AMD x2 4850e 45w

[GullyFoyle]

Anybody interested in getting this chip? This looks like the ideal chip for my pending HTPC build. It is advertised as being released on the 15th, and I'd like to buy it as soon as it comes out.

If you want to know the story on this chip, see any of the AMD 780G chipset previews from March. I guess AMD sent out a chip to each review site.

Could you reply here if you see it for sale, or know of a place accepting pre-orders?

I'm going to subscribe to this thread. Feel free to do so also, if you are interested.

Thanks,

Dan

Edit: Bought mine, $89.99 w/free shipping at Buy.com
Edit2: Now in stock at Newegg, $89.99 + 5.99 shipping

 

[IL2SturmovikPilot]

I want to know aswell,anyone know how much it'll cost?

 

[IL2SturmovikPilot]

Originally posted by: IL2SturmovikPilot
I want to know aswell,anyone know how much it'll cost?

Crap,forgot to subscribe to this topic,doing it now.

 

[GullyFoyle]

Originally posted by: IL2SturmovikPilot
I want to know aswell,anyone know how much it'll cost?

AMD has said it will be introduced at $89. This is probably QTY 1000. Supposedly, at the same time they will reduce the price of the existing BE processors. Here is a table grabbed from one review site:

Athlon X2 4850e (2.5 GHz) - > $89
Athlon X2 BE -2400 (2.3 GHz) - > $78 (now $104)
Athlon X2 BE -2350 (2.1 GHz) - > $68 (now $91).

Google shows sites with prices as low as $93 (none in stock)

 

[Martimus]

That sounds like a good chip to use. I was thinking of waiting until the 9150e was released, but this may be even better for HTPC use.

 

[GullyFoyle]

Searching through vendors on Google (Froogle), I came across one site with great prices, and accepting pre-orders:

OnSale.com, 89.99. Shipping is interesting, they are offering UPS Ground shipping for 8.99, and they will then rebate you the shipping (if you jump through the hoops).

I haven't ordered yet. Just not knowing if Newegg will have a great price, with faster shipping, keeps me holding on.

But, looks like a great deal.

Edit: This deal is dead

 

[GullyFoyle]

This vendor, Bottom Line Telecommunications (BLT) shows real time inventory from several warehouses, and one warehouse in California shows 100 4850e's in stock! (As of this writing). But at the same time, they show existing orders for 236 of them.

Edit: I guess those existing orders were just to stock the warehouse. The site shows no back-orders, and most of the original 100 CPUS are still available for purchase. Of course, now there are a lot more vendors to choose from showing it in stock.

 

[GullyFoyle]

I got an e-mail alert from a vendor listed on Froogle, keenzo.com, that they just got this product in stock. I guess this is officially NOT a paper launch. I would expect this will show up at your favorite vendor soon.

 

[GullyFoyle]

If you were waiting for a "big name" vendor to get these, it is now in stock at buy.com for $100.24, free shipping.

Still not in stock at newegg, but they got in the new slower chips in the 4x50e series. Prices are lower than the old BE- chips, despite the fact that they are charging for shipping with the new chips, while all the old chips have free shipping.

 

[AshPhoenix]

Will this processor bottleneck a high-end video card like the upcoming ATI 4870 for example ?

 

[angry hampster]

Originally posted by: AshPhoenix
Will this processor bottleneck a high-end video card like the upcoming ATI 4870 for example ?

At 1024x768, yes. At 2560 wide, no.

I imagine this chip can overclock past 3Ghz as well. I had my 4800+ brisbane to 2.99GHz stable.

 

[AshPhoenix]

Originally posted by: angry hampster

Originally posted by: AshPhoenix
Will this processor bottleneck a high-end video card like the upcoming ATI 4870 for example ?

At 1024x768, yes. At 2560 wide, no.

I imagine this chip can overclock past 3Ghz as well. I had my 4800+ brisbane to 2.99GHz stable.

I guuess it will be a bottleneck at 1680 x 1050 too , right ?

 

[zod96]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16819103256 newegg has 2 of them for sale...

 

[angry hampster]

Originally posted by: AshPhoenix

I guuess it will be a bottleneck at 1680 x 1050 too , right ?

Doubtful, but it really depends on what game you're playing. Supreme commander and warhammer are very dependent on CPU and RAM, whereas games like TF2 and gears of war are heavily dependent on VGA.

 

[AshPhoenix]

Originally posted by: angry hampster

Originally posted by: AshPhoenix

I guuess it will be a bottleneck at 1680 x 1050 too , right ?

Doubtful, but it really depends on what game you're playing. Supreme commander and warhammer are very dependent on CPU and RAM, whereas games like TF2 and gears of war are heavily dependent on VGA.

Thanks for your helpful answers, I might get an X2 4850e and ATI 4870 if it performs well in the reviews.

 

[smokedturkey]

I got mine yesterday and put it on Gigabytes 780G matx board. Got two of my awesome sticks of GSKILL on there, but no other
nice accessories. I'm trying to get my vlited Vistax64 Ultimate the way I want it, then it's OC time on the factory heatsink. I'm
making this an HTPC.

 

[GullyFoyle]

Originally posted by: smokedturkey
I got mine yesterday and put it on Gigabytes 780G matx board. Got two of my awesome sticks of GSKILL on there, but no other
nice accessories. I'm trying to get my vlited Vistax64 Ultimate the way I want it, then it's OC time on the factory heatsink. I'm
making this an HTPC.

