Should I get the FX-8350, or wait for the upcoming "Zen" processors?

atariman72 · Apr 29, 2015

I have been planning an AMD based PC for gaming for quite a while now, and have put considerable thought into it. I intend to use the FX-8350 in a AM3+ 970 motherboard. However, there are leaked official AMD roadmaps that indicate that in 2016 they are planning to release their "Zen" CPU line, utilizing the 14nm mfg process, fitted into the upcoming FM3 socket. The FX chips are dirt cheap right now, and I am wondering if I should build now, or hold off until the next generation of CPUs are released? In addition, the R9 3XX series of GPUs are purportedly to be released in this quarter, and I was planning on purchasing a R9 290X for this system. Should I revise my plans and hold off, or go budget and get the current gen hardware?

My planned build:

-AMD FX-8350 "Vishera" 4.0GHz CPU

-MSI 970 GAMING ATX AM3+ Motherboard

-AMD RG2133 Gamer Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR3-2133 Memory

-AMD 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive

-Western Digital VelociRaptor 1TB 3.5" 10000RPM Internal Hard Drive

-MSI Radeon R9 290X 4GB TWIN FROZR Video Card

-Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case

-Corsair 760W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply

-Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer

-Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)

Pyre · May 4, 2015

TNT27 :

You say AMD is falling behind...? But has intel really brought an improvement since sandy bridge, cause if there was the i5(35xxx) or i7(37xxx) will not be so great now but they perform well. Intel just keeps updating to have customers look like their trying and are reliable. Does a CPU have to be updated every two years and also be updated and deliver only 10% or less difference to its previous gen.

I think Intel have had the last laugh if you know what i'm on about, the haswell is not even a big jump from sandy bridge so do you think intel has really been updating or just minor upgrades to get people happy over BS like apple does with iphones...?

TNT27 · May 4, 2015

I do however suggest you wait a bit for amd's 300 series, hbm memory could be a big leap in performance.

TNT27 · May 4, 2015

Pyre :

I never mentioned about how much ahead intel is, or the little improvments we have seen from them.

I just stated for gaming and at the same price an intel cpu will almost always perform better. Wont be by much, but its there.

A lot of games even the 60-70$ g3258 @4+ (easy to get on a stock cooler) will perform slighlty better than amd's top of the line fx processors.

Intel's ipc is just ahead, and the platforms they are on are also ahead.

If you have an amd cpu right now id say keep it as performance difference isnt much, but if you are buying new, intel is the best way to go for right now.

UNless of course yo heavily multi task or do heavy editing and the likes of that, and you are on a low budget, then yes an amd cpu would be a better fit.

mlga91 · May 4, 2015

atariman72 :

There is no reason to go for AMD at that price point:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($309.99 @ Amazon)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($28.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 EXTREME4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($118.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($119.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($109.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($71.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB WINDFORCE 3X Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($319.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB WINDFORCE 3X Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($319.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Case: Thermaltake Commander G42 ATX Mid Tower Case ($60.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($95.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Optical Drive: LG UH12NS30 Blu-Ray Reader, DVD/CD Writer ($39.99 @ Micro Center)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($91.69 @ NCIX US)
Monitor: Acer GN246HL 144Hz 24.0" Monitor ($208.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $1897.55
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-05-04 14:47 EDT-0400

VenBaja · May 4, 2015

Pyre :

From Sandy Bridge, to Ivy Bridge, to Haswell, to Broadwell, we've consistently seen a 10-15% improvement in IPC. That's pretty standard for either company and is a great upgrade if you skip one or two cycles. Haswell was definitely a big jump from Sandy Bridge in CPU intensive workloads.

Pyre · May 4, 2015

VenBaja :

Pyre :

From Sandy Bridge, to Ivy Bridge, to Haswell, to Broadwell, we've consistently seen a 10-15% improvement in IPC. That's pretty standard for either company and is a great upgrade if you skip one or two cycles. Haswell was definitely a big jump from Sandy Bridge in CPU intensive workloads.

