The Best CPU for the Money: AMD FX vs. Intel Budget Shootout

[Steve]

Given how little has changed in the world of CPUs, you might expect buying a new processor to be fairly straightforward. For us, the choice seems clear: Intel has proven to offer superior core performance with considerably greater efficiency.

However, many enthusiasts argue that AMD offers better overclocking on its more affordable processors and therefore delivers a better bang for your buck. It's a valid point, as you can buy a quad-core AMD chip for little more than $100 and overclock the snot out of it while the cheapest overclockable quad-core Intel part costs well over $200 -- around 70% more.

We're putting the AMD FX-8320E against Intel's Core i3-4360 and the slightly more expensive Core i5-4430 to see which processor offers the best value for budget builders.

Read the complete review.

 

[Guest]

Why did you test games that use 2-3 cores tops?! Company of heroes 2? That game can use 2 core maximum,test newest games man not these 2 year old craps,my oced 8320 is on par or better than 4670k in newer titles,why not test some BF 4 multiplayer to really stress the cpu? You know nothing about cpu benchmarking...

 

[Guest]

Not much surprising knowing that AMD sucks compared to Intel since I series from Intel and they are even struggling with their GPUs against Nvidia's offering with only defense is being their aggressive pricing they lack in both performance and power consumption in general just fire off those brainless pathetic engineers. Its already 2015 and iam not seeing any "wow" improvement from their camp since.

 

[Steve]

Why did you test games that use 2-3 cores tops?! Company of heroes 2? That game can use 2 core maximum,test newest games man not these 2 year old craps,my oced 8320 is on par or better than 4670k in newer titles,why not test some BF 4 multiplayer to really stress the cpu? You know nothing about cpu benchmarking...

Uh uh...

Dragon Age Inquisition CPU benchmarks
Far Cry 4 CPU benchmarks
Alien Isolation CPU benchmarks
Metro Redux CPU benchmarks
Watch Dogs CPU benchmarks
Thief CPU benchmarks
Batman Arkham Origins CPU benchmarks
Arma 3 CPU benchmarks
Splinter Cell Blacklist CPU benchmarks

The Metro Redux benchmark uses more than 4-cores, in fact using the Intel Core i7-5960X we saw strong utilization across all 16-threads. So saying all games tested only use 2-3 cores is rubbish.

Your FX 8320 is not better than a 4670K in any game, on par at best depending on the game.

 

[Guest]

Who knows, one day I might find a good reason to replace my i3 2120.

 

[dividebyzero]

Nice comparative review as always.

Your FX 8320 is not better than a 4670K in any game, on par at best depending on the game.

After that last line, maybe you should have added a link for dealing with depression

 

[HaMsTeYr]

Thanks for the interesting article.

 

[Guest]

Thank you TechSpot for giving me reason not to upgrade my i3-4150. I know it is slower than 4360 but now I think it will last a year or two before moving to i5.

 

[Darion]

Yeah I am not quite sure what this crap is, but I have an 8120 and overclocked to 4.5 it matchs a i7 3770. Can you tell who techspot is supporting, cause every time amd out did intel they then point out the power usage. When literally no one cares about power usage.

 

[Footlong]

AMD have a very weak line up in CPUs. Now you just confirmed it for me.

 

[Darion]

And it's quite amusing how they pick biased benchmarks, because in real world testing no i3 will match a amd 8 core, even it would give an i5 a run for it's money. It's pretty commonly known overall that intel is 25% ahead in single core performance. That still doesn't make intel dual and quad core competitive against an amd octacore.

 

[Steve]

And it's quite amusing how they pick biased benchmarks, because in real world testing no i3 will match a amd 8 core, even it would give an i5 a run for it's money. It's pretty commonly known overall that intel is 25% ahead in single core performance. That still doesn't make intel dual and quad core competitive against an amd octacore.

Please request some tests to be added. I am sorry for picking what you call 'biased benchmarks'. Many of these programs we have been using for a long time. What is a little less Intel biased that we can use?

Yeah I am not quite sure what this crap is, but I have an 8120 and overclocked to 4.5 it matchs a i7 3770. Can you tell who techspot is supporting, cause every time amd out did intel they then point out the power usage. When literally no one cares about power usage.

So are you saying the results are faked or is it just your second rant about the biased benchmarks?

"literally no one cares about power usage" - Okay I have heard enough.

If you could do just one thing for me, please tell me which cooler you have used for your 4.5GHz overclock.

 

[Burty117]

Literally no one cares about power usage.

Except you know, anyone with a small form factor case and Heat will be an issue.
Anyone who is going to leave their computer on 24/7.
Anyone who would like a quiet setup and don't want their fans to spin up every time they open excel.
Anyone who's on a tight budget probably don't want to spend money on a heatsink that'll make it overclock-able to match the Intel equivalent.
Anyone who cares about the environment or live in a hot environment.

 

[Guest]

Let's see:
Except you know, anyone with a small form factor case and Heat will be an issue.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Anyone who is going to leave their computer on 24/7.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Anyone who would like a quiet setup and don't want their fans to spin up every time they open excel.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Anyone who's on a tight budget probably don't want to spend money on a heatsink that'll make it overclock-able to match the Intel equivalent.
Definitely shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Anyone who cares about the environment or live in a hot environment.
Shouldn't buy a high-end anything electronics then.