If I may ask, what is the factory heatsink like, that is included with this CPU (mine's not here yet)?
Does it have a copper bottom? Heatpipes? Fan Size? Pics?

I have one of the older, fairly well regarded, AMD stock heasinks with the 4 heat pipes, I'm wondering if this same one will come with the 4850e, or if they are using something less capable, since it's low power.

Thanks for any insight.

 

[smokedturkey]

Well, finally got it all put together. It comes with a plain Jane AL heatsink and fan, no smooth finish on the bottom of this puppy! But it does have some decent TIM on the bottom...
Mounted the 4850e on the Gigabyte 780G MB, got Vistax64 all loaded in and all the drivers etc. Loaded up Gigabytes EasyTune software and went to town. It offers pretty decent testing of OC features until you find what you want, then you can hard set them in the Bios. I also found that I had to update the bios to get my OC features in the Bios. I had to modify the HT link as the EasyTune did not do that. I also lowered the memory multiplier. After settling in, I ran the bus speed to 335mhz and played around a bit with the cpu speeds. I did not go too far really as I had already surpassed my Opteron 1210 OC. I hit 3.1ghz fairly easily, and played around a bit before dropping the Opty in there and played with it a bit. Fickle CPU that is, still couldn't pass 320mhz bus speed without trouble. settled on stock speed of 1.8ghz for the Opty HTPC.

Right now I have the 4850e in my main rig, riding shotgun on my awesome Abit NF-M2 nView board with the new Gskill 4gb ram. I traded over the Opty factory HS/Fan as it was a copper bottomed/heatpiped AL unit. Yep, I intend to deflower this baby soon!
Just burning in a bit, and testing the 2x2gb 1066mhz 5-5-5-15 memory from Gskill. I previously had many errors on memtest for windows, and I have initiated an RMA with Newegg, but I will test further on the Abit w/4850e before making a final decision. I'll post my final OC when I am done.

 

[Dadofamunky]

Looks like a winner!

 

[Winterpool]

I'd like to build a low-power system as a VM server to consolidate my three 24/7 servers before the summer. I've been looking at pairing an AMD 780G board with a cheap Athlon, but I've been wondering if paying the $15 or so premium for the new 45 W cpus is worthwhile. I'm also wondering if the truly economical choise wouldn't be simply to buy the cheapest 'Brisbane' that can decode HD video (Newegg recently offered the 4200+ for $55).

Tom's Hardware measured the 4850e as pulling almost 12 fewer watts than the X2 5000+ when idle -- and less than 42 W total. It looks like all Brisbanes use about the same power when idle, so I presume the same difference would hold for the 4200+?

Right now I'm torn between the 4200+ (cheapest option), 4600+ (best value at $66?), and the 4850e (most efficient but costs $90).

 

[ther00kie16]

Originally posted by: Winterpool
I'd like to build a low-power system as a VM server to consolidate my three 24/7 servers before the summer. I've been looking at pairing an AMD 780G board with a cheap Athlon, but I've been wondering if paying the $15 or so premium for the new 45 W cpus is worthwhile. I'm also wondering if the truly economical choise wouldn't be simply to buy the cheapest 'Brisbane' that can decode HD video (Newegg recently offered the 4200+ for $55).

Tom's Hardware measured the 4850e as pulling almost 12 fewer watts than the X2 5000+ when idle -- and less than 42 W total. It looks like all Brisbanes use about the same power when idle, so I presume the same difference would hold for the 4200+?

Right now I'm torn between the 4200+ (cheapest option), 4600+ (best value at $66?), and the 4850e (most efficient but costs $90).

Well, if yours is on 24/7, then the 4850e seems like the best bet since 24/7 for 1yr at 12w difference is about 100kwh, which will be almost $20 depending on your energy costs.
One thing I will mention as a Brisbane owner (4000+) is that they don't require stock voltage so you can lower the power draw by lowering the voltage. Mine works on 1V (stock is 1.25V) at stock speed. So according to this power calculator link it only draws 42w at load.
However, the 4850e can probably be undervolted too, though it would take some googling to figure out to what extent.

 

[Winterpool]

Jah, that's what makes is such a hard decision: the electricity bill difference (for a year) is about equal to the processor cost difference (Newegg lists $76 for the 4800+), presuming near 24/7 operation and about 15 cents per KW-hour. If I were certain that the 4850e system would produce significantly less heat in my case, then I'd definitely go with the low-power chip, but there are too many variables (case design, airflow, ambient temp) to be sure without running a real-life comparison under identical conditions. And I really shouldn't be putting one of these Athlons on my credit card, let alone two!

I suspect the difference in heat inside the case between a 4850e and, say, a 'Brisbane' 4200+ will be insignificant. Does anyone have any direct experience?

 

[superstition]

I imagine this chip can overclock past 3Ghz as well. I had my 4800+ brisbane to 2.99GHz stable.

Which would completely defy the point of buying it with the 45 watt rating in mind.

 

[superstition]

Originally posted by: Dadofamunky
Looks like a winner!

I wonder how many watts a downclocked 45 nm Intel would take to do the same work as this chip?

 

[ther00kie16]

This is just my brisbane 4000+ again, but undervolted, temps are 24-28 idle (depends on ambient) and 40 load on stock hsf and that's in a htpc case with 2 undervolted (7V) 60mm fans.
By the way, I bet the 4850e can be cooled passively. I've even tried my brisbane passively on stock hsf, though temps get too warm for my nerves.