Send me the benchmarks please.

atariman72 · May 4, 2015

VenBaja :

atariman72 :

Not to harsh on your build, but you mentioned earlier in the thread that you were looking at AMD because you're on a tighter budget. $2,000 is not budget PC territory. That's baller territory. I understand if you just want the novelty of building an AMD rig, but there is no way anyone here is going to recommend you go with an FX processor at your budget. You could EASILY build an amazing i7 4790k rig at this price point. Heck, I have a 4770k rig with a 1tb SSD, Benq monitor, etc...and I spent $400-$500 less than you've budgeted. For $2,000 there's no way on any planet you should be thinking about AMD processors.

EDIT: I just noticed you don't even have a CPU cooler listed in your build. An FX in a $2,000 gaming build is crazy enough, but to not even plan on OC'ing it? That's another level of silliness all together.

No, I would not be overclocking it. Peripherals aside, it equates to roughly 1500 USD. That isn't necessarily "baller" territory. All things considered, that is really quite baseline. Even with all of the feedback on this thread, it seems as though the actual question is being disregarded. I know Intel is dominating right now. I get it. I have seen the benchmarks. I have no intention of appearing biased, but the initial question was from the perspective of going with an AMD CPU, would the dividends be higher to wait for Zen, or should I build now and potentially upgrade come 2016/2017.

atariman72 · May 4, 2015

Pyre :

I concur with your perspective. AMD has a much smaller R&D budget, so they can't afford to throw out chips every year, introducing new sockets left and right. They put their efforts on new architectures that redefine the industry. The downside is that they only release enthusiast chips every few years. They have a steady stream of FM2+ chips, but still, they aren't aimed at the high end.

LookItsRain · May 4, 2015

Build now, nothing is coming in the cpu market that will be vastly superior to what we have out now, amd has their head up their ass in the cpu and gpu market.

TNT27 · May 4, 2015

amd gpu are still great buying new, Nvidia is heavily overpriced on most their cards, and yet still perform worse.

Cpu yes, for gaming amd does not have anything better, but performs good enough to still play 60+ FPS in most titles.

TNT27 · May 4, 2015

If you are not overclocking amd cpu are definetly not the way to go, nor is the 4790k.

Check out the Xeon 1231, about same prices in the end to an fx 8350 build, but will perform the same as a much higher priced locked i7 which is a league ahead of the fx for gaming.

VenBaja · May 4, 2015

atariman72 :

VenBaja :

atariman72 :

Not to harsh on your build, but you mentioned earlier in the thread that you were looking at AMD because you're on a tighter budget. $2,000 is not budget PC territory. That's baller territory. I understand if you just want the novelty of building an AMD rig, but there is no way anyone here is going to recommend you go with an FX processor at your budget. You could EASILY build an amazing i7 4790k rig at this price point. Heck, I have a 4770k rig with a 1tb SSD, Benq monitor, etc...and I spent $400-$500 less than you've budgeted. For $2,000 there's no way on any planet you should be thinking about AMD processors.

EDIT: I just noticed you don't even have a CPU cooler listed in your build. An FX in a $2,000 gaming build is crazy enough, but to not even plan on OC'ing it? That's another level of silliness all together.

No, I would not be overclocking it. Peripherals aside, it equates to roughly 1500 USD. That isn't necessarily "baller" territory. All things considered, that is really quite baseline. Even with all of the feedback on this thread, it seems as though the actual question is being disregarded. I know Intel is dominating right now. I get it. I have seen the benchmarks. I have no intention of appearing biased, but the initial question was from the perspective of going with an AMD CPU, would the dividends be higher to wait for Zen, or should I build now and potentially upgrade come 2016/2017.

There really isn't any information about Zen to go on yet. If you wait for it, it will be on blind faith. This is really more of a personal decision. If you have things you want to be doing on your PC right now, but can't, then upgrade now. If whatever you have is working for you then you have no reason not to wait for something new.

Jay Stew · May 5, 2015

I have a very similar build to OP. FX-8350, 32GB Fury Ram, MSI Gaming 970 Mobo, I have mine OC on air to 4.6. I know when I upgrade to water I will be able to push it up to around 5.0. I enjoy the ability to game and stream and record or game stream and render or just render at the same speed or faster than the i5. I don't feel any appreciable gaps one might notice with the FX-6300 series are there with the FX-8350 as there are many benchys out there comparing the FX and i5 and both chips working with a powerful GPU like GTX970 routinely keep the gpu supplied above 60 fps at 1080p. I also feel there is a clear edge in the multitasking for the FX because it has more cores.

