just compare apples to apples. That GTX 770 is covering a lot of ground your CPU is lacking

This is the best score I could find of your chip through modest searching.
http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/144648

Now compared to my FX8320
http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/421680

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Your boss is a ...

Your boss is wrong.

You will notice a huge boost from an 8320 as long as you paired it up wtih the right motherboard.

Hi, Thanks for the reply. My motherboard is an MSI 990FX-GD80 board which is the highest AM3+ board MSI has to offer. I do have to perform a BIOS update to get piledriver CPU's to work correctly with this board, but apart from that everything is good to go. You can see my system specs within the 3DMark in my original post.

The reason my boss thinks I won't notice a difference is because no matter how high my fps is, my 60Hz TV will become a bottleneck in noticing anything higher than 60fps.

When you say I will notice a huge difference, I understand statistically I will get higher a higher fps, but whether I will actually notice it when sitting infront of my TV is another thing. Can you please explain how and why I will see an increase please? I just want to see the real evidence before I lay £100 on a new CPU. Many thanks.

 

[jghaverty]

No thats not accurate at all. Your monitor (tv in this case) has a 60hz refresh rate, which means it can only support 60fps without screen tearing and what not. However, if you're getting 12fps from having an old cpu bottlenecking that monster of a gpu then who cares? Your CPU is not supporting your GPU at all in this case. As I said before, your GPU is covering up a lot of holes your CPU has, however as games get more CPU intensive (which they are doing in a hurry), you will find yourself dropping quality to maintain playable frame rates.

(I am assuming you are gaming based on the gtx 770, if you are not gaming then Im not understanding why you would get a 770 anyway).

edit: a good game example is planet side 2. Go take your gtx 770 monster and turn settings to max, crank resolution and render rate and I would be shocked if you got over 40 fps with that core.

 

[vmN]

However, if you're getting 12fps from having an old cpu bottlenecking that monster of a gpu then who cares?

Phenom II X4 965 should be able to get more than 12fps even so it's bottlenecking.

Your CPU is not supporting your GPU at all in this case. As I said before, your GPU is covering up a lot of holes your CPU has, however as games get more CPU intensive (which they are doing in a hurry), you will find yourself dropping quality to maintain playable frame rates.

In a hurry? Please elaborate, as it is actually slowing down in a hurry.

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

No thats not accurate at all. Your monitor (tv in this case) has a 60hz refresh rate, which means it can only support 60fps without screen tearing and what not. However, if you're getting 12fps from having an old cpu bottlenecking that monster of a gpu then who cares? Your CPU is not supporting your GPU at all in this case. As I said before, your GPU is covering up a lot of holes your CPU has, however as games get more CPU intensive (which they are doing in a hurry), you will find yourself dropping quality to maintain playable frame rates.

(I am assuming you are gaming based on the gtx 770, if you are not gaming then Im not understanding why you would get a 770 anyway).

edit: a good game example is planet side 2. Go take your gtx 770 monster and turn settings to max, crank resolution and render rate and I would be shocked if you got over 40 fps with that core.

Hmm.. I see your logic, although where did you get 12fps from? Neither my Vantage nor Firestrike scores showed as low as 12fps. When I run graphically demanding games such as Farcry 3 in ultra, I get tearing even with adaptive V-sync on. However, when I run lower specc'd games (such as borderlands 2) I can run them on the maximum settings with no tearing at all even with V-sync turned off. To me, logic dictates by upgrading I eliminate the screen tear on high demanding games.

Also, slightly confused why I get a higher combined fps (only by 1) than someone with a GTX 770 and an FX-8320 on a Firestrike benchmark. Mine: http://www.3dmark.com/fs/1710349 FX8320: http://www.3dmark.com/fs/1125369

For raw CPU power, the FX-8320 does dominate the ol' Phenom 965BE though, it's a beast haha.

 

[jghaverty]

Ignore VNM's post, hes pissy at me for arguing with him and showing data isntead of relying on anecdotal evidence.


The 12 fps was a tongue in cheek comment, not a literal one. Vantage and Firestrike are both GPU heavy. Games are quickly becoming more and more cpu intensive. As I said to see where things are going, get BF4 or PS2 and try it out. I am honestly curious. I was running an older intel which was about as powerful as your phenom, and I would hit 5-15fps all the time, and that wasn't even with high settings. All my hardware is the same, just new mobo and cpu, and Im maxing settings and Im gpu bound now, never really drop below 60 except for really large battles and Ill hit 40s intermittently.


