Gaming Shoot-Out: 18 CPUs And APUs Under $200, Benchmarked

[computertech82]

gee, what a surpise, intel STOMPS amd still. Now if games finally get updated for more then 2 cores, it might be a different story. But i don't see that happening, cheaper programming.

 

[Th-z]

Yes I find the original wording a bit odd.

By definition, nth percentile's value (say q) means n% of date are below q, in other words, n% of data doesn't include q.

So using the original description: "the 75th percentile result (say 50 ms) shows us the longest lag between consecutive frames that we see 75 percent of the time"; it would read: "the 75th percentile result shows us the longest lag between consecutive frames that we see 75 percent of the time is below 50 ms".


Anyway, I'd suggest using absolute latency values rather than the difference between each latency, because difference results can be misleading. For example, if system A has absolute latency values: 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 50 45..., the difference can look better than system B with absolute latency value: 35 45 35 45 35 45 35 45 35... Both can have same FPS, but system B will actually play smoother, so it could defeat the purpose of finding latency issues.

 

[palladin9479]

At the expense of never being able to really drop in a powerful GPU in the future, due to the low end CPU performance.

That really depends on the application. You would NEVER use an APU for a high end gaming rig, it makes absolutely no sense there. It's ideal for cheap mobile devices and low cost SFF PC's.

The Tom's review that had them build a mini-ITX gaming box kinda demonstrated how much power you can get in a box. What hindered them was they had to find an Mini-ITX case that had an expansion slot with a biger PSU. Typically that platform has 120W or less though 200W picoPSU's are now available. I used to build a ton of Mini-ITX systems for coworkers, friends and family's, mostly as home servers or network gateway devices. In particular the older Via boards could come with up to four 1Gb network ports, load linux and customize it with an IDS and firewall management system and *poof* home router that's better then any SOHO device you'll ever see. That is the world that we've moving towards, these very small machines capable of doing a ton of desktop work. The only thing they really couldn't do well is "gaming" and AMD pretty much smashed into that market with the APU.

If someone wanted me to I could build a Mini-ITX system with an A10 that runs like a champ, eats very little electricity and is so small that you'd think it was an alarm clock.

Can't wait to see if they ever do APU's on nano-itx form factors.

 

[palladin9479]

Slow down there champ I'm not attacking your favorite brand/chip/whatever, I'm just pointing out that there are trade offs to an APU system.

Some people doing a budget build will want to upgrade their GPU in the future, and while the APU+crossfire system will be better short term for them, the i3+same GPU may be a better long term option.

Nahh no favoritism here, at least not professionally. Also you rarely if ever "upgrade" the kinds of systems you'd be putting APU's in.

See

http://www.mini-box.com/M350-Enclosure-WITH-PICOPSU-150-XT-and-150W-Adapter-KIT

That is the kind of case your putting something like that into. There is no PCIe expansion slot. It's a fusion of notebook minimization technology with desktop class components.

Case + 160W picoPSU
Mini-ITX FM2 board (ASrock makes an amazing one)
A10-5700 / 5800K
8GB dual channel DDR3-2133
2.5inch SATA HDD (or SSD if your feeling frisky).

Use a USB DVD-ROM to load the OS and go from there.

Incredibly small and inconspicuous, could fit anywhere and not stand out. Sips power and does everything you want it to do.

-=Edit=-

Priced out the components for this. Your looking at $385 USD for the internals (Mobo + APU + memory + HDD) and another $100 for the case/psu combo. $500 seems pretty good for a device this small with this much capability.

 

[Guest]

what map/custom did you use to test Starcraft 2? can you post a link?

 

[mikenygmail]

The APU system *is* always the better budget choice for gamers since you can crossfire it with a low end GPU.

 

[SuperVeloce]

crossfire is far from ideal...

 

[mikenygmail]

I'm not saying crossfire rocks, just saying there is no better performer for the money than a top APU + crossfire'd graphics card system. Anyone who disagrees, list something better or gimme that thumbs up! heh

 

[Au_equus]

does anybody know (provide link please) where we can get a BM tool for frame latency?

 

[Au_equus]

figured it was FRAPS (can't test it out now, nsfw). this guy posted a program that will take the timeframe from FRAPS and renders the time stamps to a seconds per frame (SPF?) output http://sourceforge.net/projects/frafsbenchview/files/
(again at work, can't test this)

 

[oxford373]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]Memory controller, yes, but not the PCIe controller AFAIK. I think that is still on the motherboard. It's been a whiel since I've read up on it, so maybe I'm mistaken, but I'm pretty sure about it and that it's part of why AMD's differing chipsets can have different numbers of PCIe lanes without a chip such as a PLX chip in the top models.[/citation]
AM3/AM3+ platform PCI-E is still on the motherboard,but all AMD APUs(brazos/liano/trinity) have integrated both PCI-E and memory controller. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-a8-3850-llano,2975.html

 

[locgaw]

I would have liked to have seen the i5-3350p stack up. It did ok in your recent article for best gaming processors 120-200 range.

