Opinions on new FX-8370 build

[schwizer]

I copied this template from one of the sticky forums. I am looking for opinions and suggestions for improvement.

Approximate Purchase Date: e.g.: 1 week to 1 month from now

Budget Range: (e.g.: 300-400) Soft cap $USD 1,000 ($CAD 1,250)

System Usage from Most to Least Important: WoW, Windows Media Center, 4K video exporting from time lapse (Adobe Premier)

Are you buying a monitor: No (Currently using 27" 1080P with 17" side monitor)



Parts to Upgrade: All but HDD & SSD & maybe case

Do you need to buy OS: No (will reuse W7)
Please note that if you're using an OEM license of Windows, you will need a new one when buying a new motherboard.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: newegg.ca & memoryexpress.com

Location: City, State/Region, Country - Alberta, Canada

Parts Preferences: Leaning AMD CPU,

Overclocking: No

SLI or Crossfire: No

Your Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080 + 1280x1024 (maybe 4k in future)

Additional Comments: Looking for quiet and low power during idle, noise during heavy load ok. Don't want bling although wouldn't mind if inside of case didn't look like crap.

And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: Current system crashing when exporting 4k video from Adobe Premier.

My current system is:
AMD Phenom II X4 965 @ 3.4GHz (was 3.8GHz for 4 years)
2x4GB DDR3 @ 800 MHz (1600MHz)
AsusTek Crosshair III Formula Chipset 790FX
HIS HD5850 1GB
Antec P183
5x3TB, 1x2TB, 500GB WD Black and 128GB Crucial M4.
Antec 750 (I think).

This little AMD processor has treated me so well over the last 5 years, I if I can give AMD my money on a new build, I will if price/performance are comparable to intel alternatives.

My current suggestion is:
CPU: AMD FX-8370 ($CAD240) I know Intel more or less owns the high end but I find the 8 core processor is no slouch in the $240 territory where it would be compared to a I5-4440. Yes the TDP of 8370 is 125W vs Intels i5 84W but I'm willing to live with this during the relatively shorter periods of high load. If anyone has benchmarks of the 8370 vs the i5 in heavy threaded workloads such as Adobe Premier those would be appreciated.
Motherboard: AM3+ ASRock 970 ($CAD150) or AM3+ MSI 970 ($CAD125) Shooting for middle of the road cost with at least 6 SATA ports for my 5x3TB HDDs which I hope to put into a RAID 5 array and my 128GB SSD boot drive. 8 sata ports welcome if price comparable. Also really like the red/black look of these to mobos as a bonus. Content with the 970 chipset due to no crossfire.
GPU: AMD Radeon somewhere between 270X ($CAD230) and 290 ($CAD370)
Staying AMD because my HD5850 has been faithful++. Currently favoring the R9 270X and 290 due to <200W TDP. Not sure how well the 250-280W TDP cards such as the 280X or 290 hold up over the years. Also really like the look of the XFX black cards and AMDs stock red & black blower coolers although those are harder to find. I am looking for good price/performance ratio with option of not being punished too bad by 2GB GPU memory on a possible 4K future monitor. Also will consider spending extra if Adobe Premier benefits from the extra horsepower but don't see many benchmarks on this. I realize any of these are overkill for WoW alone on a 1080P monitor but on my current 5 year refresh cycle I could justify the extra $140 if price/performance doesn't tank totally. I would also love to see some idle power draw stats for the R9 cards but can't seem to find any.
Memory: Kingston HyperX 2x8GB DDR3-2133MHz CL11 ($CAD210) or G.Skill TridentX 2x8GB DDR3-2133MHz ($180) which I plan to only run at 1866 Mhz because that's all the mobo and CPU officially support. I have played with OCing memory before and have found it to be a mixed bag and more difficult than CPU ocing. I have no loyalty here as I have had many different brands of memory over the years and have found them all to be equally evil. Figured for the extra $20 I'd upgrade from default 1866 Mhz for safety factor on stability, future proofing and the red is kind of fun over the default black.
Power Supply: Corsair CS750M 750W ($CAD120). Wil probably stay corsair because of two previous power supplies the HX520 and TX650 but will also consider Antec because of my current one. I don't like to mess around with no name power supplies and will even spend an extra $20 to not get the bottom of the line model of name brands. The CS line seems like a nice middle of the road @ 80 Plus Gold efficiency. I like the half modular system since I really don't need the 20+4 pin to be modular. Just one more thing that could come loose. I'm not sure about the pins since power supply has 4 & 6 pin for GPU but some GPU (R9-280 example) require 6 & 8 pin, although it (GPU) appears to come with these adapters, not sure if that's a common thing or not. The Corsair HX series seems overkill. If I don't go R9-290, I may step down to a 650W power supply.
HDDs: Will reuse my current setup. 128GB is enough for my boot drive...for now and is already SATA III ready but currently throttled by my SATA II mobo.
Case: Oh man that's a tough one. My priorities are
1. Silent while idle
2. Room for at least 6 HDD and 2 SSD
3. Rubber grommets on HDD caddys (thank you Antec for that addiction)
4. Classy not flashy
5. Dust filters
6. Window would be nice but optional
I've considered sticking with the Antec P183 which is amazing in most of the above but it's 5 years old (read filthy) and buying a new case would allow me to keep this old system intact to give away to maybe a family member or for use as an emergency backup desktop.

