Should I get the FX 6300 for BF4 ?

[CoRazz]

Greetings ! My birthday is in 2 days so im buying a new CPU.
I've been thinking of buying the AMD FX 6300 and OC-ing it on the stock cooler from 3.5GHz to 3.7 GHz,but is it able to run BF4 on the lowest settings at 60+FPS ?

My future PC configuration :
AMD FX 6300 3.7 GHz
Sapphire HD 7870 Dual X OC ( I OC'ed it from 1 000mhz to 1 100mhz)
8 GB DDR3
AsusTek M5A78M-LE
Some Asus 500W PSU


I always run games at the lowest settings ( BF3, BO2,MW3,MW2...) . I just want to have a high FPS,that's it.FPS is more important to me than graphics.

Thanks in advance <3

 

[Contrabardus]

No, definitely not.

In fact, you need to roll back what you're doing a little because it's not helping you in any way to run your PC that way.

You've already got a FX 4100 Quad core @ 3.6. That is about as good as you're going to get in a gaming CPU.

No games use 6 cores. None. There is absolutely no benefit to gaming from having 6 cores. In fact, it can cause problems. The extra cores confuse some games and can lead to bugs and glitches. No game will receive a performance boost from the extra cores.

If anything going from a quad core to a six core will result in a performance drop. There is no game in existence that uses six cores, meaning that at best the CPU will run on 4 of them. So, even with an OCed CPU @3.7 you'll actually be running at a lower speed because two of the cores will be inactive.

In fact, you should turn off your overclocking. 4.0 ghz looks nice on paper, but has no benefit to gaming at all. No game needs more than 3.0 and the most a modern game will take advantage of is 3.4. Bumping the CPU up to 4.0 won't boost FPS ratings on anything but a benchmarking program. No game is coded to take advantage of that kind of CPU speed and you're wasting power and shortening the life of your CPU running it like that.

Not only is it not good to run your CPU at 4.0, but there's no benefit to it. 4.0 is beyond your GPU's capabilities. It's not powerful enough to take advantage of a 4.0 OCed CPU. You'd need a Multi-GPU setup or one of those Uber dual cards to reap any benefit from that kind of speed. Put simply, any benefit you could possibly get from running @ 4.0 is nullified by the bottleneck your GPU creates.

There is also no advantage to running those games at low settings with a 3.4 CPU, a 7870, and 8GB of Ram. Seriously, bump the settings up to medium and there will be no performance drop. Most games max out at 60fps no matter what anyway. There is no good reason you shouldn't be able to get 60fps on any game in existence at medium settings with max out FPS with what you have. You wanting a high FPS is a valid reason for turning the settings down, but you're going far beyond what you need to to reach max FPS with your CPU and GPU. They are plenty powerful enough to get max fps out of medium settings and turning things down the lowest settings isn't going to squeeze out any more.

If you're running into lag on multiplayer, it's because of your connection speed. 2-4 MB is not optimal for online gaming. It will do, don't get me wrong. Most games are built for a 6 MB or better connection. 2-4 will work, but you can expect stutter and lag using speeds that low on occasion.

Save your money. 6 core CPUs are not for gaming machines. They are for advanced rendering and animation software and heavy calculations. In other words, it's a heavy load business CPU and you'd have no way to take advantage of the extra cores playing video games. They would do you absolutely no good and are more likely to cause problems than result in a performance boost of any sort.

If you really feel the need to upgrade your PC, get a better GPU. Spring for a GTX Titan or a 7990 if you can find one and your case has enough room. Both are dual GPU cards.

If you don't want to spend quite that much check out a 7980 or a 680. Both are single GPU cards that are more powerful than what you have.

Given your system specs, that's your best option for a performance boost. You've got the hardware to take advantage of a GPU upgrade and there is no advantage to upgrading to a 6-core CPU and your hardware couldn't do anything with it even if it wasn't likely to give you more problems than performance boost when running games.

 

[ShamrockRig]

What do you mean by highest fps? what fps do you get on the games specified at lowest settings?
Also id go for the upgrade, bf4 recommend system requirements specify a 6core AMD Phenom 2 X6 1055t, My brother has the one up from this and it uses all 6 cores, so does crysis 3 and alot of new games going for the 6 core option future proofs your computer for even longer

 

[CoRazz]

No, definitely not.