My point remains. You are severly bottlenecked with that CPU. Sooner or later it will become evident.

 

[vmN]

Logic? I see none, I commented to this thread before commenting on the other...

Also games are been lesser and lesser CPU depended, same reason why CPU development have went so slow the last couple of years.
Also please stay professional, we can argue in one thread and agree in another.

 

[jghaverty]

Well if you were correct in this instance, I would agree with you.

"Next gen" games are INCREDIBLY cpu intensive. As I said several times in this thread, that core will NOT support BF4 and PS2 properly, and certainly not to what that GPU is capable of. If he's playing starcraft 2 and using facebook, then sure, theres going to be no difference really. If we're talking about a year from now, ESPECIALLY with mantle, then the piledriver will be far more practicable.

 

[vmN]

Define "INCREDIBLY", because they aren't. If they were you would need a high-end CPU to even consider playing higher than medium.
Mantle will benefit steamroller APUs better.

 

[jghaverty]

Define "INCREDIBLY", because they aren't. If they were you would need a high-end CPU to even consider playing higher than medium.
Mantle will benefit steamroller APUs better.

For the 8 billionth time in this thread.... Planet Side 2, Battlefield 4.
Go play those with a low end phenom and a great GPU. Then go play it with a great CPU and medicore GPU. When you do that, you will understand my point. Both games rely heavily on CPU performance.

This is single player mode, which is not nearly as cpu intensive as multiplayer.

I would consider 10-30 fps a "big difference". Especially while still in the low double digit realm.

Heres a pretty solid list of "cpu intensive" games.

 

[vmN]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

 

[jghaverty]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

Look, I was answering the dudes question. His boss said there would be no difference, and clearly and obviously there will be a massive difference. 30 fps is NOT a trivial amount when you're talking the difference between 75 and 45. Thats a very noticeable difference. I was playing Planet Side 2 with a first gen i3 530 and I would dip into single digit fps on the lowest settings with low resolution. By only upgrading the CPU to my oc'd 8320, I have ultra settings and I am consistently around 60fps, hitting around 90fps during low load sessions. Literally the only thing I changed was the CPU.

Im not sure what world you are coming from, perhaps high end rendering workstation land, but game for game, those games listed will chew up most processors right now. It doesn't really matter that a phenom "can handle it" its "how well" and at "what settings". If he wants to play low-medium vs high-ultra then yeah, its not gonna matter too much I suppose, but it will still be a nice jump in performance. With these new intensive games, and ESPECIALLY in the multiplayer environment, a higher end cpu is almost mandatory now.



edit: here is a great thread addressing bf4 and phenom ii x4's

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/forum/threadview/2955065217468226113/1/

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

Look, I was answering the dudes question. His boss said there would be no difference, and clearly and obviously there will be a massive difference. 30 fps is NOT a trivial amount when you're talking the difference between 75 and 45. Thats a very noticeable difference. I was playing Planet Side 2 with a first gen i3 530 and I would dip into single digit fps on the lowest settings with low resolution. By only upgrading the CPU to my oc'd 8320, I have ultra settings and I am consistently around 60fps, hitting around 90fps during low load sessions. Literally the only thing I changed was the CPU.

Im not sure what world you are coming from, perhaps high end rendering workstation land, but game for game, those games listed will chew up most processors right now. It doesn't really matter that a phenom "can handle it" its "how well" and at "what settings". If he wants to play low-medium vs high-ultra then yeah, its not gonna matter too much I suppose, but it will still be a nice jump in performance. With these new intensive games, and ESPECIALLY in the multiplayer environment, a higher end cpu is almost mandatory now.



edit: here is a great thread addressing bf4 and phenom ii x4's

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/forum/threadview/2955065217468226113/1/

Hi dude, thanks for all the info you guys gave me and you've convinced me to buy the FX-8320 for just over £100. It should arrive tomorrow and I'm hoping it's a worthwhile purchase. While I can't test on my Phenom with PS2 and BF4 (as I don't own them), the most graphically demanding game I have is Farcry 3.

IMO PC gaming isn't worth it unless you're playing at ultra settings, otherwise if you're gaming using anything lower than that you might aswell buy a console. So with my 4.1GHz OC'd 965BE and a CPU-NB OC to 2.6GHz, I was hitting 85fps on idle and averaging high 60's to mid 70's whilst running through areas on FC3. This is, of course, with every graphical setting to the maximum bar AA, which was at x4. In heavy area's my FPS dipped to the 50's and even high 40's at some parts, but I never saw anything below 30fps.