Top 3 contenders are:
Antec P280 ($CAD130) Only thing I don't like is that the door is less wide than the body itself. It looks funny to me but my current Antec has been awesome so loyalty bias there.
Fractal R5 ($CAD150) Great reviews, sacrificing rubber grommets on HDD caddies though.
NZXT H440 (red) ($CAD150) although the red trim is borderline flashy for me and the white/black doesn't go with the red/black of the mobo/ram.

Honorable Mention:
InWin 904 ($CAD290) Most likely disqualified for only 3x3.5" bays and a little because of price but SEXY.
Rosewill MX2-B ($CAD 210) Also sexy but again only 3x3.5" bays.
These 2 cases above may be an option if I go separate NAS with my 5x3TB HDDs.

All in all, a possible parts list would probably look something like this.
Total cost $US866.94 ($CAD1109.94) (No HDD, no windows)
CPU: AMD FX-8370
Motherboard: AM3+ ASRock 960
GPU: XFX R9-280A
Power Supply: Corsair CS750M
Case: Fractal Define R5
Ram: 2x8GB DDR3 2133 MHz G.Skill Trident X
HDDs: Reusing previous

Thoughts?

Schwizer

 

[mdocod]

AMD builds are largely novelty options, especially when you start throwing expensive cooling options and large PSU's at the problem.

For the sort of money you are throwing at that FX-8370 + AIOCLC, you cold buy an i7-4790K.

At stock clocks, the i7-4790K runs under 100W, and has the same execution performance in heavily threaded workloads as an FX-83XX overclocked to 5GHZ (which requires ~300W at the CPU). In lightly threaded workloads, you would have to overclock the FX-83XX to ~7.5ghz to match the stock clocked i7-4790K (not going to happen). Throw a $20-40 HSF on the i7 and you can overclock it to ~4.5+ghz and effectively remove the piledriver from contention at any level.

If you want to go AMD for the sake of going AMD, or the novelty of it, or whatever, there's nothing wrong with that, but I think it's important to point out that there's rarely ever a value advantage to the AM3+ platform except in situations that make use of some of the platform specific features available well below Intel minimum implementation costs. (IOMMU, ECC memory)..

 

[schwizer]

Thank you for the advice. Not sure what AIOCLC means. I totally agree the i7-4790K is in a class above the FX-8370 but I still think the FX-8370 has a place in real world applications. For example, according to toms chart on Adobe Premier, the i7-4770 is about 15% faster than the FX-8350. Neither the 4790 or the 8370 are in that chart but I think it's not a bad comparison since both of those CPUs in the chart are just a little below the ones we are talking about in this thread. Now the 4790 currently runs for $420 on memoryexpress vs the $240 for the 8370. That's an increase in cost of 75% for an extra 15% performance (in this specific application). My main argument is that the FX-8370 offers pretty decent performance/dollar. Similarly priced i5's don't perform as well on that specific benchmark. Now of course that's a heavily threaded workloads and things would look different in a single threaded application but Adobe Premier is going to be a main load on this machine. I'm not planning to spend any extra on a cooler or overclocking.

Again, definitely agree the 4790 is leagues above the 8370 but I don't think the 8370 is in "novelty" territory just yet for another little while as long as they keep adjusting price downward to compete with i5s.

 

[Bossyfins]

I do know WoW is very CPU intensive, and that you will benefit from a 4790k. Also the 4790k is not a 4770k. I am pretty sure there is a bigger gap between them in adobe.

 

[mdocod]

In WoW, an i3-4160 will produce ~50% higher FPS during raids than the FX-8370.

