Question about cpus and overclocking possiblities

MengusDew

MengusDew

New Member
I'm building my first system. Not knowing much at all, except for what I've been reading in reviews, every time I started concluding what to go with, I have a second thought about it all.

I have a limited budget, but want a high performance system(within reason), so AMD Phenom II x4 is the cpu goal for me. I definitely plan to be running after-market air cooling and plan on doing O.C. Now, with that being concluded, my question right now is this:

Would getting, say a phenom II x4 955 B.E. 125W be worth the extra cash as opposed to getting the phenom II x4 810 95w, even after O.C.ing it? Or would the outcome of the two be the same at the same O.C.ed speed? Would it be putting more stress on the the 810, say O.C.ed at 3.2Ghz then it would be on the 955 at the factory 3.2Ghz? The price difference between the two isn't that much, but would still be a slight significant waste if the O.C.ing efficiency is the same.

Can someone throw me a bone here? I will run into more questions in the future, as I mentally construct this build, but this is the first step I'm stuck on.
 
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MengusDew said:
I'm building my first system. Not knowing much at all, except for what I've been reading in reviews, every time I started concluding what to go with, I have a second thought about it all.

I have a limited budget, but want a high performance system(within reason), so AMD Phenom II x4 is the cpu goal for me. I definitely plan to be running after-market air cooling and plan on doing O.C. Now, with that being concluded, my question right now is this:

Would getting, say a phenom II x4 955 B.E. 125W be worth the extra cash as opposed to getting the phenom II x4 810 95w, even after O.C.ing it? Or would the outcome of the two be the same at the same O.C.ed speed? Would it be putting more stress on the the 810, say O.C.ed at 3.2Ghz then it would be on the 955 at the factory 3.2Ghz? The price difference between the two isn't that much, but would still be a slight significant waste if the O.C.ing efficiency is the same.

Can someone throw me a bone here? I will run into more questions in the future, as I mentally construct this build, but this is the first step I'm stuck on.
Click to expand...

the 955 should be faster clock for clock over the 810. They all overclock quite well. If you want to save money the x3 720 is a sweet deal with a possible (albeit low) chance of being able to unlock x4. This should be your budget option. The 810 doesn't seem to be a great option when you can jump up to a 945 for very little money or a 955 for a little more.

Edit: I don't want to persuade you away from the 810, its a great chip. It just doesn't seem to fall in line good with the great pricing of other AMD chips.
 
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Backwoods166 said:
the 955 should be faster clock for clock over the 810. They all overclock quite well. If you want to save money the x3 720 is a sweet deal with a possible (albeit low) chance of being able to unlock x4. This should be your budget option. The 810 doesn't seem to be a great option when you can jump up to a 945 for very little money or a 955 for a little more.

Edit: I don't want to persuade you away from the 810, its a great chip. It just doesn't seem to fall in line good with the great pricing of other AMD chips.
Click to expand...

Oh yeah, I mean the little extra money isn't a big deal if it's worth it. It's just that I was under the assumption that all CPUs with the same technology are the same, only with different levels of preset clock speeds, thus making the cheaper one the same, if you change the clock settings. That's just what I've read in the O.C.ing book that I purchased. Of coarse, I could be misinterpreting that. It says something to the effect of the more expensive Black edition CPUs are the same CPU just with higher clock settings, that I myself can go in and adjust without paying the extra cash to purchase one already preset that way. But maybe that doesn't apply to the different model #'s of the CPUs.

But yes, if there is a physical difference in performance between a 945 and 955 on the same clock speed settings, the slight price increase is fairly insignificant. I've also read in some review that 965 is just a preset OC on the 955 and isn't worth the extra $60. If that is the case couldn't the same be said for the 945 and the 955? I'm not trying to be super cheap just real efficient with my money.
 
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MengusDew said:
Oh yeah, I mean the little extra money isn't a big deal if it's worth it. It's just that I was under the assumption that all CPUs with the same technology are the same, only with different levels of preset clock speeds, thus making the cheaper one the same, if you change the clock settings. That's just what I've read in the O.C.ing book that I purchased. Of coarse, I could be misinterpreting that. It says something to the effect of the more expensive Black edition CPUs are the same CPU just with higher clock settings, that I myself can go in and adjust without paying the extra cash to purchase one already preset that way. But maybe that doesn't apply to the different model #'s of the CPUs.

But yes, if there is a physical difference in performance between a 945 and 955 on the same clock speed settings, the slight price increase is fairly insignificant. I've also read in some review that 965 is just a preset OC on the 955 and isn't worth the extra $60. If that is the case couldn't the same be said for the 945 and the 955? I'm not trying to be super cheap just real efficient with my money.
Click to expand...

well, you are onto something there. Since the manufacturing of CPU's is on such a complex and small scale, no two cpu's are exactly the same. Soooo chips with the same architecture that have different clock speeds, all else being equal, are actually the same chip. And, yes, they are just clocked differently from the factory. But, that's not the end of the story. Since no two CPU's are exactly the same, some work better than others. At the factory they identify which work better and which do not. The one's that can clock better are clocked better and sold as such. The one's that don't run so hot (reverse pun here?!?) are sold as the baseline model. That's not the end of it either, unfortunately. The base line models tend to sell better because they are cheaper. If the factory runs out of baseline chips, all they have to do is lower the clock on some of the higher end chips and ship them out as baseline chips. feeeew, did I forget anything?

The result of all this ends up being that the high end chips are, in fact, better chips. The bonus is that a good portion of the low end chips are, in fact, fairly high end chips. This is the reason that people who get a cheap chip with a low vid can easily overclock to some quite astonishing numbers. Yet, people buying the same chip with a high vid can't even come close.

this is getting tl:dr

bottom line is, if you buy the high end stuff you are guarantied high end stuff.
 
MengusDew said:
I'm building my first system. Not knowing much at all, except for what I've been reading in reviews, every time I started concluding what to go with, I have a second thought about it all.

I have a limited budget, but want a high performance system(within reason), so AMD Phenom II x4 is the cpu goal for me. I definitely plan to be running after-market air cooling and plan on doing O.C. Now, with that being concluded, my question right now is this:

Would getting, say a phenom II x4 955 B.E. 125W be worth the extra cash as opposed to getting the phenom II x4 810 95w, even after O.C.ing it? Or would the outcome of the two be the same at the same O.C.ed speed? Would it be putting more stress on the the 810, say O.C.ed at 3.2Ghz then it would be on the 955 at the factory 3.2Ghz? The price difference between the two isn't that much, but would still be a slight significant waste if the O.C.ing efficiency is the same.

Can someone throw me a bone here? I will run into more questions in the future, as I mentally construct this build, but this is the first step I'm stuck on.
Click to expand...

The 810 has 2mb. less L3 cache then the 955. There is a chance with the right chip and board you can unlock the other 2mb. of L3. Pretty sure the 810 is being discontinued. Right now price wise, I think the Phenom II X4 945 95W and the Phenom II X3 720 both with the full 6mb. of L3 are the best deals. Plus with the 720 you have the chance of unlocking the 4th. core
 
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