In fact, you need to roll back what you're doing a little because it's not helping you in any way to run your PC that way.

You've already got a FX 4100 Quad core @ 3.6. That is about as good as you're going to get in a gaming CPU.

No games use 6 cores. None. There is absolutely no benefit to gaming from having 6 cores. In fact, it can cause problems. The extra cores confuse some games and can lead to bugs and glitches. No game will receive a performance boost from the extra cores.

If anything going from a quad core to a six core will result in a performance drop. There is no game in existence that uses six cores, meaning that at best the CPU will run on 4 of them. So, even with an OCed CPU @3.7 you'll actually be running at a lower speed because two of the cores will be inactive.

In fact, you should turn off your overclocking. 4.0 ghz looks nice on paper, but has no benefit to gaming at all. No game needs more than 3.0 and the most a modern game will take advantage of is 3.4. Bumping the CPU up to 4.0 won't boost FPS ratings on anything but a benchmarking program. No game is coded to take advantage of that kind of CPU speed and you're wasting power and shortening the life of your CPU running it like that.

Not only is it not good to run your CPU at 4.0, but there's no benefit to it. 4.0 is beyond your GPU's capabilities. It's not powerful enough to take advantage of a 4.0 OCed CPU. You'd need a Multi-GPU setup or one of those Uber dual cards to reap any benefit from that kind of speed. Put simply, any benefit you could possibly get from running @ 4.0 is nullified by the bottleneck your GPU creates.

There is also no advantage to running those games at low settings with a 3.4 CPU, a 7870, and 8GB of Ram. Seriously, bump the settings up to medium and there will be no performance drop. Most games max out at 60fps no matter what anyway. There is no good reason you shouldn't be able to get 60fps on any game in existence at medium settings with max out FPS with what you have. You wanting a high FPS is a valid reason for turning the settings down, but you're going far beyond what you need to to reach max FPS with your CPU and GPU. They are plenty powerful enough to get max fps out of medium settings and turning things down the lowest settings isn't going to squeeze out any more.

If you're running into lag on multiplayer, it's because of your connection speed. 2-4 MB is not optimal for online gaming. It will do, don't get me wrong. Most games are built for a 6 MB or better connection. 2-4 will work, but you can expect stutter and lag using speeds that low on occasion.

Save your money. 6 core CPUs are not for gaming machines. They are for advanced rendering and animation software and heavy calculations. In other words, it's a heavy load business CPU and you'd have no way to take advantage of the extra cores playing video games. They would do you absolutely no good and are more likely to cause problems than result in a performance boost of any sort.

If you really feel the need to upgrade your PC, get a better GPU. Spring for a GTX Titan or a 7990 if you can find one and your case has enough room. Both are dual GPU cards.

If you don't want to spend quite that much check out a 7980 or a 680. Both are single GPU cards that are more powerful than what you have.

Given your system specs, that's your best option for a performance boost. You've got the hardware to take advantage of a GPU upgrade and there is no advantage to upgrading to a 6-core CPU and your hardware couldn't do anything with it even if it wasn't likely to give you more problems than performance boost when running games.

I don't really think I need a new GPU.Im happy with my HD7870 .
Also,im from Croatia,and the HD7870 in Croatia costs like a 7970 Platinum in the U.S...so yeah...

I see that people run BF4 even with the ultra settings with a 7870,with a decent FPS of course.

I think that it's just my cpu.It's the first of the FX series CPU and I was on a low budget when I bought it.
My friend is using the 6300 with a 6670 and hes playing BF4 on a higher FPS than me ://

Of course,maybe I'll just wait and collect more money,because you're not buying a CPU every week.
I've been also looking at some i5 cpu's ,like the 4670k.

Thanks for telling me your opinion mate It's really awesome when I see that admins are extremely active on the forums !!!