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

Hi there, sorry to start an argument and hate war on this thread, it wasn't my intention and I don't want to get involved between you guys. There are 2 reasons why I want to upgrade my CPU and they are A) I feel like my 965BE is holding the GTX770 Lightning back B) Get rid of the damn screen tearing issue.

For the screen tearing, I know it's to do with the CPU and GPU sending the frames faster than what my TV can process, however I'm just going by my observation here. So far, I've seen I get NO tearing at all with V-sync OFF in graphically lower demanding games such as Fallout, Dishonoured or Skyrim. Each of these games I've played on the maximum graphical settings and again, no tearing. However, when playing higher demanding games such as Crysis, Farcry 3 and Borderlands (with maximum PhysX setting) I begin to see screen tear Therefore logic dictates if I upgrade my rig so that it can handle the high demanding games better, the screen tearing issue will no longer be present.

I understand that by upgrading to a FX-8320 it will be statistically better, but those are just numbers and figures. How effective is this upgrade going to be to address my issues? I started this whole thread because I told this to my boss and he believes it won't make any real world difference at all as no matter what FPS my rig is pulling, I'm being bottlenecked by the 60Hz TV and my eyes won't be able to tell the difference. I just wanted to see different people's opinions on the matter. Many thanks for the info anyway!

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Ignore VNM's post, hes pissy at me for arguing with him and showing data isntead of relying on anecdotal evidence.


The 12 fps was a tongue in cheek comment, not a literal one. Vantage and Firestrike are both GPU heavy. Games are quickly becoming more and more cpu intensive. As I said to see where things are going, get BF4 or PS2 and try it out. I am honestly curious. I was running an older intel which was about as powerful as your phenom, and I would hit 5-15fps all the time, and that wasn't even with high settings. All my hardware is the same, just new mobo and cpu, and Im maxing settings and Im gpu bound now, never really drop below 60 except for really large battles and Ill hit 40s intermittently.


My point remains. You are severly bottlenecked with that CPU. Sooner or later it will become evident.

Sorry, I missed this post. I only got to browse the forum on my lunch break so I've only just had the time to read it all. I've just looked on Steam and I didn't realise but Planetside 2 is free, which I've just begun downloading. It's still going to take awhile before I'm able to play it though. FC3 is probably in the same situation as Vantage and Firestrike then whereby it is GPU heavy rather than CPU. Even still, it sounds like the Phenom is holding the 770 Lightning back so those figures aren't completely irrelevant. Once I'm able to play PS2, I'll report back with the fps figures as I'm curious myself too. The help and advice is much appreciated

 

[jghaverty]

Well the problem with going the 8 series route is you need a stout mother board to handle it. You really do. I found a shining jewel of a motherboard with 8+2 phase and great VRM's and serious overclocking potential and costs 134$ on new egg. I used 2 m5a97's and they both crapped on me in less than 2 weeks before I told newegg to just refund me instead of sending another board that will break. So that plays into too I guess.


Yeah, PS2 is really fun! Make sure you crank all the settings and theres an in game FPS monitor (alt+f, and the bottom left of the screen will show FPS and either [CPU] or [GPU] to what youre bottlenecking. I can almost without a doubt say you will be bottlenecking your CPU under 60fps) Edit: standing around isn't too bad, you will have really high fps as your GPU is controlling, but when you get into a fight with 30-100 people all shooting, your CPU takes over.

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Well the problem with going the 8 series route is you need a stout mother board to handle it. You really do. I found a shining jewel of a motherboard with 8+2 phase and great VRM's and serious overclocking potential and costs 134$ on new egg. I used 2 m5a97's and they both crapped on me in less than 2 weeks before I told newegg to just refund me instead of sending another board that will break. So that plays into too I guess.


Yeah, PS2 is really fun! Make sure you crank all the settings and theres an in game FPS monitor (alt+f, and the bottom left of the screen will show FPS and either [CPU] or [GPU] to what youre bottlenecking. I can almost without a doubt say you will be bottlenecking your CPU under 60fps) Edit: standing around isn't too bad, you will have really high fps as your GPU is controlling, but when you get into a fight with 30-100 people all shooting, your CPU takes over.

PS2 finished downloading literally as you posted that. But this is retarded, I just wasted an hour an a half and 9GB of storage space to find out upon registered it lists every country under the friggin sun and the UK isn't there. I looked for England, Britain and United Kingdom and none of them exist according to PS2. A typical case of American's not realising there are actually other countries there besides themselves...

