AMD Phenom II X4 965 vs Intel Core i3-2100 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz for new build

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blueyfooey

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Aug 13, 2012
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Hello,

I'm not sure which is better. The AMD Phenom II X4 965, I've been told, has less gaming capability than the Sandy Bridge, but if it's negligible, I'd rather not spend the extra money on the Sandy Bridge. I have a budget that I'm trying not to pass ($650) and I'd rather have more money to spend on the GPU. Anyone able to give a bit of advice?

Edit: The CPU's looked at are

AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb 3.4GHz Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor

Intel Core i3-2100 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz LGA 1155 65W Dual-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 2000
 
Solution
DJDeCiBeL
Get the 965 and overclock it. The extra two real cores will make a difference in games and other applications that can use them.

A comparison between the two, if you're interested: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/102?vs=289

The i3 is better in many areas, but overclocking the 965 will close the gap significantly.

Edit: Having said that, you'll need to factor in the cost of an aftermarket cooler, like a Cooler Master Hyper 212+ or Evo to OC the 965.
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Bulldozer is the name of the architecture used by the FX CPUs. Piledriver is its successor and Steamroller is the successor to Piledriver.

I don't recommend a GTX 480. They use a lot of power and although the performance is good, it's no better than the Radeon 7850 that has a now similar price and several other advantages while using about one third of the power. With the GTX 480, you'd want at least a 600w PSU. A 7850 can be good with a 430w PSU, although with overclocking the Phenom II x4, you might want to go for a 450w or 500w PSU with the 7850 and a 650w or 700w with the 480, leaving room for overclocking the graphics too.

If you get the 480 and want to overclock it, be aware that it needs an after-market cooler to overclock because its default cooler can't handle it. The 480 can be a good graphics card, but I'd recommend the 7850 over it.
 
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A 7870 is considerably better than a 480. The 7850 is roughly on-par with the 480.
 
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Don't use HWCompare. It doesn't get any less accurate than them when you're comparing graphics cards. I recommend the 7850 far more than the 480. If you must have a Nvidia card at that price, then and only then do I recommend the 480. It's far cheaper than the 570 while having similar GPU performance and more VRAM and it's a lot faster than the 560 TI and has the same advantages over the 560 TI 448 core as it has over the 570, except it's also slightly faster too.

However, the 7850 uses far less electricity, doesn't need an aftermarket cooler to be one of the best overclocking cards ever, has better tessellation efficiency, and other advantages. It's also about the same price.
 
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never use hw compare. comparisons can only truely be made if the gpu is from the same family(i.e comparing a 7850 to a 7870)
 
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^lol pretty much. Well, my logic is that a standard 7850 can overclock well enough to match the GTX 570, which is about as good as a GTX 480, so logic dictates (again this a is rule of thumb, but still more accurate that HW compare I think) that the 7870 GHZ edition (which is factory clocked higher) should run with the GTX 480, or, yes, exceed its capabilities.
 
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FX5800.jpg
 
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I see. I did not realize that hwcompare provided such inaccurate estimates. Would there be a better site to use? Also, if I could scrounge up the cash for the 7870, I might buy it. Hoping that the microcenter at orange county will price match the after rebate price of the GPU, or provide a lower price.
 
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Hwcompare deals in theoretical, most of their performance reviews don't seem to have any benchmarks of how they actually perform in any specific games. Thats the problem with it.

This is a good thing to use for quick info, its not perfect either, but its pretty nifty
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU12/372

It doesn't have a direct comparison of the GTX 480 to the 7870 though, you'll just have to take our words for it I'm afraid.
 
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Anand doesn't update the results of their tools when new drivers come out. That tool, although useful when the cards were initially tested, is so far out of date that it's irrelevant.
 
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I find that looking at the latest reviews from Tom's is a good way to gauge cards. For example, the Radeon 7970 GHz Edition and the GTX 660 TI reviews have some of the latest drivers (there are some new drivers now, but those tests are still the most relevant that I'm aware of) and a lot of other cards are tested in those reviews. The problems with many sites that have tools for comparing cards (such as Anand) is that they usually don't update the results when new drivers and game versions change things around.
 
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Well, thank you all for the information. I've put up a new build list for people to help me a little on in the New Build section of the forum. It'd be greatly appreciated if you could glance at it and give a little more advise.
 
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