 

[CoRazz]

What do you mean by highest fps? what fps do you get on the games specified at lowest settings?
Also id go for the upgrade, bf4 recommend system requirements specify a 6core AMD Phenom 2 X6 1055t, My brother has the one up from this and it uses all 6 cores, so does crysis 3 and alot of new games going for the 6 core option future proofs your computer for even longer

BF3 lowest settings ,im mostly playing on noshahr canals so there's alot going on,that's why my fps ain't so good.It's from 40-90 lol


BO2 lowest settings - 60 - 150 FPS

MW3 same as BO2

Also,it depends on the game.Sometimes I just crank up the graphics ,like on Mas Effects 2 or Trine 2.
Mass Effects 2 - everything on the highest ,locked at 60 FPS ( don't know why )
Trine 2 - everything on the highest ,locked at 60 FPS

 

[Contrabardus]

What do you mean by highest fps? what fps do you get on the games specified at lowest settings?
Also id go for the upgrade, bf4 recommend system requirements specify a 6core AMD Phenom 2 X6 1055t, My brother has the one up from this and it uses all 6 cores, so does crysis 3 and alot of new games going for the 6 core option future proofs your computer for even longer

Sorry, but I've got to call foul on this. It's bad advice.

The system requirements for both Battlefield 4 and Crysis 3 most certainly do -not- recommend a 6 core CPU. Both recommend quad cores for high performance settings. Crysis 3 recommends an i7 2600k @ 3.4 for high performance settings and BF 4 suggests an i7 930 @ 2.7 for high performance settings. Both are quad core CPUs.

BF 4 can run on an AMD 6-core cpu. It is coded to accept and use such a CPU, but it doesn't provide any performance advantage over a quad core cpu either. It's essentially running on a patch that prevents the extra cores from causing problems, Crysis 3 may also be coded this way, but again there is no performance advantage to running the game with six cores.

OP is better off saving his money and upgrading his GPU. He'll get a much higher performance boost doing that than upgrading his CPU to a useless 6 core that outperforms the current GPU installed even if it doesn't cause compatibility issues in games or a performance drop due to only 4 of the cores running in any particular title.

Games that will take advantage 6 cores are still a ways off. In a year or two it might well be a benefit to upgrade to 6-8 cores if you want to run games at maxed out settings, but currently it would provide no benefit.

There is even less reason to do so if you're not looking to run games at maxed out graphical settings considering that OP's priority is running at a higher framerate over graphical fidelity. There's nothing a 6 core gpu is going to do to boost the framerate of any game right now. Especially if it's running on medium low settings.

It might indeed future proof the PC for several years from now to go with a 6-core CPU, but it would provide no current benefit whatsoever and is more likely to cause problems. OP is better off waiting until a need arises before upgrading to something his current hardware and the software he's interested in won't take advantage of anyway.

 

[ShamrockRig]

The naked eye cant see more than 60fps mate, so any higher than that doesnt make it better, I agree, saving for an intel quad core would be a good idea and is what i would do, but some people are set on amd so id go with the cpu you said in the OP, future proofing for me would be essential, the gpu he has is good, my brothers 1100t uses all 6 cores on bf4,bf3, crysis 3 etc

 

[Solarstarshines]

Well i will just have to correct alot of this speculation per say

AMD has designed all FX chips to run above 4GHZ for ever how long you choose it was built for overclocking purposes that is why they are Black editions chips now if you run a CPU over the rated voltage for too long that will in fact degrade a cpu

Most of Modern day CPU's will be overclockable due to today's tech and it's easier to do then yester year
As long as you don't go over the required voltage you can overclock the piss out of it and if you do burn it up call AMD they will give you another

It would be better to upgrade to the 6350 or 8320 they are actually full 4core cpu's with 2 or 4 shadow cores

Now moving along the performance will be much greater pairing the right card and cpu together 6350 and 8300 chips run better with 7800 and 7900 series

I am sorry but i must call foul too i run both platforms and saying overclocking a cpu to 4ghz will harm it is a myth unless you are using something from 2005

 

[Contrabardus]

I don't really think I need a new GPU.Im happy with my HD7870 .
Also,im from Croatia,and the HD7870 in Croatia costs like a 7970 Platinum in the U.S...so yeah...

