Intel Core i3-4130 vs AMD Athlon X4-760K

[naukkis]

as for TrinityRichland there no l3 cache, I doubt it's going to change much for the CPU performance...

Amd uses very conservative binning for these Ahtlons and 750K/760K default nb speed is only 1600MHz. Usually there's as much gain from NB overclock as cpu overclock speed wise - AMD's memory controller ain't very good and at low frequencies it really hampers cpu speed.

 

[escrow4]

The last thing you want to buy is a low end dead end 760G mobo with poor phases and VRMs with a 6300, seeing as you'll likely want to overclock to make up for FX's horrific single threaded performance.

I vote neither. Save up a $1K and buy a Broadwell i5 come Christmas which would slaughter both those choices.

 

[kidyankee764]

Okay, I need all the extras on the motherboard to upgrade in the future. I am building the initial $600 PC, then upgrading as I get more $$. Also, I am buying 8GB of RAM that will be upgraded to 16. I want to be able to get 16GB in the future. I have the OS and monitor already bought.

 

[alexruiz]

The last thing you want to buy is a low end dead end 760G mobo with poor phases and VRMs with a 6300, seeing as you'll likely want to overclock to make up for FX's horrific single threaded performance.

I vote neither. Save up a $1K and buy a Broadwell i5 come Christmas which would slaughter both those choices.

Have you used that mobo to make the comment?
That motherboard has 4+1 phases, beefy heatsink in the VRMs, supports 125W CPUs very nicely. Other motherboards will be better at overclocking, but that one will pump a FX6300 to 4.0GHz base with minimal effort.

Now, in reply to the OP, I am thorn. I would say X4-760K as the FM2 / FM2+ platform is newer than AM3+. But the price o the FX6300 combo is hard to pass, and unless you are benchmarking some very specific things, SATA II even on a OCZ Vector SSD will have no speed difference compared to SATA III other than huge file transfers, and I have yet to meet a person that spend most of his/her time copying ISOs or videos from one SSD to another SSD. For normal usage, SATA III and SATA II are virtually equivalent, specially if a mechanical drive is involved.

Save the money, put it in a better GPU, get the FX6300.

Edit: Just saw the last comment by the OP. FM2+

 

[Arkaign]

More $$ than the cheaper combo option, but a bit more robust than an AMD Quad. That's with an upgraded mobo with 6x Sata6Gbps, gobs of features, yadda. I've used both $200+ 990FX boards and $50-$60 cheapies, and honestly 99% of the time there's no difference. The big difference with this board is that the power delivery is good enough to feed the FX @ 4.5Ghz-4.6Ghz on a Noctua (which honestly gives very very good performance) AND it gives you SLI/Crossfire.

This FM2+ is even better, but the FM2 CPUs aren't that exciting (yet, maybe we'll see something better down the line).

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813157457

I really wish AMD would have made a revision of the FX that fit FM2+, it would have been a smart move imho.

 

[coolpurplefan]

Okay, I need all the extras on the motherboard to upgrade in the future. I am building the initial $600 PC, then upgrading as I get more $$. Also, I am buying 8GB of RAM that will be upgraded to 16. I want to be able to get 16GB in the future. I have the OS and monitor already bought.

My experience is usually the RAM from the previous generation platform will be more expensive. Like by the time they come out with DDR4, DDR3 may creep up in price.

 

[Arkaign]

My experience is usually the RAM from the previous generation platform will be more expensive. Like by the time they come out with DDR4, DDR3 may creep up in price.

That is very very very true. The mfgs have to re-tool to produce the new standard (to feed OEMs/system builders/etc), and thus stock of the previous standard falls significantly. Prices for the old memory are always high, particularly for large sizes. Hell, look at 2x4GB DDR2 prices, they're absolutely freaking insane. 2x4GB DDR3 is a ton cheaper.

8GB DDR2 G Skill $209

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231182

8GB DDR3 G Skill $69

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231544

 

[Hubb1e]

The performance of the i3 vs a stock Athlon will be in favor of the i3. You haven't said you wanted to overclock but an overclocked Athlon will catch up to the i3 when overclocked (for the most part). But, the upgrade path on the Intel platform is far far far better than the upgrade path for FM2+. You'll be able to upgrade in a few years to a used i5 or i7 which is far better than any FM2+ chip available even probably in the future unless FM2+ gets an unexpectedly awesome upgrade which it won't.

The CPU platform sticks with you for far longer than the GPU so if you buy an upgradable CPU platform, you'll be far better off in 3 years when you decide you want something a little quicker. For that, I would sacrifice a little GPU at this time because you can always turn down the settings a little bit on a game and honestly the differences aren't THAT much between high and medium. You'll still have fun in the game.

 

[coolpurplefan]

After doing research for an Intel platform, I decided to look for an AMD mobo for the fun of it. The ASUS A88X-PRO for AMD looks interesting because it has heatpipes, ALC1150 audio and is a 6 + 2 phase motherboard.

 

[Arkaign]

Sounds fun. Honestly the Intel dual cores seem past their prime. Great single-thread performance, but I feel like 2014 shouldn't even have dual cores for desktops. And $100+ for the i3 is just annoying. They don't even offer a K variant to justify that price. In that way I feel like the i3 is the odd man out, a few bucks more gets an i5 that's a ton more powerful at multitasking, and a Celeron or Pentium Dual Core is much cheaper and is just as good for office/HTPC duties.