 

[jghaverty]

Well the problem with going the 8 series route is you need a stout mother board to handle it. You really do. I found a shining jewel of a motherboard with 8+2 phase and great VRM's and serious overclocking potential and costs 134$ on new egg. I used 2 m5a97's and they both crapped on me in less than 2 weeks before I told newegg to just refund me instead of sending another board that will break. So that plays into too I guess.


Yeah, PS2 is really fun! Make sure you crank all the settings and theres an in game FPS monitor (alt+f, and the bottom left of the screen will show FPS and either [CPU] or [GPU] to what youre bottlenecking. I can almost without a doubt say you will be bottlenecking your CPU under 60fps) Edit: standing around isn't too bad, you will have really high fps as your GPU is controlling, but when you get into a fight with 30-100 people all shooting, your CPU takes over.

PS2 finished downloading literally as you posted that. But this is retarded, I just wasted an hour an a half and 9GB of storage space to find out upon registered it lists every country under the friggin sun and the UK isn't there. I looked for England, Britain and United Kingdom and none of them exist according to PS2. A typical case of American's not realising there are actually other countries there besides themselves...

hahaha they have UK! Besides, its ran by Sony which is a japanese company! 'murica.


UK is special. They have their own network http://planetside2.eu/ xD

 

[jdwii]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

Look, I was answering the dudes question. His boss said there would be no difference, and clearly and obviously there will be a massive difference. 30 fps is NOT a trivial amount when you're talking the difference between 75 and 45. Thats a very noticeable difference. I was playing Planet Side 2 with a first gen i3 530 and I would dip into single digit fps on the lowest settings with low resolution. By only upgrading the CPU to my oc'd 8320, I have ultra settings and I am consistently around 60fps, hitting around 90fps during low load sessions. Literally the only thing I changed was the CPU.

Im not sure what world you are coming from, perhaps high end rendering workstation land, but game for game, those games listed will chew up most processors right now. It doesn't really matter that a phenom "can handle it" its "how well" and at "what settings". If he wants to play low-medium vs high-ultra then yeah, its not gonna matter too much I suppose, but it will still be a nice jump in performance. With these new intensive games, and ESPECIALLY in the multiplayer environment, a higher end cpu is almost mandatory now.



edit: here is a great thread addressing bf4 and phenom ii x4's

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/forum/threadview/2955065217468226113/1/

Hi dude, thanks for all the info you guys gave me and you've convinced me to buy the FX-8320 for just over £100. It should arrive tomorrow and I'm hoping it's a worthwhile purchase. While I can't test on my Phenom with PS2 and BF4 (as I don't own them), the most graphically demanding game I have is Farcry 3.

IMO PC gaming isn't worth it unless you're playing at ultra settings, otherwise if you're gaming using anything lower than that you might aswell buy a console. So with my 4.1GHz OC'd 965BE and a CPU-NB OC to 2.6GHz, I was hitting 85fps on idle and averaging high 60's to mid 70's whilst running through areas on FC3. This is, of course, with every graphical setting to the maximum bar AA, which was at x4. In heavy area's my FPS dipped to the 50's and even high 40's at some parts, but I never saw anything below 30fps.

Well yeah that is your opinion many will disagree with this however since a PC can do WAY more and allows modding. Consoles graphics even in today's standards barley even come up to high settings on the PC and 1080P.

Either way i own a 1100T OC 3.9Ghz and i still see no reason to upgrade to a 8350fx however i have 6 cores i would probably invest in a 8320 is i were you(160$). Your phenom is hitting its age its almost 5 years old now...its amazing that it can even play those games at all.

 

[jdwii]

Something odd is happening screen tearing only happens when your getting over 60fps which means performance is fine.

 

[Gam3r01]

Just to simplify this entire thing. The 965, even running at 4.11GHz will bottleneck the 770, no question about it. Mine is running at that speeds and BARELY clears the 760 I own.

If you have the money, get the 8320 and overclock it. It a great CPU and a worthy upgrade to your 965. If tearing is present then turn V-sync on if it becomes an issue.

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Again bunch of pictures, you wont even link to the site you got them from...
And for the love of god, please read my replies again, instead of twisting my words.
I never said that there wouldn't be a noticeable difference from phenom to piledriver.

And to be clear those games are still not heavily CPU depended, as lower to mid end CPU can handle it.

What list, the GPU benchmark?

