AMD FX 4100: Gaming?

[Soturi]

I would like to know people's opinion on the AMD FX 4100 (Bulldozer) for gaming.

I'm going to be building a budget gaming PC at some time. I was looking at the AMD FX 4100 with an AMD HD Radeon 6850... I've seen videos of this setup on YouTube and people being able to play demanding games such as BF3 on max settings.

However, I also know a lot of people say AMD Bulldozer was a "flop"... and the 4100 is the lowest of them all; is it as bad as people say it is?

From what I've seen on YouTube it's really good.

An important question as well is, will this CPU be a bottleneck to the 6850? And if not, what would be the best graphics card I could get to go with it before it begins to bottleneck the card? Ie will it bottleneck a GTX 580?

All replies are much appreciated; except haters.

Thank you.

//Soturi

 

[noob2222]

The 4100 series are cheap, and thats all the good that can be said about them.

8120@4.7 ghz BF3 42 player map 6970 CF ULTRA 4x AA otherwise maxed out

4 cores (4100) - fps 30-55 - cpu usage pegged at 100%
6 cores (6100) - fps 60-95 few drops to 50 - cpu usage ~80%
8 cores (8100) - fps 80-120, few drops to high 60s - cpu usage ~80% on 2 cores, 60-80% on other 6.


Keep in mind this is with 2 - 6970 cards. FPS might improve if I disabled xfire on the 4100(less gpu driver overhead)

With a single 6850, it would probably be pretty well balanced with the 4100 at 4.5+ ghz. anything else, I would consider the 4100 as a dual core phenom II, it does its job.

 

[amuffin]

i3-2100.

 

[computernewb]

its a decent cpu, cheap, highly overclockable, and you will be able to do moderate gaming just fine. But there are better options within that price range.

for $10 more, you can get a phenom ii x4 965, a true quad core

and for $15 more, you can get a i3-2120

the fx would be my last choice.

 

[ohyouknow]

All of the FX processors perform relatively the same with one another in gaming since their clock speeds determine the minor FPS changes amongst them for the most part. That being said, go for the 4100 if you are going to be purchasing an FX.

As far as bottlenecking is concerned, I mean are you going to be playing at 1280 x 720 res? 1080p is more graphics bound for the most part so I don't think that should be a huge concern.

I would suggest you pony up a little bit more money for a 6870 since it's a great value for a graphics card at that price point. Cheers and happy gaming.