I don't mean to come off condescending here but if you have any constrains on budget or performance requirements, then there are plenty Intel and AMD offerings to match them. If you want the high-end segment, power usage should only be relevant in how much cooling you need, now how many dollars a year you can save. Besides the whole point of dollars per year means that the cost is spread out and easier to afford (see: credits, loans and the entire banking industry).

AMD is definitely not in a good light here, but spending £300+ on a motherboard and CPU alone and then complaining about power use is silly. There's children with no lights OR cpus in africa ​

 

[Steve]

Let's see:
Except you know, anyone with a small form factor case and Heat will be an issue.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Why is that? Makes no sense at all. We just put a Core i7-4790K into the new Silverstone SG13 and its brilliant.

Anyone who is going to leave their computer on 24/7.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Again this makes no sense. I leave my PC on 24/7 and I like that it has loads of power when I am using it but left near idle when I am not using it the power consumption is very low.

Anyone who would like a quiet setup and don't want their fans to spin up every time they open excel.
Shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Again why? You can buy a Core i7 and a GTX 980 and expect to have a very quiet system without much fuss. All thanks to their extreme performance and very low power consumption.

Anyone who's on a tight budget probably don't want to spend money on a heatsink that'll make it overclock-able to match the Intel equivalent.
Definitely shouldn't buy a high-end CPU.

Not sure we are talking about high-end CPU's here, hell were we ever talking about high-end CPUs :S

Anyone who cares about the environment or live in a hot environment.
Shouldn't buy a high-end anything electronics then.

Probably not and I don't think this article had anything to do with high-end CPU's.

 

[cliffordcooley]

I don't mean to come off condescending here

What you were doing was being irrational.

 

[Guest]

N+9872439576298652th Intel brainwasher article.

 

[Guest]

What you were doing was being irrational.

Nah, I just have different requirements and principles about computing, my case is a gargantuan behemoth, complete with a pedestal, and my watercooling loop is way overkill for my measly ~200w+ OC i7-950, and I just don't see the point of mini PCs and such. There is a place for them, but they are not for me, and maybe my point of view is not the right one here.

@Steve You made good counter-arguments but I disagree with the 24/7 and excel examples, mainly because I thought we were talking about 24/7 doing some sort of load (not necessarily full load). I'm running my system whisper quiet as well at idle or low loads, and pretty much any cooling system nowadays (from a 212 Evo to GPU aftermarket coolers) is quiet on idle and light loads.

Regarding the entire high-end CPU statement: the way I see it, the 8000 series from AMD is their highest end, that could probably compete with Intel's high end from years ago (or their current midrange). Of course you should get a midrange Intel than a high-end AMD based on many many reviews like this one, but I still don't think you should complain about power use on a high end CPU, regardless if its performance is outclassed.

 

[cliffordcooley]

N+9872439576298652th Intel brainwasher article.

Brainwashing would be used when peddling AMD CPU's. Aside from integrated graphics (since this is an FX article), you can't truthfully suggest AMD is a better choice.

 

[Dragoncracker]

WHY No g3258 at 4.8ghz? And why did you not use intel quicksync for encoding benchmarks?

 

[Kibaruk]

Stop replying irrational posts, everyone tries to say their rig is the best, I have a budget FX6300 which is great, but I'll never go as far as to compare it to an i5... even less to say it's on par with the i7 lineup (Unless it's the first gen, and even then I wouldn't).

I'm no fan boy, I know my cpu is not the best and will never be, it was great and it's ok, but it's no match for intel and thats why it's priced in such a different range. It's just a 2+2 type of problem.

AMD has never beaten, it hasn't and it will never beat intel on it's game. Sorry kidos. Oh yeah, and stop replying to guests.

 

[Steve]

WHY No g3258 at 4.8ghz? And why did you not use intel quicksync for encoding benchmarks?

Because we prefer the Core i3 and Core i5 processors. You can't get away with a dual-core anymore even at 4.8GHz. Some modern games won't even let you in with a dual-core now.

Plus once you factor in the cost of a decent cooler so you can run all day at 4.8GHz you might as well have just bough a Core i3 or even Core i5 and not worried about overclocking.

As for GuickSync we prefer to make these type of comparisons without it. Many say that QuickSync isn't as good as x264 quality wise, I am not here to dispute that. It is just better to make a fair comparison using the same encoding method.

 

[Dragoncracker]

Because we prefer the Core i3 and Core i5 processors. You can't get away with a dual-core anymore even at 4.8GHz. Some modern games won't even let you in with a dual-core now.

Plus once you factor in the cost of a decent cooler so you can run all day at 4.8GHz you might as well have just bough a Core i3 or even Core i5 and not worried about overclocking.

As for GuickSync we prefer to make these type of comparisons without it. Many say that QuickSync isn't as good as x264 quality wise, I am not here to dispute that. It is just better to make a fair comparison using the same encoding method.

ok thanks for your reply, have a nice day

 

[Burty117]

Spending £300+ on a motherboard and CPU alone and then complaining about power use is silly. There's children with no lights OR cpus in africa ​

Yes but since I'm not in Africa and I've just spent £300 on a Mobo and CPU I kinda expect them to be efficient, I get what your trying to say, but it's the wrong attitude, You wouldn't buy a more expensive mobile phone and expect it to last 5 minutes because it's way more powerful than a £100 phone would you? Just an FYI no one was "complaining" about power consumption but it is a factor which affects everything and therefore should be monitored.

Oh yeah, and stop replying to guests.

My bad, I'll stop now

 

[Tekkaraiden]

Nice to see that an AMD can be fairly comparable to Intel but the difference in power usage, wow.