Graphics card support for an ASUS M5A97 2.0 Evo

[Toucan59]

Will a GTX1060 6GB be compatible with my graphics card or do i need to look at another graphics card? If so what are some good ones! Thanks

 

[Viking2121]

The 1060 should work just fine with a M5A97 motherboard.

 

[Toucan59]

The 1060 should work just fine with a M5A97 motherboard.

I have an AMD fx 4300 Black edition CPU, is there a better CPU that will also fit into the M5A97 that won't kill my bank but will be a solid improvement?

 

[Viking2121]

Yes, there is, The best that would work safely in the board is the FX8350, I'd look into the FX8370E as its a 95 watt chip run cooler and I would trust it more than the 8350 in that board since the FX8350 is a 125watt chip. The FX8320 125watt or the FX8320E 95watt are also a good option.

I strongly recommend that you look around for a 2nd hand (used) FX8xxx CPU, I do not recommend buying them new at full retail price.

AMD FX is old and out dated, If you can afford a new system, a New AMD Ryzen or even an i3 6100 which yes has only 2 cores, but often beats the FX8350 8 core in pretty much any game. With the i3 6100 it gives you room to upgrade to an i5 or an i7 skylake later. AMD Ryzen uses the the AM4 socket which I would think would be around for awhile, But you will have to get DDR4 ram for either platform.

There are older Xeon systems or older Sandybridge or Ivybridge Xeons, i5 or i7s that well perform even better than the FX8xxx and the FX9xxx.

 

[The Paladin]

looking at the support page at ASUS for the motherboard support of CPUs : https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/M5A97_EVO_R20/HelpDesk_CPU/

it will handle only the following....

FX-8320(FD8320FRW8KHK,3.5GHz,8C,125W,rev.C0,AM3+)
FX-8320E (FD832EWMW8KHK, 3.2GHz, 8C, 95W,rev.C0,AM3+)
FX-8350(FD8350FRW8KHK,4.0GHz,8C,125W,rev.C0,AM3+)
FX-8370(FD8370FRW8KHK, 4.0GHz, 8C, L3:8M, 125W, rev.C0, AM3+)
FX-8370E (FD837EWMW8KHK, 3.3GHz, 8C, L3:8M, 95W, rev.C0, AM3+)

 

[Toucan59]

Yes, there is, The best that would work safely in the board is the FX8350, I'd look into the FX8370E as its a 95 watt chip run cooler and I would trust it more than the 8350 in that board since the FX8350 is a 125watt chip. The FX8320 125watt or the FX8320E 95watt are also a good option.

I strongly recommend that you look around for a 2nd hand (used) FX8xxx CPU, I do not recommend buying them new at full retail price.

AMD FX is old and out dated, If you can afford a new system, a New AMD Ryzen or even an i3 6100 which yes has only 2 cores, but often beats the FX8350 8 core in pretty much any game. With the i3 6100 it gives you room to upgrade to an i5 or an i7 skylake later. AMD Ryzen uses the the AM4 socket which I would think would be around for awhile, But you will have to get DDR4 ram for either platform.

There are older Xeon systems or older Sandybridge or Ivybridge Xeons, i5 or i7s that well perform even better than the FX8xxx and the FX9xxx.

So if the FX series is outdated, should I look at getting an I3 or even an I5? If i do, do i need to get a new motherboard?

 

[Viking2121]

Yes, there is, The best that would work safely in the board is the FX8350, I'd look into the FX8370E as its a 95 watt chip run cooler and I would trust it more than the 8350 in that board since the FX8350 is a 125watt chip. The FX8320 125watt or the FX8320E 95watt are also a good option.

I strongly recommend that you look around for a 2nd hand (used) FX8xxx CPU, I do not recommend buying them new at full retail price.