As to wether or not to get the FX-8350 or "E" version avoid the "E" version as it is power neutered, the FX-9XXX series appears to not offer the same value of performance for the $$ that the FX-8350 does and really the only other AMD chip I would have considered is the FX-8370 but you can get 99% of that chip's performance when you OC the FX-8350.

I feel the system you are looking to build is more then enough to satisfy your need an you don't need' to break the budget doing it.

I do question the need for a 10K Raptor drive as you will never ever get the performance of an SSD with any harddrive setup and as far as storage capacity I find USB 3.0 is the way to go now. I don't feel there is a need put storage inside that isn't SSD. Prices for USB 3.0 External is usually only $10 or $20 more per TB if that. I'd recommend some of those Canvio drives for storage. Flash is getting so cheap I just can't think of any reason to want or use a HD for fast access anymore over Flash.

In terms of HDDs I like the flexibility of being able to take my movies or music with me to a friends. Here is why I do not favor the Raptor. For the price of a 1TB 19k Raptor at $200+ you can get 2X 2TB USB 3.0 external drives. So basically 4 times the storage for the same price, and portable. I would think that one over really carefully. Even watching a blueray from USB 2.0 there are no skips for me. However wit USB 3.0 I routinely see transfer speeds of 100MB/sec on the Canvio drives.

atariman72 · May 5, 2015

Jay Stew :

I plan on using the SSD as a boot drive, as well as Steam, and games I run more often and which are more demanding and have longer load times (Battlefield, Metro: Last Light, Star Citizen, Battlefront, ect.). For the HDD, I didn't want to compromise on performance significantly as opposed to an 1 TB SSD, which cost around 500 USD, and I wanted to have a drive through SATA, because executing programs via an external USB 3.0 HDD is noticeably slower than a SATA 3Gb/s drive and gives the CPU extra load. I was going to go with a seagate SSHDD hybrid, but figured that I would rather go with a AMD 240GB SSD (Which are mfg by OCZ) and a 10K Raptor for faster read/write and boot.

gonf · May 5, 2015

why not pay 10-20 buk more for the 990 motherboard?
Storage: Western Digital VelociRaptor 1TB 3.5" 10000RPM Internal Hard Drive ($193.99 @ SuperBiiz) ?
why is this 1tb hdd so over price? caz of the rpm? whats wrong with 7200 rpm? they work just as good.remember the big hhd will be for photo,video etc etc. 3tb is like 119?
does the monitor support FreeSync? caz the newer one will support it now or soon. it should be free for the monitor manufacturers so they shouldn't bill us too much for it.
I didn't see a cooling for your cpu. EVO212 should be cheap 30buk?
do you need all that ram with that high speed? 8gb of ram should do most stuff.

Jay Stew · May 5, 2015

atariman72 :

Jay Stew :

I plan on using the SSD as a boot drive, as well as Steam, and games I run more often and which are more demanding and have longer load times (Battlefield, Metro: Last Light, Star Citizen, Battlefront, ect.). For the HDD, I didn't want to compromise on performance significantly as opposed to an 1 TB SSD, which cost around 500 USD, and I wanted to have a drive through SATA, because executing programs via an external USB 3.0 HDD is noticeably slower than a SATA 3Gb/s drive and gives the CPU extra load. I was going to go with a seagate SSHDD hybrid, but figured that I would rather go with a AMD 240GB SSD (Which are mfg by OCZ) and a 10K Raptor for faster read/write and boot.

I would agree, I would never execute programs from the External if you can avoid it but the same theory applies to HDDs vs Flash. Why not just get a 500GB flash SSD then? You wont need more than 40GB of that for Win 7 and then plenty of space for your programs and stick your movies and stuff on an external.