I see that people run BF4 even with the ultra settings with a 7870,with a decent FPS of course.

I think that it's just my cpu.It's the first of the FX series CPU and I was on a low budget when I bought it.
My friend is using the 6300 with a 6670 and hes playing BF4 on a higher FPS than me ://

Of course,maybe I'll just wait and collect more money,because you're not buying a CPU every week.
I've been also looking at some i5 cpu's ,like the 4670k.

Thanks for telling me your opinion mate It's really awesome when I see that admins are extremely active on the forums !!!

I'm not an admin. I've just been her a while.

At any rate. I still say don't waste your money. You're not going to see a FPS boost with a new CPU. What you currently have is overkill to be honest. Your framerate issues are most likely from your connection speed or a GPU bottleneck. Your Ram is also more than sufficient and running at a great clock speed.

I had a 6870 myself and I know that the card should be able to handle BF 3 and 4 as well as Crysis 3 at medium settings with 50-60 fps. So a 7870 shouldn't have any trouble at all.

I honestly suspect your framerate issues are not from your CPU, GPU, or Ram, but are a result of your connection speed when playing online. Especially considering the issues are popping up when playing with settings lowered to the minimum. Like I said earlier, you really want to have a 6 MB or better connection if you want lag free multiplayer 2-4 will work, but you can expect lag and framerate issues when playing multiplayer with those kinds of speed.

Honestly, even with a 6 MB or better connection you'll get lag and framerate drops on occasion when playing online. Sometimes it's not a problem on your end and the server might be the culprit. Perfection is something you'll never find when it comes to framerates and online connections.

I have a three 7970 GPU running in Xfire, 16 gb of DDR3 Ram, and a quad core that I can OC to 4.3 ghz and I still get lows in the 40s on benchmarking tests sometimes. My averages are easily 60-120+ depending on the game or test, but you shouldn't focus on the 'high' and 'low' count when benchmarking or running an FPS counter in game.

 

[Solarstarshines]

Actually Tri fire delivers bad scaling if you used two of them it would run a lot higher then all three together gaming it's weird that way

Gaming online comes down to server and connect pretty much but also drivers will play a big role
Since your card is about 2 years old it should be pretty optimal

In case i would go ahead and use the Raptr app AMD is pushing it will even optimize even more basicly i gather this is there mantle and check if you have frame pacing enabled if it is take it off you are on running single GPU configuration

 

[Contrabardus]

Well i will just have to correct alot of this speculation per say

AMD has designed all FX chips to run above 4GHZ for ever how long you choose it was built for overclocking purposes that is why they are Black editions chips now if you run a CPU over the rated voltage for too long that will in fact degrade a cpu

Most of Modern day CPU's will be overclockable due to today's tech and it's easier to do then yester year
As long as you don't go over the required voltage you can overclock the piss out of it and if you do burn it up call AMD they will give you another

It would be better to upgrade to the 6350 or 8320 they are actually full 4core cpu's with 2 or 4 shadow cores

Now moving along the performance will be much greater pairing the right card and cpu together 6350 and 8300 chips run better with 7800 and 7900 series

I am sorry but i must call foul too i run both platforms and saying overclocking a cpu to 4ghz will harm it is a myth unless you are using something from 2005

I didn't say it would burn it out and destroy his computer. I said it would shorten the lifespan of his CPU, and it will. OCing anything shortens it's lifespan. The harder you run something, the more it shortens the lifespan. Just because a CPU is designed so it can run at 4.0 does not mean that it won't run for longer at 3.4.

My main point wasn't that OP's PC was in danger because OCing is 'bad', but rather that he was wasting power, which costs money, needlessly shortening the lifespan of his hardware [even if by only a minor amount] and OCing to a level that has no advantage to what he's doing with his PC and going beyond the point that his other hardware would be able take advantage of it anyway. It's a waste of time and energy [literally] for him to OC to 4.0. There's no real benefit to doing so.