AMD FX is old and out dated, If you can afford a new system, a New AMD Ryzen or even an i3 6100 which yes has only 2 cores, but often beats the FX8350 8 core in pretty much any game. With the i3 6100 it gives you room to upgrade to an i5 or an i7 skylake later. AMD Ryzen uses the the AM4 socket which I would think would be around for awhile, But you will have to get DDR4 ram for either platform.

There are older Xeon systems or older Sandybridge or Ivybridge Xeons, i5 or i7s that well perform even better than the FX8xxx and the FX9xxx.

So if the FX series is outdated, should I look at getting an I3 or even an I5? If i do, do i need to get a new motherboard?

Yes you will have to get a new motherboard, and if you go with the newest i3 or i5 you will have to get new RAM as well. It's well worth it, any lower end i5 will be faster than any AMD FX CPU for gaming. If you go for the new AMD Ryzen CPU, you will also have to get a new motherboard and RAM as they are DDR4. An i3 6100 is a good option and its always way above AMD in games for only $119 USD, You can get a cheaper h110 or h170 board for the i3, and 8GB of DDR4 ram and you will be set and you will have a upgrade path for an i7 later. You can use your old PSU and Case and storage devices.

But if you are on a budget, the FX 8 core will still do alright in games and is much better than the FX4300, But I don't recommend to buy a brand spanking new FX CPU if you go that route, the FX8320 being the cheapest 8 core is not worth $160 USD new, If you can find it for $100 bucks its a alright deal since you already have a compatible motherboard.

 

[Toucan59]

Yes, there is, The best that would work safely in the board is the FX8350, I'd look into the FX8370E as its a 95 watt chip run cooler and I would trust it more than the 8350 in that board since the FX8350 is a 125watt chip. The FX8320 125watt or the FX8320E 95watt are also a good option.

I strongly recommend that you look around for a 2nd hand (used) FX8xxx CPU, I do not recommend buying them new at full retail price.

AMD FX is old and out dated, If you can afford a new system, a New AMD Ryzen or even an i3 6100 which yes has only 2 cores, but often beats the FX8350 8 core in pretty much any game. With the i3 6100 it gives you room to upgrade to an i5 or an i7 skylake later. AMD Ryzen uses the the AM4 socket which I would think would be around for awhile, But you will have to get DDR4 ram for either platform.

There are older Xeon systems or older Sandybridge or Ivybridge Xeons, i5 or i7s that well perform even better than the FX8xxx and the FX9xxx.

So if the FX series is outdated, should I look at getting an I3 or even an I5? If i do, do i need to get a new motherboard?

Yes you will have to get a new motherboard, and if you go with the newest i3 or i5 you will have to get new RAM as well. It's well worth it, any lower end i5 will be faster than any AMD FX CPU for gaming. If you go for the new AMD Ryzen CPU, you will also have to get a new motherboard and RAM as they are DDR4. An i3 6100 is a good option and its always way above AMD in games for only $119 USD, You can get a cheaper h110 or h170 board for the i3, and 8GB of DDR4 ram and you will be set and you will have a upgrade path for an i7 later. You can use your old PSU and Case and storage devices.

But if you are on a budget, the FX 8 core will still do alright in games and is much better than the FX4300, But I don't recommend to buy a brand spanking new FX CPU if you go that route, the FX8320 being the cheapest 8 core is not worth $160 USD new, If you can find it for $100 bucks its a alright deal since you already have a compatible motherboard.

So i'm an idiot and after all of that, i'm thinking of going with the RX480 8GB GPU instead of the 1060, Good or bad choice?
480 should be compatible and then all i need to do it get a new CPU eventually!

 

[Viking2121]

The RX480 is a decent choice, the GTX1060 is a small margin faster, but not enough for what they cost.

There is a few things that may or may not be important to you between the 2 cards.

GTX1060:

1.) These cards come in either 3 or 6GB flavors, 3GB is starting to not be enough for newer games, where the RX480 4GB can make a decent difference on graphics settings depending on the game. The Performance will be the same as the 6GB GTX1060 if Vram is not a problem.