 

[Wendigo]

I was looking at the frame latency results, and was wonderiing if, instead of presenting them as percentile results, it will not be clearer and easier to understand if presented by box and whisker plots, or bar graph with the mean latency and error bars... The tighter the bars are around the mean, the better it is.

Just a suggestion...

 

[jeffredo]

There's little reason to get rid of my Phenom II X4 @ 4.0 Ghz according to this article - well, if I don't want to pay well over $200 for a new CPU that is (not to mention a new Intel motherboard).

 

[pit_1209]

[citation][nom]jeffredo[/nom]There's little reason to get rid of my Phenom II X4 @ 4.0 Ghz according to this article - well, if I don't want to pay well over $200 for a new CPU that is (not to mention a new Intel motherboard).[/citation]
Let´s hope that at the end of the year we got a good reason.

 

[turbolover22]

Actually, you're incorrect. The 3550 is $199 at tigerdirect.com

As for the 2500K, we explained why, but you have to read it to find out...

Actually the i5 2500K is $199 on Tigerdirect right now.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7073161&CatId=6988

 

[Guest]

That's what i was saying for long time: in gaming AMD Phenom II 980 = AMD FX 8350. There are few exceptions ofcourse, but still shame...

 

[palladin9479]

That's what i was saying for long time: in gaming AMD Phenom II 980 = AMD FX 8350. There are few exceptions ofcourse, but still shame...

Not anymore.

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/Crysis-3-PC-235317/Tests/Crysis-3-Test-CPU-Benchmark-1056578/

Took them years but we're now seeing games that need 4 or more cores to perform optimally.

 

[FYFI_13]

[citation][nom]palladin9479[/nom]Not anymore.http://www.pcgameshardware.de/Crys [...] k-1056578/Took them years but we're now seeing games that need 4 or more cores to perform optimally.[/citation]
True that, but by the time we have enough games like Crysis 3 there will be new processor generations out.

 

[ASHISH65]

awesome review!!!!

just hope thacht next time there would be g2130 instead of g860 pentium in benhmark

 

[ASHISH65]

[citation][nom]ASHISH65[/nom]awesome review!!!! litle shocking regrading pentium.just hope that next time there would be g2130 instead of g860 pentium in benhmark[/citation]

 

[Guest]

Weird, I thought this was a benchmark of all these CPU's integrated graphics up until the benchmark pages

 

[palladin9479]

True that, but by the time we have enough games like Crysis 3 there will be new processor generations out.

Very few people go out and buy a new system the moment a new processor is released. Instead they tend to run on the same rig for 3~4 years, some will do a few minor upgrades like video card, memory, HDD or even a new CPU, but never a complete rebuild. So if someone is buying something ~today~ they need to be planning to use it for three to four years at a minimum.

 

[Avro Arrow]

[citation][nom]LORD_ORION[/nom]Except they weren't cheap for their time. eg: 945 was $280 for its 1st year? :\Spend that now and what do you get?[/citation]
Yeah, but you're not taking into account that a comparable Core2Quad was an extra $100-$150 at the time. I worked at TigerDirect when the Phenom II X4 940 was released. It was comparable in performance to the Core2Quad Q9400 but instead of costing $450, it was only $275. It's funny how people can't remember the perspectives of the times.

 

[Avro Arrow]

For all the rigamoroll about UD5 this, UD7 that, micro-stuttering this and Skyrim that, I feel that I should just make ONE simple statement about user experience. I run an AMD Phenom II X4 965 on a Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 motherboard with 16GB od DDR3-1333 and 2xATi Radeon HD 4870 1GB in Crossfire. The game plays buttery-smooth, there is no micro-stuttering AT ALL (at least none that I've ever noticed in over a year playing it), no slowdows, no FPS problems, no artifacts, no nothing! If this is the game that is supposed to give AMD the most trouble, then AMD has no trouble at all. I usually have Firefox open while I'm playing the game (simply because I always leave firefox open) with about 30 tabs open within it and there are NO ISSUES. Now think, if I can have no issues at all and be using a 965, UD3, "slow" RAM, Windows 7 x64 Ultimate running firefox and skyrim on "primitive" non-DX11 HD4870s with only 1GB VRAM in Crossfire, then please explain how anyone using newer tech could be having problems that I'm not? The way I'm reading this article, my rig should make Skyrim borderline UN-PLAYABLE! I don't care whether you're using Intel, AMD, nVidia or ATi. If you have newer tech than me, then your gaming experience should be AT LEAST as flawless as mine. Endpoint - All this bickering is a complete waste of time.