I have done alot of research into Ryzen and haven't bought one but instead an old Xeon x5650, with it and the mobo for $230. Now many might be confused as why i would have bought an old xeon, this video may explain why.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWjFjN_PBWo
Ask me if you are curious, about this. I bought my combo off gumtree.
I honestly don't care about ddr4, as personally ddr3 is perfectly fine. New graphics cards are definitely supported, as my motherboard was made in 2010/11, but depends i guess, for the money this is perfect as you can reuse your old parts, and such, and i5 750 still isn't bad, so for sure you can still hang on, for 1 or 2 years. Depends on what you do with your computer though, i play games, so x5650 works very nicely, and my gpu (r9 280) is half decent, so no need for a ryzen 5 or etc..
Ah, yeah the R9 280 is a nice card. Since I upgraded to a HD6950, you can tell how old my system is. I understand that gaming on the system wouldn't be an issue. for now, but if I'm wanting to keep my system relevant and still able to game, even if at min. settings, would I be able to do that 5 years down the line with 5 years newer parts is really my worry.
But yea I'll have a watch of the vid first before I come back with more questions, thanks!
This might be a bit late, but I just upgraded the GPU on the i5 750 system to an RX580 8GB and it's opened up a whole new bunch of games that are now playable. I had a similar GPU to what you have now.
Most games can't go past 4 core utilisation and no one seems to be doing anything about using more cores in their games. The only real option to upgrade the CPU in your current system is one of the Xeon CPUs that are cheaper than the i7 but are essentially the same thing. You can get them online for around $50.
One way to look at it is that DDR3 memory is really cheap. Get as much as you can and put it in. 16GB preferably.
Then spend about $300 on an upgraded GPU like a 580 or 480 or 1060. This GPU will last you a good 5 years if you get the higher memory version. So the 8GB or 6GB version. Games are starting to use more and more GPU memory. If you upgrade your mobo/CPU/memory to a new platform in a few years then you're going to be able to bring the GPU with you. This makes future upgrades way cheaper.
I personally went for the RX 580 8GB. I found one on gumtree for $300. AMD generally have a better long-term plan for the GPU I've found.
wow thats quite the bargain. Didnt think an ancient die-shrinked Nehalem Chip could keep up.
I do wonder what the results would be like if they put a 1080ti in there and if the xeon would bottleneck it. Either way the overclock seems rather essential.
Yeah if you could afford a 1080ti i wouldn't think you would even be considering a xeon x5650. lol
lol yeah fair point. Comparing it to a 1080ti because thats how awesome this is; 6 cores 12 threads @4ghz for $230?? bloody awesome
Power efficiency is way worse on Westmeres. You're looking at 100w+ idle versus 50w for modern boards. Load power consumption is much worse as well (plus you have to cool the thing)
Then there's all the limitations on connectivity options. Running SSDs at full speeds, PCI-E 3.0, USB 3.1, etc.. all limitations.
Lack of AVX/AVX2, poor IPC, etc…
I picked up X58 boards cheap back in the day and I own a couple of 6-core Xeons as well. For $150 per combo 4 years ago its pretty good. $230 today, not so much.
It's a server cpu, how can power comsumption possibly be bad. Cooling i just chuck a few fans in and it's fine. Sata 3 6bps and my mobo has pci-e 3.0.
Its a bloody old chipset… its not really the CPU that sucks.. its the chipset. Plus the triple-channel DDR3, extra PCI-e lanes, etc consumes extra power as well.
X58 chipset doesn't support PCI-e 3.0 (X79 barely supports it). SATA3 support is not native and only through 3rd party controllers (which tends to be lower performing)
Not that great of a bargain for gaming/general use imo. Can find brand new H110 motherboards for <$80 and an i5 6500 for $150-175 (or less on sites such as OCAU). So, much newer, better gaming performance without the requirement for overclocking (and the need for an aftermarket cooler to go with that), lower idle/load power consumption and obviously less chance of dying.
An i5 6500, for 150-175??? Please link, never heard of such a good deal. Plus Xeon X5650 is a server cpu, power comsumption is obviously much better.
Currently, this with P5ozzie code comes to just under 175. Looking at completed listings they go from anywhere between 100-170 from Aus.
On OCAU forums, 110-130 would be the current approx going price.
Power consumption, especially overclocked to the same clocks as the i5 is far higher due to the older architecture.
Can you link on OCAU, this sound like a terrific deal, when i go on OCAU i don't see a market place or something? Do i need an account?
People sell there because they want a quick sale without interference of eBay etc. Plus, if you're buying things cheaper there, you'd be more inclined to sell for less. Have yet to see a 'scam' there as most people post photos and have a good reputation (hence the 90 day window before being able to sell on the forums) and it's well moderated.
I sell on OCAU as well — well, only once, but multiple things in one go because it beats having to pack + ship out and pay the final value fees.
I've also bought stuff from OCAU and the people you deal with OCAU are so, so much better than randoms on Gumtree.
Yeah but since i don't have an account what do you think about Ebay? Like the link he posted above? Is buying from them safe?
Xeon X5650 is a server cpu, power comsumption is obviously much better.
I don't know why you keep saying this, it isn't better.
Can be please provide proof it isn't?