I just hate adding the heat to the case from the HDD. Alternatively all HDDs are slow compared to Flash. I really think the Raptor is a bad buy. I mean if you want fast SSD is the clear win win, if you need size then the biggest HDD you can afford usually gives you the best $/TB, seems like 3TB is the sweet spot still. It takes a year to fill up 2TB and it is literally. Can you really get speed and size with a 1TB Raptor? I don't know.

I figure if I can buy a smaller external for movies and keep the programs and OS on my SSD then I'm win win.

mahanddeem · May 5, 2015

Get intel and ditch the ghetto amd series.

atariman72 · May 5, 2015

gonf :

1. The 990FX boards that I would get (Crosshair V) are over 100 USD more expensive. The 990 chipset essentially only provides 9xxx series support and SLI support, and I will not be using anyways.
2. The hard drive is 194 USD because it is 10K rpm, which allows faster read/write times.
3. No, it does not, but it is a 144Hz 1ms monitor, albeit TN as opposed to IPS, which would be much more expensive.
4. I won't be overclocking the CPU initially. The stock cooler is fine.
5. 16 GB is optimal for things such as rendering and editing, which I will utilize. The clock speed is 2133 because the mobo supports it.

LookItsRain · May 5, 2015

atariman72 :

1. You can get a quality 990fx board for 120 usd thats alot better than the msi junk you have now, there are bigger diffrences in the quality of the mobo over checkmarks for sli and the 9xxx series.
2. Just buy a bigger size ssd, 10k rpm hdds are not that fast compared to ssds. Im surprised you can even buy one
3. Monitors, personal preference.
4. Overclocking is a must for AMD, do it from the start, and build towards having this ability. I would grab a cooler
5. Correct

NightAntilli · May 5, 2015

I suggest you to wait... Why? Because;

- Any CPU you buy right now is 28nm. Zen, and next Intel CPUs are going to be 14nm. This means that power consumption will go down greatly, you'll have less heat, and the performance will be superior compared to whatever you have now.

- If you go for an AM3+ motherboard right now, you have zero upgrading options and large power consumption. Not to mention the quality ones that you need for an FX-8xxx are quite pricey. Your cooling needs to be good for overclocking also.

- Even if you consider going to Intel, it's still best just to wait. Right now everything is based on guessing for what might happen next year. It's better to just wait it out and make an informed decision rather than a speculative decision. Intel seems good right now, but we don't know what Zen is going to deliver. On paper it looks like it has the potential to beat Intel, although most of us are skeptical. Simply wait.

- We might have a 'battle' between DDR4 and HBM memory. Not in reality, but the AMD APUs are reported to be using HBM. We don't know how that's going to work, but, systems are reported to be having 16GB of HBM rather than DDR3/DDR4 for Zen. Again, it's best to wait it out for now until we have more clarity.

davy rockstar · May 5, 2015

hi there... i know that you have the ilution of a new and fresh system but:
FX CPU has already like 3 years in the market...

well my point is, i am a crow, i find oportunities in places that no one else would like to go...
i just figured out that in pawnshops there are so great oportunities, i purchase a computer with core i7 3770 (witch OC's at 4.1 in my z77 motherboard 1000 times better than any non "k" core i7 haswell CPU), 16GB in RAM, a toshiba 2TB HDD and more stuff even an asus 22" fullHD display

for only 450USD!!!!!!

you should try

Jay Stew · May 7, 2015

LookItsRain :

Have to agree, computing is slowly getting better, the value of the products you buy today doesn't depreciate the way it did at one time. Some of these rigs will be great for years to come. Will Zen be superior to FX, looks like it but so what, FX is a great buy today an so is i5 both are under $300, and at $165 I chose the FX. I have almost the same rig as you only I skipped the 1TB Raptor and got a 2 TB USB external and double the ram because I do a lot of video editing.

NightAntilli · May 7, 2015

As of now, significant information of Zen has been released. I still suggest to wait. My reasons stayed pretty much the same.

Jay Stew · May 7, 2015

Can always upgrade later unless you are married right?

atariman72 · May 7, 2015

Jay Stew :

Probably. I'll be in college by the time that Zen is released. I'm only 16, so I really don't have any financial liabilities.

Should I get the FX-8350, or wait for the upcoming "Zen" processors?

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