AMD processor advice

[mistarick]

Hey guys. I'm looking into building another htpc. A mini itx build. I currently have a system with an a6 dual core in it with 8gb ddr 3 and it works quite well. What type of advantages would I see by using an a8 or a10 quad core chip in my next build? May do some light gaming on this next build but who knows. I'm terrible on making decisions and tbh I just don't know enough about all the technical details. I.e. Richland, trinity. I know they are versions but deeper than than and I get lost easily.

Thanks
Rick

[christoph86]

It really depends on what you will be doing with your htpc. Are you going to be doing a lot of streaming to other devices, transcoding, video conversions? Those are usually more CPU intensive. Gaming is probably going to be more reliant on the limits of your gpu, but depends on what games you will be playing and how high of settings you want to use. The trinity a10 quad core will allow you to play most games on at least medium settings without much problem I would think, but if you want highest settings with good fps you will need a good standalone graphics card. For most htpc needs, this would be a solid APU, but depending on what you are using your htpc you may or may not need it.

[mistarick]

I don't really do any gaming on pc at all. If I game I go to my console. So I don't think I will need power to game. Mostly will be used for htpc. Watch and record TV, play movies, I'm sure I will be fine with another dual core a6 maybe ill grab the Richland now that its out and pair it with an fm+ mobo. That way I can always upgrade the processor 'aster down the road if I need to. I'm leaning toward a mininitx board for the small form factor. Anyone have anything to say about the motherboards with integrated WiFi and blue ray? Good or bad. Saw a decent gigabyte also an Asus or msn. Looking to keep costs low as it isn't going to be an over the top system and the current living room setup works pretty well for what I do with it. Although I almost thing that the 8gb ddr 3 that I have in it is over kill as I dont have any extenders either. And don't plan on any in the future.

[jjwatmyself]

Can you post links of the components you're interested in?

My 10 cents... If you're planning on having a display attached and watching TV, GPU (or APU) is key. For example, a G33 motherboard for an Intel Q9650 CPU (older) benchmarks at the same levels as the AMD A8-5500 (newer). But the difference in integrated graphics performance is like night and day. To the point that you can only use the G33 motherboard as an HTPC if you add a dedicated graphics card. The second your fire up TV the image will not render. The AMD on the other hand will preform due to the superior GPU on the CPU.

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

If you do not plan to have a dedicated GPU, choose a CPU for its graphics capabilities. AMD and Intel are both doing well in this space with their current chips. Price will probably be lower for AMD. The AMD A10-7850K is probably a great choice and had the higher GPU core count.

http://shop.amd.com/us/All/ModelsPerLin ... ordesktops

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2 ... i-review/1