 

[el etro]

I agree the FX 6300 combos at microcenter are very attractive if one is close by.

At this price is a awesome(maybe unbeatable) value.

 

[crashtech]

Sounds fun. Honestly the Intel dual cores seem past their prime. Great single-thread performance, but I feel like 2014 shouldn't even have dual cores for desktops. And $100+ for the i3 is just annoying. They don't even offer a K variant to justify that price. In that way I feel like the i3 is the odd man out, a few bucks more gets an i5 that's a ton more powerful at multitasking, and a Celeron or Pentium Dual Core is much cheaper and is just as good for office/HTPC duties.

Past their prime is probably a mischaracterization, since i3s contain the same new technology as all other Intel CPUs, but I do agree that 2 cores is getting on the thin side of comfort moving forward. But i5s are not just "a few bucks more," and even if one was to go with a low end i5, it won't have the single-thread performance of an i3, and that still matters. Tests by Xbit Labs show some surprising gaming results with the new i3s, as well as some highly threaded results that are predictably lackluster. I agree that something like an i3-4340K would be a very interesting animal, indeed.

I shouldn't like the i3 as well as I do, given that I am traditionally a "moar cores" kind of guy, but these new units have earned my respect with their very efficient use of execution resources.

 

[coolpurplefan]

Well, the way I see it, if you pay $50 more for a quad core today, it may save you from buying another motherboard and RAM in a year or 2.

Those are pretty impressive benchmarks though for the newer i3.

 

[crashtech]

Well, the way I see it, if you pay $50 more for a quad core today, it may save you from buying another motherboard and RAM in a year or 2.

Those are pretty impressive benchmarks though for the newer i3.

I'm not sure how you figure that, I would say that paying $50 more for a quad core today saves you from paying $50 more for a quad core in a year or two. But a lot of people live on the kind of budget that won't allow for that, so why not sell the i3 in a year or two and use the money to help buy an i5 or i7? I don't see the problem. Maybe it's not optimal, but it sure as heck gets a guy a platform with a more certain future.

 

[Arkaign]

Fwiw, I've installed dozens of the i3s starting way back with the 1156 models. I just don't get a great result out of them. I deal with them as office workstations, but the average user is pretty bad at managing their systems. It puts me in a tricky spot, because I really do much prefer the Intel USB/Sata controllers, even over FM2+ 88-series mobos. I can directly attest that Intel Sata 3Gbps is superior to the AMD chipsets supposed Sata 6Gbps.

However, when it comes to somebody running Outlook, Lync, a few dozen tabs, two displays, Quickbooks, Timeslips, and maybe another half dozen to dozen office documents, the i3s REALLY bog down. Users on Phenom II X4/X6 actually have a smoother experience, and those are systems I put in over three years ago (back when Core2Quad and i7-920 were ultra expensive by comparison). Even with 8GB ram, the i3s just suffer. To compound the issue, users are often bad about installing junkware along the way.

 

[crashtech]

Have you tried the new i3s? There's no way I would say a PhII is a better experience than a Haswell i3, but then again I tend to be pretty anal about process clutter. Maybe for the average sloppy user, the more cores the merrier, then they won't even realize when they become part of a botnet!

 

[mynameisjake]

I would go with the Athlon. You are getting performance that an i5 would get because its 3.8Ghz can be overclocked to close to 4.5 with a good cooling fan.

 

[Phynaz]

I would go with the Athlon. You are getting performance that an i5 would get because its 3.8Ghz can be overclocked to close to 4.5 with a good cooling fan.

Maybe you are confused about the Athlon CPU, because it can't get anywhere near the performance of an i5.

 

[Bman123]

Go with a i3 to get the system built and running. When cash gets better sell the i3 and get a i5. No reason to go with amd and get less performance

 

[frozentundra123456]

Past their prime is probably a mischaracterization, since i3s contain the same new technology as all other Intel CPUs, but I do agree that 2 cores is getting on the thin side of comfort moving forward. But i5s are not just "a few bucks more," and even if one was to go with a low end i5, it won't have the single-thread performance of an i3, and that still matters. Tests by Xbit Labs show some surprising gaming results with the new i3s, as well as some highly threaded results that are predictably lackluster. I agree that something like an i3-4340K would be a very interesting animal, indeed.

I shouldn't like the i3 as well as I do, given that I am traditionally a "moar cores" kind of guy, but these new units have earned my respect with their very efficient use of execution resources.

True, but even the low end i5s have turbo, so even with the lowest end i5, in lightly threaded loads you will see something around 3.2 ghz, which is not that far from the highest end i3. (I have an i5 2320, and under full load all cores stress test it runs about 3.15ghz.)

 

[Arkaign]

Have you tried the new i3s? There's no way I would say a PhII is a better experience than a Haswell i3, but then again I tend to be pretty anal about process clutter. Maybe for the average sloppy user, the more cores the merrier, then they won't even realize when they become part of a botnet!

I agree. For myself, an i3 works fine, because I'm super focused as well about not having umpteen billion things left open or running in the background. But the users I work with are usually the polar opposite, and 4 or 6 legit cores seem to balance things much better with windows scheduler than 2 cores.

 

[sm625]

Even if the athlon was clocked to 5GHz, the stock i3-4130 would still be faster under most use cases.