2.) Shadowplay (NVENC Encoding), If you are interested into recording gameplay or even streaming, shadowplay will record your gameplay with little to no performance drop. You don't have to use Nvidia's Software to record, you can use OBS and other recording or streaming software.

RX480:

1.) It is slightly slower then the GTX1060 but the 4GB or 8GB flavors of the RX480 can help in games like GTA5 or Battlefield 1 or other games that uses huge HD textures.

2.) AMD don't have vary good game capture software, so if you want to record gameplay, the RX480 isn't the greatest.


Its your choice, Of course there are more factors between the cards, but the RX480 4GB is a pretty good card for the price, The FX4300 will hold it back somewhat so if you don't notice much of a performance improvement it will be because of the FX4300.

 

[Toucan59]

The RX480 is a decent choice, the GTX1060 is a small margin faster, but not enough for what they cost.

There is a few things that may or may not be important to you between the 2 cards.

GTX1060:

1.) These cards come in either 3 or 6GB flavors, 3GB is starting to not be enough for newer games, where the RX480 4GB can make a decent difference on graphics settings depending on the game. The Performance will be the same as the 6GB GTX1060 if Vram is not a problem.

2.) Shadowplay (NVENC Encoding), If you are interested into recording gameplay or even streaming, shadowplay will record your gameplay with little to no performance drop. You don't have to use Nvidia's Software to record, you can use OBS and other recording or streaming software.

RX480:

1.) It is slightly slower then the GTX1060 but the 4GB or 8GB flavors of the RX480 can help in games like GTA5 or Battlefield 1 or other games that uses huge HD textures.

2.) AMD don't have vary good game capture software, so if you want to record gameplay, the RX480 isn't the greatest.


Its your choice, Of course there are more factors between the cards, but the RX480 4GB is a pretty good card for the price, The FX4300 will hold it back somewhat so if you don't notice much of a performance improvement it will be because of the FX4300.

You sir are a god with answers, I'm from Australia so the internet is quite slow meaning no streaming or recording Is there a nice CPU i could get without having to upgrade my motherboard and ram that won't hold back my GPU?

 

[Viking2121]

The RX480 is a decent choice, the GTX1060 is a small margin faster, but not enough for what they cost.

There is a few things that may or may not be important to you between the 2 cards.

GTX1060:

1.) These cards come in either 3 or 6GB flavors, 3GB is starting to not be enough for newer games, where the RX480 4GB can make a decent difference on graphics settings depending on the game. The Performance will be the same as the 6GB GTX1060 if Vram is not a problem.

2.) Shadowplay (NVENC Encoding), If you are interested into recording gameplay or even streaming, shadowplay will record your gameplay with little to no performance drop. You don't have to use Nvidia's Software to record, you can use OBS and other recording or streaming software.

RX480:

1.) It is slightly slower then the GTX1060 but the 4GB or 8GB flavors of the RX480 can help in games like GTA5 or Battlefield 1 or other games that uses huge HD textures.

2.) AMD don't have vary good game capture software, so if you want to record gameplay, the RX480 isn't the greatest.


Its your choice, Of course there are more factors between the cards, but the RX480 4GB is a pretty good card for the price, The FX4300 will hold it back somewhat so if you don't notice much of a performance improvement it will be because of the FX4300.

You sir are a god with answers, I'm from Australia so the internet is quite slow meaning no streaming or recording Is there a nice CPU i could get without having to upgrade my motherboard and ram that won't hold back my GPU?

Ah, yeah prices in Australia are high for PC hardware.

The FX8xxx 8 core are an ok choices for your motherboard, it of course it will hold back the card in some games that like fast cores but it will be much better than the FX4300, but the majority of the game out there the FX8xxx will provide you with playable frame rates for sure, I have a FX8320 in another system and it still plays the latest games with an old GTX670 just fine at 1080p, my family still uses it daily.