I'd agree that an upgraded quad core CPU would not hurt, but I also don't see any benefit to doing so considering the current hardware. OP is looking for a FPS boost, and upgrading the CPU won't achieve that goal. The only way OP is going to see any significant performance boost is by upgrading his current GPU. The CPU and Ram are both good enough that the 7870 can run at maximum efficiency and would simply be a bottleneck to any further upgrade to the CPU anyway.

There's no good reason to spend money on a CPU upgrade considering OP already has a 3.7 ghz quad core installed. Even with an upgraded GPU there wouldn't be any need to upgrade the CPU. It's plenty to handle any GPU on the market and tear through any game currently released and probably anything on the near horizon as well.

I still think the root of the FPS problem, such as it is, is most likely a result of the servers OP is using or the connection speed being a bit lower than optimal. The current hardware is more than good enough to run BF 4, Crysis 3, and whatever else OP wants to play at above low settings at max FPS easily. I don't see how it's a hardware problem unless something is broken.

 

[Contrabardus]

The naked eye cant see more than 60fps mate, so any higher than that doesnt make it better, I agree, saving for an intel quad core would be a good idea and is what i would do, but some people are set on amd so id go with the cpu you said in the OP, future proofing for me would be essential, the gpu he has is good, my brothers 1100t uses all 6 cores on bf4,bf3, crysis 3 etc

Intel uses a different kind of socket and wouldn't be compatible. If OP is running an AMD CPU then OP must continue to use AMD unless the MoBo is upgraded as well.

Also, just because a game can run on a 6 core system does not mean it's optimal or better. I run BF3, BF4, Crysis 3, etc at maxed out settings easily on my quad core. 6 cores does not currently provide any performance advantage of any kind in any game. It's just that some newer titles are coded to accept 6 cores to prevent incompatibility issues.

 

[Contrabardus]

Actually Tri fire delivers bad scaling if you used two of them it would run a lot higher then all three together gaming it's weird that way

Gaming online comes down to server and connect pretty much but also drivers will play a big role
Since your card is about 2 years old it should be pretty optimal

In case i would go ahead and use the Raptr app AMD is pushing it will even optimize even more basicly i gather this is there mantle and check if you have frame pacing enabled if it is take it off you are on running single GPU configuration

I usually run on one or two cards. Most of the time there's no point to running all three, or even two of them to be honest. Most games will run at maxed out settings on one card, a scant handful need two for Ultra settings, and I only ever need three cards for maxed out settings on a seriously heavily 4k texture modded Skyrim with ini settings cranked beyond Ultra, or benchmarking program.

Three cards do run better than they used to with the newer drivers. It's currently overkill for anything that isn't modded to stupid levels or to run benchmarking programs for insane score ratings for bragging rights. Currently a 3 card setup is pretty useless considering I'm using such high end cards anyway.

It's future proofing, but I knew that when I did it and didn't expect any real advantage to be gained immediately from having a tri-card setup. I don't expect it to be useful for a couple of years at least.

 

[Solarstarshines]

Actually Tri fire delivers bad scaling if you used two of them it would run a lot higher then all three together gaming it's weird that way

Gaming online comes down to server and connect pretty much but also drivers will play a big role
Since your card is about 2 years old it should be pretty optimal

In case i would go ahead and use the Raptr app AMD is pushing it will even optimize even more basicly i gather this is there mantle and check if you have frame pacing enabled if it is take it off you are on running single GPU configuration

I usually run on one or two cards. Most of the time there's no point to running all three, or even two of them to be honest. Most games will run at maxed out settings on one card, a scant handful need two for Ultra settings, and I only ever need three cards for maxed out settings on a seriously heavily 4k texture modded Skyrim with ini settings cranked beyond Ultra, or benchmarking program.

Three cards do run better than they used to with the newer drivers. It's currently overkill for anything that isn't modded to stupid levels or to run benchmarking programs for insane score ratings for bragging rights. Currently a 3 card setup is pretty useless considering I'm using such high end cards anyway.

It's future proofing, but I knew that when I did it and didn't expect any real advantage to be gained immediately from having a tri-card setup. I don't expect it to be useful for a couple of years at least.

