On Fri, Jul 22, 2016 at 02:04:43PM -0400, rhkra...@gmail.com wrote: > I'm considering buying a new motherboard and CPU, and I'm thinking about the > AMD FM2+ combo. It seems they have a pretty good price / performance ratio, > and slightly better than the AM3+ line. (BTW, I rarely buy Intel--I feel it > has a higher (i.e., worse) price / performance ratio.)
It depends. For the last several years, AMD has supplied more cores doing less work per core at the same price points as Intel. If you absolutely need top per-core performance, Intel is the way to go. If you want a nice low-cost chip, AMD does pretty well. > I've done a fair amount of googling, but I'm confused. IIUC, at least some > of > the FM2+ processors come with graphic processors built into the CPU, but, > iiuc, not all FM2+ motherboards support that. > > Further, maybe some FM2+ motherboards provide graphics capability on the > motherboard, but not utilizing the GPU built into the processor. I guess I > would anticipate that the performance in this case is less. No, if you see graphics capability on an FM2+ m/b, it is using the GPU of the FM2+. There might be some weird exceptions, but not many. If you don't see graphics capability on an FM2+ m/b, it will likely be advertising multiple PCIe x16 slots for graphics cards. > AMD A8-7600 Kaveri Quad-Core 3.1 GHz Socket FM2+ 65W AD7600YBJABOX Desktop > Processor AMD Radeon R7 > Link: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113371 > > Digression: While I'm asking questions, let me ask this, which has been on my > mind for a while: Will a 4-core processor actually be utilized in the typical > applications I use (which mostly include things like a mail client (kmail), > web browsers (Firefox and Konqueror), and various editors (nedit, kate, and > geany), or am I just as well off with a faster 2-core or single core > processor? > In other words, do those applications actually make use of more than 1-core? Pretty much anybody can figure out ways to use two cores at once efficiently. If you have interesting specific workloads (movie or music editing, lots of background activity) a third and fourth core can be useful. I rarely run into desktop users who use more than 4 cores at all. > Motherboard 1: ECS A58F2P-M2 (V1.0) FM2+ AMD A58 review > Link: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813135396 > > Specific question(s): > * It sounds like I'd get video without a video card (which is what I > want), > but I'm not sure it will make use of the on-CPU GPU (which I also want it to > do)? It does. > * In other words, it sounds like I don't need the on-CPU GPU to get video? You do. > * There is no clarification on why the commentor says the board is not > compatible with the Kavari 860K or whether he is correct. It's an older chip, not the one you are looking at. But in any case, go to the motherboard mfg website and look at their compatibility list. They will have it all laid out. > Motherboard 2: ASUS A68HM-K FM2+ AMD A68H FCH (Bolton D2H) SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 > * It sounds like this makes use of the on-CPU GPU, and, without one, would > not provide video? Correct. > Motherboard 3: BIOSTAR Hi-Fi A70U3P FM2+ / FM2 AMD A70M SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 > > * It sounds (even more strongly than Motherboard 2) like this makes use of > the on-CPU GPU, and, without one, would not provide video? Still correct. -dsr-