Look, I was answering the dudes question. His boss said there would be no difference, and clearly and obviously there will be a massive difference. 30 fps is NOT a trivial amount when you're talking the difference between 75 and 45. Thats a very noticeable difference. I was playing Planet Side 2 with a first gen i3 530 and I would dip into single digit fps on the lowest settings with low resolution. By only upgrading the CPU to my oc'd 8320, I have ultra settings and I am consistently around 60fps, hitting around 90fps during low load sessions. Literally the only thing I changed was the CPU.

Im not sure what world you are coming from, perhaps high end rendering workstation land, but game for game, those games listed will chew up most processors right now. It doesn't really matter that a phenom "can handle it" its "how well" and at "what settings". If he wants to play low-medium vs high-ultra then yeah, its not gonna matter too much I suppose, but it will still be a nice jump in performance. With these new intensive games, and ESPECIALLY in the multiplayer environment, a higher end cpu is almost mandatory now.



edit: here is a great thread addressing bf4 and phenom ii x4's

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/forum/threadview/2955065217468226113/1/

Hi dude, thanks for all the info you guys gave me and you've convinced me to buy the FX-8320 for just over £100. It should arrive tomorrow and I'm hoping it's a worthwhile purchase. While I can't test on my Phenom with PS2 and BF4 (as I don't own them), the most graphically demanding game I have is Farcry 3.

IMO PC gaming isn't worth it unless you're playing at ultra settings, otherwise if you're gaming using anything lower than that you might aswell buy a console. So with my 4.1GHz OC'd 965BE and a CPU-NB OC to 2.6GHz, I was hitting 85fps on idle and averaging high 60's to mid 70's whilst running through areas on FC3. This is, of course, with every graphical setting to the maximum bar AA, which was at x4. In heavy area's my FPS dipped to the 50's and even high 40's at some parts, but I never saw anything below 30fps.

Well yeah that is your opinion many will disagree with this however since a PC can do WAY more and allows modding. Consoles graphics even in today's standards barley even come up to high settings on the PC and 1080P.

Either way i own a 1100T OC 3.9Ghz and i still see no reason to upgrade to a 8350fx however i have 6 cores i would probably invest in a 8320 is i were you(160$). Your phenom is hitting its age its almost 5 years old now...its amazing that it can even play those games at all.

True, the PC can do way more than a console and it does allow modding, which can be both good and bad. I like the modding freedom you get with PC, but this should be done sensibly and for fun, not for cheating. For example, I've put mods on GTA 4, which is pretty fun when it's me and a few people playing and messing around. But in the same respects, mods shouldn't be used to gain a 1-hit kill on BF4 or something if you see what I mean.

It's awesome you have a 1100T, I did think about upgrading to that processor instead of going to a piledriver, but no-one sells it anymore As I said in my original post, I was going to go for an FX-6300 which sells for £90 new here, but I've just noticed Amazon has price cut the FX-8320 from £140 to £105. So for £10 more, it's a deal sealer

In regards to the 965BE, yeah it is an old processor now, but there are a large number of people out there still using it haha. It's a solid processor and the Phenom line was probably the prime of AMD's top line processors. It's great to hear the 1100T is still holding it's ground!

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Something odd is happening screen tearing only happens when your getting over 60fps which means performance is fine.

I did wonder about this, but I'm not going to argue with experiences over the theory haha. I don't know too much about how screen tearing exactly works, but as I said previously, in lower demanding games (which obvs run at higher fps) I don't get any tearing, but on higher demanding games (obvs lower fps) I get tearing. I have to use adaptive V-sync on Farcry 3, Crysis and Borderlands 2 and even then I get tearing in dense area's of the games.

 

[Ro-Tang Clan]

Just to simplify this entire thing. The 965, even running at 4.11GHz will bottleneck the 770, no question about it. Mine is running at that speeds and BARELY clears the 760 I own.

If you have the money, get the 8320 and overclock it. It a great CPU and a worthy upgrade to your 965. If tearing is present then turn V-sync on if it becomes an issue.

Yeah, I had an MSI GTX660 Twin Frozr III originally and when I upgraded to the MSI GTX770 Lightning (yeah.. kinda an MSI fanboy xD) I didn't notice much of a difference. The FX-8320 arrived a few hours ago (1-day delivery - Amazon Prime member ) so in the next few days I should be installing it and doing testing and benchmarking against the Phenom II 965. I shall continue to post my findings here

Pssst, MSI GTX760 has been given a price cut too (SLI 760 ): http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00DJPPCLK?ie=UTF8&tag=blogccasion&link_code=as2&camp=2486&creative=8946&creativeASIN=B00DJPPCLK