Unleashed
Like the K Series Intel chips, the entire
FX range is unlocked, so overclocking is definitely on the menu. Well, so long
as you've got a decent, OC friendly motherboard backing it up. We did struggle
a little going through the BIOS of our Asus RoG board, but with the
Windows-based AMD Overdrive software we were able to hit 4.7GHz stably.
We could boot via BIOS overclocking, but
once we started stressing the chip it eventually fell over. With the AMD
software though, it remained happily number-crunching away. It's not quite the
lGHz + speed boost you can get out of Intel's architecture, but it does give
you some impressive performance gains.
Running at 4.7GHzthe FX 8350 is
significantly faster in multi-threaded applications than even the i7 B770K at
stock speeds. Of course, the Intel chip can also be overclocked, but it gives
you some idea of how competitive these AMD chips can be.
In a vacuum then, the Intel chips remain
the only CPUs you'd want in your machines. They are the best at gaming, and the
second-tier quad-core chips remain competitive with AMD’s best in
multi-threaded applications. But this Piledriver update has closed the gap a
little, and in terms of platform value as a whole, the AMD setup just has the
edge. Spend the difference in CPU price on a better graphics card and the
performance difference in games between AMD and Intel chips will instantly melt
away.
Like the Bulldozer release though, the
top-tier FX chip is probably not the one that we'd really recommend. The $32
difference in price is negligible, and won’t make a massive difference in what
GPU you go for. The hex-core FX-6300, on the other hand, could be a much more
tantalising prospect.
If pricing follows the previous generation
then you're looking at around a $112 difference, and that could make for that
bump up to a HD 7950. The hex-core chip will also overclock happily, so you'll
still get decent multi-threaded performance easily as capable as the i5, for a
lot less cash. An equivalently priced AMD hex-core machine then would make for
a better gaming PC than an i5 3570K rig with a weaker GPU.
We need AMD to be competitive to keep the
PC market vibrant, and keep Intel honest. These new Piledriver chips should be
able to do that, especially at the value end of the market. And if that pushes
Intel to make better chips maybe even a mainstream six-core desktop CPU then
that's got to be good for everyone too.
Technical analysis
As you can see from the benchmark results,
the i7-3770K is still the top desktop chip on pretty much all counts, but at
$160 more than the latest FX-8350 you're paying through the nose for that extra
performance. Compared with the similarly priced Core iS, the FX-8350 looks more
impressive, ably beating it in any multi-threaded test you give it. In fact
it's actually rather close to the eight threads of the top Ivy Bridge CPU in
those multi-threaded metrics. In gaming terms though the Intel chips still
retain a healthy lead in raw CPU performance terms.
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Vital statistics
·
Price: $240
·
Manufacturer: AMD
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Web: www.amd.com
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Socket: AMD AM3+
·
Cores: 8
·
Threads: 8
·
Clock speed: 4GHz
·
Lithography: 32nm
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