#Amd fx 8350 price upgrade

Eight AMD cores running at 4GHz - not too shabby. In fact, this top-end FX chip is hitting the ground running at 4GHz out of the box. That's not to say the new Piledriver design doesn't add any extra performance for your cash. We've seen the first implementation of this new design in the recently released Trinity desktop chips, but this is the first time we've seen it in a dedicated desktop design. To try to amend this, AMD has gone and done a little light restructuring of the Bulldozer modules via this Piledriver update. That also meant gaming performance was down the pecking order, and the competing Intel chips left AMD trailing in their collective wake. In actual use though, this sharing of key components meant that while multi-threaded performance was improved, having so many more threads of processing available meant the single-threaded performance was slower even than the Phenom chips that preceded it. It created Bulldozer modules with a pair of 'cores' in each, sharing some lower utilisation silicon such as level-2 cache, fetch and decode components, while the more vital, time-sensitive parts, such as the integer pipelines and level-1 cache were part of each 'core'. The original Bulldozer design was a pretty radical shift in terms of the change from the Stars architecture found in Phenom. It is not, however, a threat to IntelвЂ™s high end CPU line-up.Strap in, I'm going to talk about architecture here. If youвЂ™re an AMD fan looking for a new CPU, the FX-8350 is the fastest processor the company has released to date. Ultimately, the new FX-Series of desktop processors from AMD is an evolutionary step for the company that advances their products forward.

#Amd fx 8350 price upgrade

What the AMD FX-8350 does offer over mainstream Core i5 chips though is an easy upgrade path for existing AMD owners and more flexibility for overclocking, due to its unlocked multipliers. The FX-8350 outpaced the i5-3470 in a couple of tests, but overall, weвЂ™d still consider the Core i5-3470 the вЂњfasterвЂќ CPU. Unfortunately, the performance comparisons between those chips donвЂ™t favor AMD. At the FX-8350вЂ™s expected price point, it goes head-to-head with Intel processors like the Core i5-3470 ($199) and Core i5-3570 ($214). Please note, however, that all of these initial FX-Series processors will feature the same die quad and hex-cores listed here will feature the same 8-core die with a core module or two disabled. The processors will differ in their core counts, Northbridge frequencies, base and Turbo CPU clocks, cache compliments and TDP. The initial Piledriver-based FX-Series product line-up is going to consist of four processors, ranging from the high-end FX-8350 at $195 to the more mainstream FX-4300 at $122. Compatibility with current platforms does make it easy for existing AMD owners to upgrade their processors, however, which is something we always like to see.

Regardless, it still would have been nice to have feature parity between Intel and AMD in that respect. The former can be added via third-party controllers and the latter offers minimal benefit to end-users at this time. We would have liked to have seen a new chipset accompany this CPU release that would bring things like native USB 3.0 and PCI Express 3.0 support to AMDвЂ™s high-end desktop platform, but thatвЂ™s not in the cards just yet. Forward progress is something that AMD needed and that is what they got with the new FX-Series of desktop processors, even if the amount of forward progress isnвЂ™t enough to significantly shift the balance of power in the desktop CPU space. The FX-8350 we tested offered better performance and improved power efficiency than its predecessor in every test we ran. The new AMD FX-Series of desktop processor is still a clear step forward for AMD. IntelвЂ™s higher-end Core i5 and Core i7 processors, are still the highest performing and most efficient desktop processors available. Unfortunately for AMD, while they have eaten into IntelвЂ™s lead in the desktop CPU space somewhat, they have not changed the performance landscape all that much. And it does so while consuming less power, which hints at its improved efficiency as well. The improvements afforded by its updated Piledriver microarchitecture, in addition to significantly increased frequencies, have resulted in a processor that clearly outperforms its Bulldozer-based predecessors across the board. Performance Summary: The FX-8350 is the most powerful desktop processor released by AMD to date.