What is the best gaming CPU for $200 or less?
Best I can see is an i5 4460 @ 3.20Ghz.
Edit:
Current graphics card is a AMD Radeon HD 6950, with a AMD 1035T @ 2.6Ghz & 4GB DDR3. Overall I was looking at a $500 upgrade.
$100 Motherboard
$200 CPU
$200 GPU
Get the 4460 which costs $200. It's basically the sweet spot between price and performance.
Many of the upper end Core i5's aren't any different except for clock speeds, the cache is the same. It's not worth paying an extra $19 dollars for a 100mhz bump for the i5-4590.
Most of the time, the choice is inconsequential because it is the graphics card that will do most of the work.
Most of the time, the choice is inconsequential because it is the graphics card that will do most of the work.
literally this. I game with an i5-650 and the R9 290 and can easily max Watch_Dogs and Crisis 3.
AMD 8350 if you have a graphics card for $224 @ MSY
or if you have no graphics card go for the
A10 7850K for $199 @ msy! Do tell us what you end up getting :)
Good Luck!!
Did a quick Google forbenchmarks, the AMD 8350 is stronger on multi thread applications - but the Intel 4460 dominates on single threaded.
Interest dilemma.
Yeah definitely interesting, I totally agree!
Main use of the machine is for gaming.
Current graphics card is a AMD Radeon HD 6950, with a AMD 1035T @ 2.6Ghz & 4GB DDR3. Overall I was looking at a $500 upgrade.
$100 Motherboard
$200 CPU
$200 GPU
You have a 6950? I would stick with that for the moment. If you spent $200 on a new card, it probably isn't going to be much faster than what you have currently. $200 at most would buy you a R9 270X (basically a renamed 7870).
It will be an improvement, but still not significant enough for you to see the difference.
Buying any AMD FX CPU is completely pointless. They suck power, are on an obsolete chipset, and are murdered by an Intel i5 in the majority of benchmarks. Low end i5 is a bad idea, games still want clock speed. You want a 3.4GHz i5 at least. You'll also want to double the GPU budget at least. $200 won't get you maxed out or even High ish when the Witcher 3 comes out.
@ethereal88 man your "power" argument is completely invalid to me heres why:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBeeGHozSY0
Also if your going with a high end i5 itll cost way more then $200 which really defeats the purpose of the post "$200 CPU".
Ideally getting the i5 4690K for $275 eg.(@PCCasegear)is out of budget other then that anything lower I dont think you could overclock wheres as the "obselete" from AMD is Overclockable
A random Youtube video. Congratulations! Here:
http://www.techspot.com/review/586-amd-fx-8350-fx-6300/page7…
"Even worse, the Core i5-3470 machine pulled just 122 watts, 52% less than the FX-8350 computer."
and that isn't Haswell. There are dozens of reputable sources online. And I was thinking 4690 minimum. Which is $242.
and AM3+:
http://www.overclock.net/t/1463696/is-am3-worth-investing-in
DEAD. And APUs for gaming are trash. Seriously. You want to game you want Intel and a dedicated GPU. Why do you want to overclock? You don't need too and a locked i5 would still spank FX all day every day.
Ahh fair enough then, thanks for your insight and sarcasm :)! And a random link? Congratulations!
I bet your so ill sighted you couldn't even watch the video. Its not like he's building a laptop, so there's no issue with battery life because a PC doesn't need one. Besides it takes almost two decades to make the difference in energy saved by the Intel chip compared to AMD. So this power consumption difference is fairly miniscule. Yes I understand the Ozbargain way of saving every cent, but realisticly no one up to date with tech uses a CPU for two decades.
P.S You said "APUs for gaming are trash". Do you realise that this "trash", Microsoft Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Wii U, have it installed in their hardware? Which sold over and at the very least a record number of 7 Million Consoles (Under quoted figure I presume) ) So this “trash” that has been used by reputable companies who are willing to put their reputation at risk, are doing so for nothing? Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are willing to put their reputation and sales at serious risk, with serious consequences and backlash for trash? It can’t run games without dedicated graphics card? Oh wait a minute, last time I checked a Play Station 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Wii U all run games. Or are they used for something like writing emails?
@Richardwise
Maybe watch Jays2cents video link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWans5FU4cU
Consider going for an APU even get an A10 7850K($199 @MSY) has a fairly reasonable amount of graphics on the chipset plus it can crossfire with a dedicated graphics fairly well with some pretty awesome results!
Also if you go for a AMD graphics card depending on what you get, heres an example a R9 270x($229@MSY) you can get (Radeon Silver Reward) two free games through their Never Settle Forever program or if you get anything above the R9 280 series you can get 3 free games link below:
http://sites.amd.com/us/promo/never-settle/Pages/nsreloadedf…
if i had to…
i5 4690
some kind of z97 (possibly asrock z97m or some crap like that)
$250 amd r9 270 or 280
probably 2 x 4Gb of some 2000+ rice ram
yeah a bit much but i wouldnt compromise
Probably want to go with an AMD APU if your not going to have a separate GPU. The i5 is the best CPU for ~$200.