AMD A4 series...

[mantukis5000]

Are AMD A4 series apu's unlocked?

 

[Poprin]

Nah, I know it's not Intel fanboyism. I'm a big fan of Intel myself. And I bought an Asus R290X DC2OC so I could play games, so I knew I wouldn't be relying on integrated graphics. I honestly bought the 7850K because it had the most cores and the highest frequency of that core number, while still maintaining the 8 iGPU core count. It wasn't the best buy I probably could've made, but it's served me well enough, minus the POS cooling.

Zetto, I'm aware you own one of these and genuinely I'm not trying to bash you but this is just a fact. The Ahtlon 860k which is less than half the price of a 7850k is the EXACT same processor minus the GPU cores, which when using a dedicated graphics card are completely inactive. So the 7850k makes no sense and the reason why it runs so damn hot is because they have crammed all those GPU cores onto the die where as the 860k has so much room on the chip it can have a little party hence runs cooler. In fact the frustrating thing is AMD could easily make an 8 core FM2, which would actually be pretty sweet if it was cheap enough but they won't do it because they are pushing the APU's so hard and don't want to effect sales. Not to mention the fact that they still manage to sell FX chips in droves because really it's their only enthusiast chip option.

 

[nekulturny]

Wow, do I even want to interject here?

In which case this begs a question... why suggest him buy A4-6300 if he will have to buy a Graphics Card anyway?

Its a 40 dollar CPU, you get what you pay for. Its an APU just like ALL of Intel's CPUs have been for years. Under your logic I could say "why buy an i7 when you're just going to buy a graphics card anyway"? Good lord dude, cool your jets.

And why not buy some actual half-decent CPU without integrated GPU crap AND a graphics card?

Because you pretty much can't avoid integrated "GPU crap" anymore as I said already. Both major CPU manufacturers have clearly demonstrated this continued integrating feature as being the industry standard.


Now to get to the OPs question, no its not an ideal CPU for "gaming", I'm not sure what this one guy's deal is where hes ranting and raving because a 40 dollar CPU doesn't perform like a 200 dollar one (possibly "mommy issues", but who can say?), but the old adage you get what you pay for does apply here. I run the 6300 in an HTPC that doubles as a Minecraft homebox, it does that fine, would I try to power up Battlefield 4 on ultra on it? No...

The call of duty games are not particularly demanding at all, you wouldn't have much trouble running them with an A4 however. The other titles you mentioned I have no first hand knowledge to report, but I ran COD MW 3 on an old laptop with a Core2Duo just fine.

As far as overclocking at the BLCK, unless AMD has radically changed their design (which I doubt), its fine with their CPUs. When you overclock at the multiplier you are only overclocking the CPU. At the base clock, you are also overclocking your RAM and your North Bridge on an AMD CPU. So, you're introducing more potential stability trouble points. However, its fine to do so, as long as your temps are good and your system is stable. Now with Intel you don't want to overclock at the base clock, as they have literally tied everything into it, including the PCI lanes, SATA even the ethernet. Some of those things even an adjustment of 1 or 2mhz can cause severe stability problems.

As far as the stock AMD cooler, its adequate from first hand experience. For overclocking? They're not, but for overclocking, Intel's stock heatsinks are equally useless.

 

[WhiteSnake91]

I don't get that other guy's deal either trying to make the person spend more money. It seemed pompous too, obviously if the guy was looking at an a4 6300 his budget is low and couldn't afford an intel. I'm sure even the a4 6300 coming from an old 2005 desktop for his parents would seem amazing. It'll play stuff on 720p low at ~30fps. When more money allows he could upgrade it to like a gtx 750 and be fine. I'm not super familiar with overclocking the AMD apu.....couldn't it just be overclocked by the FSB like my 1055t was able to do since it's technically a locked CPU too?

He'd be better off overclocking the iGPU anyway rather than the cpu, 3.7ghz is sufficient. I looked at a MW3 gameplay vid of the a4 6300 and it was playable, this dude acts like 720p at 30fps is the end of the world with how bad he was talking about the APU, first world problems lol. Obviously it wouldn't be maxing stuff out, but it'll roughly be xbox 360/ps3 graphics, and it could always be upgraded later to a gtx 750 or 750ti. 4gb ram to start out with an if they're really serious, upgrade to 8gb ram later on. Like I said earlier it's like somebody with not much money wanting something to eat, and then people belittling them for only being able to afford a peanut butter sandwich and demanding they buy an expensive steak lol.

