CPU Help? What to choose?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

And to get a feel of what the FX can do clocked at 4.4 Ghz:

Tron 34.395340 fps
Splice 23.940010 fps
Big Buck Bunny 128.419891 fps (Tested 3 times, same result??? Looks like some error)

Regardless of the error, it looks like you need to clock the FX-6100 pretty high to get it to a Phenom II x6 1100Ts level

I would try lower overclock settings and see how the results changes. Try around 3.8GHZ for example and see what the performance looks like.

The stock scores are on par with a Core i5 2300 and are much higher than any AMD Phenom II X4 at stock clockspeeds. It seems to be line with this review:

http://ht4u.net/reviews/2011/amd_fx_...ew/index15.php

However,with other video encoding applications you can match a Phenom II X6(as seen in the review). Like I said the FX6100 does have variable performance dependent on the workload.

Don't know what the hotfix has done, it hasn't improved the video encoding.

The hotfix seems to have improved within game fps according to the crysis benchmark

What was MS plans on the FX fix? I know this hotfix was to improve scheduling but are there any future patches in development for the FX series?

The hotfix will only improve applications which use 2 to 4 threads on your CPU. Crysis only uses two to three threads and there is an improvement. The main improvements with the hotfix have been mainly with games.

With HandBrake I was expecting a small improvement as the initial part of the encode should use less threads. However,most of the encode uses all threads.

Anandtech saw this with another video encoding application:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5448/t...patch-tested/3

They also saw around 4.7% improvement with Crysis Warhead.

The Windows 7 schedular update does not have the full efficiency of the Windows 8 schedular. Microsoft will release the Beta version of Windows 8 soon,so if you want to get an indication of any performance improvements running a few benchmarks would be a good indication.

Toms Hardware tested the Developer Preview:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-23.html

WoW only uses two threads and saw an improvement of around 8.2% to 11.9% with the Developer Preview.

[DanceswithUnix]

WoW only uses two threads and saw an improvement of around 8.2% to 11.9% with the Developer Preview.

Lol, news normally travels fast but somehow when WoW is involved it goes really slooooow

There used to be a performane issue on a small number of multi core machines which made them set core affinity to just 2 cores on all machines as a work around. They got rid of that about 2 years ago, so it now makes good use of 3 cores and on my machine doesn't make a huge use of the 4th but it does have something running on it.

So there is probably a mixed bag of loads of threads running with a few big ones, sounds like an ideal candidate for the Win8 schedular fixes.

[mikeo01]

Handbrake FX Patch Stock Speeds (3.3 Ghz)

Big Buck Bunny 27.871857 fps
Splice 19.038990 fps
Tron 27.924072 fps

FX Patch 3.8 Ghz OC
Big Buck Bunny 31.428810 fps
Splice 21.513891 fps
Tron 31.621393 fps

Definitely improvements with an overclock. It is pretty much along with the i5 2300 yeah. Considering Bulldozer wasn't intended to be the best of the best, its technology is still pretty decent and as said with the Windows 8 scheduling it should be an OK CPU

But apart from all that yeah it can match a Phenom II x6 which is pretty decent as far as I am concerned, it is a new technology after all.

Although a bit strange there wasn't actually an improvement with the FX fix, but obviously as you said performance is variable.

Well with Windows 8 Bulldozer should be used more efficiently due to the new scheduler from that link you posted. Even with the FX hotfix there are still some improvements within games as well.

Just a shame that you would have to upgrade to Windows 8 to see the full potential of the FX series, which is the same with Piledriver because it uses the same architecture doesn't it.

For its price its not too bad, lots of overclocking potential and it can sometimes match the Phenom. I say the FX architecture is somewhat better than the Phenoms. Although struggles to match a Phenom, its way of handling is pretty decent

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The upcoming FX6200 runs at 3.8GHZ so should give HandBrake results similar to a Core i5 2500 or a Phenom II X6 1075T.

I suspect,there might some issues with throttling at 4.4GHZ which might explain the slightly worse scaling at that clockspeed.

[DanceswithUnix]

Considering Bulldozer wasn't intended to be the best of the best, its technology is still pretty decent and as said with the Windows 8 scheduling it should be an OK CPU

I'm pretty sure they did intend it to be the best of the best, but just missed the target

Still it seems a credible base for AMD to build from over the next couple of years.

I wouldn't sweat over the poor OS support, it will come soon enough. We had the same with NUMA memory layout from AMD multi socket opterons and with Intel Hyperthreading when they came out. These days you just expect those features to work well.

[mikeo01]

Even though AMD aren't the best, they still do some amazing stuff.

And yeah if MS gets off and does something about it, you would think a huge company like them could really drive development.

Overall I am pleased with the FX, it does have potential, and most of it, its fun to tweak and do whatever with.

And it overclocks like mad

So thanks everyone for helping me decide on what CPU to get!

[mikeo01]

I won't make a new thread just to ask this, but whats the max safe voltage for the FX? 1.45 like all other AMD chips?

If it is I will have a see how much I can overclock the FX-6100.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Could you re-run the encoding tests with the latest version of HandBrake:

http://handbrake.fr/downloads.php