Would an AMD A10-7890K Work With a GTX 950 SLI

[anthony_greene]

So as the title asks, would it work? I originally planned to get an AMD FX 8350 to go with a GTX 950 SLI, but my motherboard only supports FM2+ processors.

Also is it worth actually getting a whole new motherboard if the A10-7890K isn't good? I'm on a budget of $325

 

[bwen1]

Yes it will not cause any problems.

 

[anthony_greene]

Yes it will not cause any problems.

Will it bottleneck the GTX sli?

 

[Ecky]

That's a really strange combo. It's normally a bad idea to do SLI with low-end cards, and AMD's APUs have a weak CPU portion but a relatively strong integrated video, which you would ignore/disable.

If you don't want to change your board, might I suggest something like an Athlon x4 860K or 880K, and a GTX 1060? It will be very considerably faster. The next step up would be an i3 6100, and above that, an i5 6500.

 

[anthony_greene]

That's a really strange combo. It's normally a bad idea to do SLI with low-end cards, and AMD's APUs have a weak CPU portion but a relatively strong integrated video, which you would ignore/disable.

If you don't want to change your board, might I suggest something like an Athlon x4 860K or 880K, and a GTX 1060? It will be very considerably faster. The next step up would be an i3 6100, and above that, an i5 6500.

 

[anthony_greene]

So the athlon would work better than the a10? I can't go for the GTX 1060 at the moment like I said my budget is only enough for a CPU around $150 and the GTX 950 because I already have one 950, and $150 is easier to justify.

 

[dudeman509]

Yes it will not cause any problems.

Will it bottleneck the GTX sli?

One of the strongest in AMD's lineup single-thread wise. Should be an OK performer in most current games. Not an i7, but it should be capable of mid-range gaming just fine.

However, it would be better to get a single card than a SLI setup. Look into a RX480 or GTX 1060.

 

[Ecky]

The Athlon x4 is the same CPU as the A10, only it's a lot cheaper because it doesn't have an active iGPU which you wouldn't use anyway.

SLI doesn't work well in many titles, so expect your 2nd card to sit idle pretty often. When you put two cards together, it doesn't double your VRAM - you actually have slightly less to work with, so even when it works, you might not be able to turn up the textures or resolution because you'll be VRAM limited. A GTX 1060 is twice as fast as a single 950, and faster than 950 SLI in probably every case, and you can get one for under $200. Plus, you could sell your existing 950, and end up only ~$50 out of pocket for the new GPU.

 

[neblogai]

It is much better to switch to Intel i3 6100 with new motherboard, RAM. Then, after you sell your old parts, you could upgrade graphics card to GTX1050Ti or RX 470- the latter is more powerful than GTX950SLI, and has no issues of dual gpu:

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/list/sYmTyc
CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($110.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: MSI B150M MORTAR Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($79.89 @ OutletPC)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($41.99 @ B&H)
Total: $232.87
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-10-17 23:33 EDT-0400

 

[anthony_greene]

Yes it will not cause any problems.

Will it bottleneck the GTX sli?

One of the strongest in AMD's lineup single-thread wise. Should be an OK performer in most current games. Not an i7, but it should be capable of mid-range gaming just fine.

However, it would be better to get a single card than a SLI setup. Look into a RX480 or GTX 1060.

Like I said I'm getting another 950 to go with a previous one I have, so how do you think it could handle GTA V I mean as of now I have an AMD A8-5600k and that doesn't do so bad with one 950.

 

[Karadjgne]

http://www.eteknix.com/nvidia-gtx-950-sli-graphics-card-review/

Hmm ok, consider me educated. This was eye-opening.

According to page 7, the 950 sli is about as capable as a single 1060.

A 860k for $99 with a decent cooler to get a decent OC and you're upto @ $150. I3-6100 + H110 + ram will run @$220-250.

Dunno if you'll see the performance gains on the i3 or not as worth the extra cost. An i5 with decent board and ram will set you back closer to $400.

 

[Ecky]

Look at the minimum framerates:

Gameplay was likely very choppy, probably with hitching too. SLI also has more CPU overhead than a single card. To top it off, a GTX 970 is a fair bit slower than a GTX 1060, which comes in around $40 more than a single GTX 950.

 

[Karadjgne]

Ecky, that's 1440p....

Try the 1080p chart.

 

[anthony_greene]

Look at the minimum framerates:

Gameplay was likely very choppy, probably with hitching too. SLI also has more CPU overhead than a single card. To top it off, a GTX 970 is a fair bit slower than a GTX 1060, which comes in around $40 more than a single GTX 950.

So buying a single 1060 with the athlon is the way to go?

 

[Karadjgne]

What gets me is gta:V has decent sli support, so why minimum frames are so low is beyond me, they are lower than with a single card, and they shouldn't be.

 

[Karadjgne]

A single card is always the best choice for all around gaming. Sli/crossfire is basically for those who are stuck for the best match. Most times there is a raise in performance in both avg and min frames, but as shown here, the 2Gb cards are taking a beating with minimums. So a better single card, with higher ram is definitely the way to go. For the gpu. But you will be pushing the cpus limits, the fm2+ platform was never designed for gaming, that's what the am3+ was for.