A dual core AMD cpu at 3.7ghz, AGAIN, beats the requirements for the MAJORITY of games EVER made.

When I was looking to build a PC years ago in 2009-2010 I was scared off of building when I barely had any money because of users like the dude above talking down acting like cheap parts on a budget are unplayable, it really irks me, because after being educated on PC parts and reading up on stuff and seeing video evidence and first hand experience with lower end parts, it certainly doesn't take THAT much to play stuff. He probably scared the guy off, but OP if you ever come back, you DON'T have to spend money for an i7 and 290x. An AMD APU is perfectly fine to start out with.


You could certainly do worse than a dual core at 3.7ghz.

 

[nekulturny]

Well COD in particular is a console port, I haven't played the series myself since MW3, but it really isn't that pretty, in fact many games are console ports, made for a console with lesser hardware capabilities than a mid level gaming computer and repackaged for a PC, since consoles still dictate the market. BF4 (and a few others) are one of the outliers in popular game titles in which they're made for the PC and dumbed down for a console. So absolutely, while not the most ideal, if you're on a very tight budget if you want a computer and need to sacrifice somewhere you could do worse than the A4-6300, but so the OP knows in the interest of considering all options you can also do A LOT better.

As far as overclocking at the FSB, yes. They techically don't have Front Side Bus's anymore and haven't for generations, but for all intents and purposes reference clock and FSB are synonymous terms. The multiplier may be locked, but the reference clock isn't. I'm not 100% sure however what other issues are introduced with the integrated GPU on die, but I doubt there isn't a simple solution based on AMD's track record of offering flexibility.

 

[nekulturny]

If the OP does return, I wouldn't mind playing with the Clock speeds on my HTPC and maybe run a couple benches. But I'm not going to go through the trouble if he was scared off by some inconsiderate person.

 

[Zetto52SD]

Nah, I know it's not Intel fanboyism. I'm a big fan of Intel myself. And I bought an Asus R290X DC2OC so I could play games, so I knew I wouldn't be relying on integrated graphics. I honestly bought the 7850K because it had the most cores and the highest frequency of that core number, while still maintaining the 8 iGPU core count. It wasn't the best buy I probably could've made, but it's served me well enough, minus the POS cooling.

Zetto, I'm aware you own one of these and genuinely I'm not trying to bash you but this is just a fact. The Ahtlon 860k which is less than half the price of a 7850k is the EXACT same processor minus the GPU cores, which when using a dedicated graphics card are completely inactive. So the 7850k makes no sense and the reason why it runs so damn hot is because they have crammed all those GPU cores onto the die where as the 860k has so much room on the chip it can have a little party hence runs cooler. In fact the frustrating thing is AMD could easily make an 8 core FM2, which would actually be pretty sweet if it was cheap enough but they won't do it because they are pushing the APU's so hard and don't want to effect sales. Not to mention the fact that they still manage to sell FX chips in droves because really it's their only enthusiast chip option.

I get what you're saying now. And it's a real shame that AMD discontinued the FX line. That really could have been their saving grace. If they were to update it with DDR4 memory or even just DDR3 memory at 2133MHz (without overclocking RAM), they could compete more with Intel.

 

[Tulio T]

The A8-7650k plus a cooler is not bad (only if overclocking it), is a good apu 4 cpu cores an decent igpu for $106 dollars, not so bad, I a gamer because I'm love play games not for my computer move it at 4k resolution at 240 FPS. The A4 6300 with a pair of RAM at 1600 move Residen Evil 5 to more at 30 FPS at 720p same as Darksiders 1 and 2 in god quality or High; and others, if you games the some years old games (buy in Steam for a five to nine dollars, even I buy Capcom Bionic Commando for less of tow dollars) how you never play before you can wait until got the money for the PC for the ultimate an last games(only if you wished)