Possible CPU upgrade in the future

[altair486]

Hi everyone
While playing BF4 i'm experiencing a massive bottleneck due to my CPU, actually the video card is working at 30% of its power. The question is if it is worth buying an AMD athlon 860k or waiting to get the announced Athlon 880k.

Here are my spec:

CPU: AMD A8 7600 quadcore 3,8 GHz (turbo)
GPU: AMD R9 280 Dual-X
MOBO: Asus A88XM-A
RAM: 4x 2Gb Corsair 1333 MHz
PSU: Corsair 550VX 80 + gold
CPU cooler: Zalman CNPS10X Extreme
Case: Midi Cooler Master Centurion 5 II

In both of these instances will the new CPU bottleneck my GPU and will the power supply sufficient for all the system and for a little O.C. in the future?

 

[George Phillips]

The CPU could really be underpowered to drive that video card in low resolutions below 1080p. To really solve this CPU bottleneck issue, it's best to go with a Intel based system. I suggest to just get a Pentium G3258 and a budget motherboard that supports overclocking and overclock hell out of it. This way, you could also reuse all other components without purchasing any additional parts may be except another even better and also low budget aftermarket cpu cooler.

After that, you may sell the cpu and motherboard on eBay to get some money back. This will be an excellent upgrade path that also allows you to upgrade to faster cpus in the future.

 

[altair486]

I watched some gameplays with r9 280 and this Pentium. Well, it is a pure beast.
Anyway I have some doubts. Firstly, do you think that future videogames will benefit more from quad or more cores CPUs? Actually I know the last years games require a very performant single core but I read that with the new coming of DX12 multicores processors will perform greatly.
Secondly, does my CPU cooler fit in a new possible Intel mobo? And also, why do you think I should change it? In my modest opinion it performs well and probably it could handle a 4.7 GHz over clock.

 

[NightAntilli]

Don't go for the Pentium G3258. It's a dual core without hyperthreading, and some games will not run at all because of this, despite its speed. The 860k is a fine upgrade. The difference between the 860k and the 880k probably won't be that big, and you can close the gap by overclocking.

 

[altair486]

NightAntilli are you sure the 860k is fine for all the system, especially for the PSU? In fact I'd like to overclock it a bit if it's possible. Are you also sure it won't bottleneck my video card?

 

[NightAntilli]

Bottlenecks are dependent on a lot of things. If you play on low settings or low resolution any CPU will bottleneck the video card. The Pentium is faster in BF4, but the 860k is faster in BF Hardline when using a Radeon GPU. Generally, the Pentium is indeed faster in most current games. But trust me, for DX12 you're gonna want the 4 cores. More and more games will only be supporting 4 threads and up. Anything lower than an i3 for Intel is gonna force you to upgrade again later, and the price won't be as pretty. But, if you specifically want to play BF4, I'd say go for the Pentium then. Want to be a bit forward thinking? Get the 860K (only if you want to overclock though).

Why not try overclocking your current CPU? You'd have to do it the old-fashioned way though, with FSB, which is a lot harder. The 860K would be the easy route since you can change the multiplier.

You can find a comparison between the Pentium and the 860K in battlefield here;
http://www.techspot.com/review/1017-best-budget-gaming-cpu/page3.html

I don't think your PSU will be a problem, unless you go past 4.5 GHz with overclocking.