Yes, in heavily threaded workloads, an 8 core piledriver can come close to an i7, the problem is that, the real world is full of workloads that aren't anything like this. WoW is one of them 😉

 

[schwizer]

Do you have any benchmarks of the i3-4160 vs the FX8370 with frame rates in wow?

 

[mdocod]

A benchmark is only valid if the conditions used for testing are repeatable.

The conditions during real-world highly congested game-play in an MMO, are not precisely repeatable, so no such benchmark can exist.

"benchmarks" for games, are almost always largely misleading and useless, as they are almost always conducted in GPU bound single player test sequences that are not representative of the way anyone plays games.

WoW is a poorly threaded, CPU bound game in congested conditions. Performance in WoW scales primarily with core performance, not core count.

 

[schwizer]

Even in wow, the population of people in a major city representing a higher workload are not going to fluctuate by more than 5% from one minute to the next. Anyone with 2 comparable systems could easily log in on one computer and then 1 minute later log in on the other computer and easily compare frame rates at a given resolution and quality setting. Sure the comparison won't ever be perfect but if the difference is indeed 50% it should be easy to compare. I'm actually surprised at the lack of wow benchmarks. I'm guessing most CPUs are overkill for it and that the load mainly goes to the graphics card so unless someone can tell me otherwise, I'll probably give the benefit of the doubt to the FX-8370 because of the good Adobe Premier performance compared to price. One of the few benchmarks I found is below.

http://youtu.be/eu8Sekdb-IE

 

[Bossyfins]

That benchmark proves almost nothing. The 3570k is not a 1231. In fact, the 1231 is a 4770k without the GPU in it.

Also, The Xeon has hypterthreading, so it had 8 cores, 4 real, 4 extra from HT.

WoW is VERY CPU intensive. Also, in streaming, the CPU will eat it up.

 

[mdocod]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pentium-g3258-overclocking-performance,3849-10.html

Note the huge difference in minimum FPS between haswell dual core (i3) and piledriver dual module (750k)

 

[Dubyah Bush]

I copied this template from one of the sticky forums. I am looking for opinions and suggestions for improvement.

Approximate Purchase Date: e.g.: 1 week to 1 month from now

Budget Range: (e.g.: 300-400) Soft cap $USD 1,000 ($CAD 1,250)

System Usage from Most to Least Important: WoW, Windows Media Center, 4K video exporting from time lapse (Adobe Premier)

Are you buying a monitor: No (Currently using 27" 1080P with 17" side monitor)



Parts to Upgrade: All but HDD & SSD & maybe case

Do you need to buy OS: No (will reuse W7)
Please note that if you're using an OEM license of Windows, you will need a new one when buying a new motherboard.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: newegg.ca & memoryexpress.com

Location: City, State/Region, Country - Alberta, Canada

Parts Preferences: Leaning AMD CPU,

Overclocking: No

SLI or Crossfire: No

Your Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080 + 1280x1024 (maybe 4k in future)

Additional Comments: Looking for quiet and low power during idle, noise during heavy load ok. Don't want bling although wouldn't mind if inside of case didn't look like crap.

And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: Current system crashing when exporting 4k video from Adobe Premier.

My current system is:
AMD Phenom II X4 965 @ 3.4GHz (was 3.8GHz for 4 years)
2x4GB DDR3 @ 800 MHz (1600MHz)
AsusTek Crosshair III Formula Chipset 790FX
HIS HD5850 1GB
Antec P183
5x3TB, 1x2TB, 500GB WD Black and 128GB Crucial M4.
Antec 750 (I think).

This little AMD processor has treated me so well over the last 5 years, I if I can give AMD my money on a new build, I will if price/performance are comparable to intel alternatives.