Yeah i have often wanted to get a third card or better cards but seriously the only way you can tell them apart if benching them game performance shows little increase and if you have a overclock on them they are running a lot faster so in sense unless you really start having bad performance no need to get the latest and greatest

 

[CoRazz]

Well,alot of you are telling me to stick to my current CPU and to just get a better GPU. But,since the Croatian gaming market isn't that big,couldn't I just crossfire my Sapphire 7870 Dual X OC ? I mean,I'd have 2 GPU's ,isn't that better than a single let's say 680 or 7970 ?
Thanks for helping me guys ! I really appreciate it <3

 

[Solarstarshines]

If you can crossfire that would be best and it would boost performance by alot

 

[Contrabardus]

Well,alot of you are telling me to stick to my current CPU and to just get a better GPU. But,since the Croatian gaming market isn't that big,couldn't I just crossfire my Sapphire 7870 Dual X OC ? I mean,I'd have 2 GPU's ,isn't that better than a single let's say 680 or 7970 ?
Thanks for helping me guys ! I really appreciate it <3

Yes. It would be more powerful.

Just make sure you have room in your case and that your PSU can handle it. Xfire requires more room and power. So for a 7870 Xfire I recommend having at least an 800w-900w PSU [1000w + would be optimal]. Get extra cooling as well, two GPUs generate a lot of heat. A few cheap after market fans will do fine. No need for liquid cooling or anything like that.

Also, be aware that some games run better with a single GPU. Newer titles usually run fine, but some slightly older games don't care much for it. A single GPU is more stable than two in Xfire. However, most games that don't run well on Xfire are either old enough or have low enough requirements that you can run them maxed out on a single card anyway. So it's not really an issue, and just something you should be aware of.

Battlefield 3 + 4, Crysis 3, and the kinds of shooters you seem to like all run fine in Xfire so it probably won't be an issue. However, if you're having difficulty running something with Xfire try turning it off and using a single card.

 

[Solarstarshines]

After seeing your PC connection specs you need at least a good 10mb for really smooth Game play

I am being super serious here because i run over 30mb and i still get slight lagging from servers i could only imagine how much harder it is anyway you might need to optimize your internet as much as you can it will really help you on a MOP

 

[Contrabardus]

After seeing your PC connection specs you need at least a good 10mb for really smooth Game play

I am being super serious here because i run over 30mb and i still get slight lagging from servers i could only imagine how much harder it is anyway you might need to optimize your internet as much as you can it will really help you on a MOP

Yeah, that was my gut reaction as well. 6 MB is the minimum for decent online gaming. 2-4 will function, but that's about it. I'm also on a 30 MB connection, but I lived with 6 for a while and it worked well enough. Most games recommend having at least a 6 MB connection but are optimized with 12 MB in mind.

Just based on the discussion I'm guessing that since he's getting framerate drops on a 7870 on low settings that it's not his hardware at fault but his connection and the servers he's playing on.

Upgrading the GPU will gain a performance boost for sure, but I doubt it's going to do anything for his framerate outside of benchmarking and single player. I don't think it's a problem on OPs hardware that's causing it, but rather the nature of online gaming and it's only made worse by a low speed DSL connection.

 

[Solarstarshines]

After seeing your PC connection specs you need at least a good 10mb for really smooth Game play

I am being super serious here because i run over 30mb and i still get slight lagging from servers i could only imagine how much harder it is anyway you might need to optimize your internet as much as you can it will really help you on a MOP

Yeah, that was my gut reaction as well. 6 MB is the minimum for decent online gaming. 2-4 will function, but that's about it. I'm also on a 30 MB connection, but I lived with 6 for a while and it worked well enough. Most games recommend having at least a 6 MB connection but are optimized with 12 MB in mind.

Just based on the discussion I'm guessing that since he's getting framerate drops on a 7870 on low settings that it's not his hardware at fault but his connection and the servers he's playing on.

Upgrading the GPU will gain a performance boost for sure, but I doubt it's going to do anything for his framerate outside of benchmarking and single player. I don't think it's a problem on OPs hardware that's causing it, but rather the nature of online gaming and it's only made worse by a low speed DSL connection.

Yup I 2nd that that connection is pretty bad and will kill any game low spec or not if it's a MMOP