X5650 @ 4 Ghz = 260W
https://www.tomrei.com/2015/06/intel-x5650-overclocking-resu…
Ryzen 1600 @ stock = 128W (still faster)
Ryzen 1600 @ 3.9 Ghz = 166W (way faster)
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/amd_ryzen_5_1600_review…
Its not close… and this is Ryzen. Intel's modern chips have even better performance at similar power usage to AMD (costing more)
@Thrawn: Sorry if i wasn't clear i'm comparing to ryzen 3, this is a budget cpu you do realise. $230 for motherboard + ram which is ddr3 which like everyone has.($50 for 8gb) This is clearly a budget orientated cpu, and should be comapred against ryzen 3, and older i5's. And even not overclocked it has practically the same performance as older i7's, so yeah it's still a stunning deal, considering a ryzen 3 system will cost around 300- 400. Considering you are buying brand new parts.
You're also buying 7 years old parts that has been put through the wringer before being resold, the power consumption is double of a modern CPU, and performance is still worse than the Ryzen 3/5, which aims to match Haswell's level of performance, a 4 years old architecture. Westmere is also well known for being rather hot. Its a pretty terrible deal.
Ivy Bride i5-3570 goes for ~100 dollars, and H77 mobo for about that much as well on eBay. i5-4690 + board + ram + HDD you can harvest off Optiplex 9020 that goes for ~250 whenever eBay has a 20% off sale, or you can just base the build around that and just add a LP card for a cheap machine.
Also, I don't know where you get this idea that server CPU are somehow magically much more power efficient than its desktop CPU counterpart. Its the same architecture.
@tatsulotto: That's it being overclocked to 4ghz, you do realise it's 2.66 ghz stock, so yeah of course power consumption will be increased. Also if it matches ryzen 3 performance i would be happy, and it clearly beats it, in real world game bench marks, no synthetic geekbench scores.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XafMZKJHQYU
Beats the i5-3570, also if i bought a dell optiplex i can't use my old gpu, which has 3 fans and is like really long, so yeah. Power efficiency i am yet to find some proof that at stock consumes twice the amount of power, than ryzen. Also if your looking at overclock, please do some research, you can find fantastic results on games like pubg, gta v, etc..
@SimpleRoger: You're OCing a 7 years old CPU that's already been used heavily. Severs are kept on 24/7 for years until they're replaced. Gaming performance varies on the dev's optimization, there's always been a clear bias toward intel in the last 5-6 years. If you're looking for gaming performance, the Ivy/Haswell option are superior.
Gaming performance are dependent on single core IPC, which Ivy/Haswell beats it. There's currently very few consumer program (aside from benches) that makes use of 6C/12T, even now (which is also why AMD's Bulldozer platform failed. It gambled on using multithread to beat out Intel's superior single core performance).
Power Efficiency
PCGamers has a Bloomfield (Westmere is a variation of Bloomfield) vs Skylake comparison, and Bloomfield's power consumption at 3.6Ghz is 250W, over twice as much as Skylake OCed to 4Ghz. Idle performance shows similar stats, 50W for Skylake vs 150W for Bloomfield. Skylake itself is about 20% more efficient than Haswell, which is also about that much to Ivy.
Old enthusiast are a nice platform to play around and can work if you need powerful multithreaded performance on a very small budget. But recommending it to people as a general usage platform is just dragging them into a trap they don't expect. When you get a new rig, you can expect it to last 4/6/8/10 years, depending on the OC level. A 7 years old rig that's been always on for its entire life is liable to fail at any time, even more so if you OC. Other people has also brought up issues with the X58 chipset. Overall if you owned this rig back in 2011/2012, there's no reason to upgrade. The i5-2500 is a good example, it was good value for money back in the day, and even now its only started to bottleneck. However, buying a rig like this now is just taking a gamble with your money. You're free to do that, its your money, but you're also potentially baiting people who don't have the tech knowledge/experience into it without knowing gain/trade off.
@tatsulotto: Firstly as someone who doesn't have their computer on 24/7 i really don't think that it would have that much of an economical impact.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nv-KsCNr0zo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWRVL5202f8
Plenty more videos showing the capabalities of this cpu.
If it's using an extra 100W at idle, assuming electricity costs of 35c/kWh, by just leaving it on for 8 hours a day (not touching it) you're using (0.8 * 0.35 * 365) = $102.20 extra in electricity per year based on current pricing, just idling it all day.
Also, most of those gaming benchmarks have the Xeon overclocked to 4+GHz which requires an aftermarket cooler, further adding to the cost (as stated above).
@donnot: It's an extra 100w, when overclocked, stock would be much less. Is there a way i can measure myself, i'm sure it isn't that high.
whats your geekbench score?
Cinebench is 612.
That's low as hell, Ryzen 5 1600 gets 1300 stock my overclocked 1700 gets 1650 on cinebench r15.
Yeah but it's like how much more expensive, also haven't overclocked, google x5650 overclocked benchmarks and it's like 1500.
@Diji1: Sorry mistook for another cpu, 982 on cinebench after an overclock. Still not bad for the money
Uh, did anyone listen to the video in the OP?
The idiot maxed out the graphics to "with 8x MSAA, really push these cpus to the limit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWjFjN_PBWo&feature=youtu.be…
Thanks, will have a look when I have more time. One question though - what do you think of the future-proofing aspect when it comes to decisions like this? Because while I like my tech, I'm past the point where I'm always making major upgrades and I now tend to keep my computers for VERY long periods of time (like 7 years long) - would using older parts, especially motherboards, limit the ability/flexibility to add smaller parts in the future?
I added extra RAM (DDR3) and a HD6950 to my build a few years back (i5-750 system - yes, it's that old), and I'm pretty sure that's already at the limit of what I can upgrade in my system. I'm fairly sure I can't add DDR4 RAM (mobo doesn't support it), or any of the newer graphics cards (1050, etc).
Would starting off with older parts exacerbate this issue?