My current suggestion is:
CPU: AMD FX-8370 ($CAD240) I know Intel more or less owns the high end but I find the 8 core processor is no slouch in the $240 territory where it would be compared to a I5-4440. Yes the TDP of 8370 is 125W vs Intels i5 84W but I'm willing to live with this during the relatively shorter periods of high load. If anyone has benchmarks of the 8370 vs the i5 in heavy threaded workloads such as Adobe Premier those would be appreciated.
Motherboard: AM3+ ASRock 970 ($CAD150) or AM3+ MSI 970 ($CAD125) Shooting for middle of the road cost with at least 6 SATA ports for my 5x3TB HDDs which I hope to put into a RAID 5 array and my 128GB SSD boot drive. 8 sata ports welcome if price comparable. Also really like the red/black look of these to mobos as a bonus. Content with the 970 chipset due to no crossfire.
GPU: AMD Radeon somewhere between 270X ($CAD230) and 290 ($CAD370)
Staying AMD because my HD5850 has been faithful++. Currently favoring the R9 270X and 290 due to <200W TDP. Not sure how well the 250-280W TDP cards such as the 280X or 290 hold up over the years. Also really like the look of the XFX black cards and AMDs stock red & black blower coolers although those are harder to find. I am looking for good price/performance ratio with option of not being punished too bad by 2GB GPU memory on a possible 4K future monitor. Also will consider spending extra if Adobe Premier benefits from the extra horsepower but don't see many benchmarks on this. I realize any of these are overkill for WoW alone on a 1080P monitor but on my current 5 year refresh cycle I could justify the extra $140 if price/performance doesn't tank totally. I would also love to see some idle power draw stats for the R9 cards but can't seem to find any.
Memory: Kingston HyperX 2x8GB DDR3-2133MHz CL11 ($CAD210) or G.Skill TridentX 2x8GB DDR3-2133MHz ($180) which I plan to only run at 1866 Mhz because that's all the mobo and CPU officially support. I have played with OCing memory before and have found it to be a mixed bag and more difficult than CPU ocing. I have no loyalty here as I have had many different brands of memory over the years and have found them all to be equally evil. Figured for the extra $20 I'd upgrade from default 1866 Mhz for safety factor on stability, future proofing and the red is kind of fun over the default black.
Power Supply: Corsair CS750M 750W ($CAD120). Wil probably stay corsair because of two previous power supplies the HX520 and TX650 but will also consider Antec because of my current one. I don't like to mess around with no name power supplies and will even spend an extra $20 to not get the bottom of the line model of name brands. The CS line seems like a nice middle of the road @ 80 Plus Gold efficiency. I like the half modular system since I really don't need the 20+4 pin to be modular. Just one more thing that could come loose. I'm not sure about the pins since power supply has 4 & 6 pin for GPU but some GPU (R9-280 example) require 6 & 8 pin, although it (GPU) appears to come with these adapters, not sure if that's a common thing or not. The Corsair HX series seems overkill. If I don't go R9-290, I may step down to a 650W power supply.
HDDs: Will reuse my current setup. 128GB is enough for my boot drive...for now and is already SATA III ready but currently throttled by my SATA II mobo.
Case: Oh man that's a tough one. My priorities are
1. Silent while idle
2. Room for at least 6 HDD and 2 SSD
3. Rubber grommets on HDD caddys (thank you Antec for that addiction)
4. Classy not flashy
5. Dust filters
6. Window would be nice but optional
I've considered sticking with the Antec P183 which is amazing in most of the above but it's 5 years old (read filthy) and buying a new case would allow me to keep this old system intact to give away to maybe a family member or for use as an emergency backup desktop.

Top 3 contenders are:
Antec P280 ($CAD130) Only thing I don't like is that the door is less wide than the body itself. It looks funny to me but my current Antec has been awesome so loyalty bias there.
Fractal R5 ($CAD150) Great reviews, sacrificing rubber grommets on HDD caddies though.
NZXT H440 (red) ($CAD150) although the red trim is borderline flashy for me and the white/black doesn't go with the red/black of the mobo/ram.

Honorable Mention:
InWin 904 ($CAD290) Most likely disqualified for only 3x3.5" bays and a little because of price but SEXY.
Rosewill MX2-B ($CAD 210) Also sexy but again only 3x3.5" bays.
These 2 cases above may be an option if I go separate NAS with my 5x3TB HDDs.

All in all, a possible parts list would probably look something like this.
Total cost $US866.94 ($CAD1109.94) (No HDD, no windows)
CPU: AMD FX-8370
Motherboard: AM3+ ASRock 960
GPU: XFX R9-280A
Power Supply: Corsair CS750M
Case: Fractal Define R5
Ram: 2x8GB DDR3 2133 MHz G.Skill Trident X
HDDs: Reusing previous

Thoughts?

Schwizer

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007671%20600213784&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&CompareItemList=343%7C19-113-374%5E19-113-374-TS%2C19-113-284%5E19-113-284-TS%2C19-113-346%5E19-113-346-TS%2C19-113-347%5E19-113-347-TS&percm=19-113-374%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24%3B19-113-284%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24%3B19-113-346%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24%3B19-113-347%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24

If you are going AMD either get the 8350 or get a 9370. Why? My 8350 already overclocks to the 4.3 ghz the 8370 is supposed to. It's basically the same processor. I say save yourself the cash, buy a good cpu cooler overclock the hell out of the 8350, or buy a faster CPU.