# Athlon II vs. Phenom II?



## Floobles (Dec 27, 2010)

I'm building a gaming rig to max out all current games at 1440x768 resolution. My current build is solid enough I believe, but I really want to bring my price down as much as possible.

I still hear good things about the AMD Athlon II being a damn good CPU, would choosing this over a Phenom II cause a significant drop in performance? 

Here's a screenshot of most of my parts, I'll provide actual links though if you need them.


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## Madeentje (Sep 6, 2009)

If I'm not mistaken the only difference between them is that Phenom II has a level 3 cache, Athlon II doesn't. At the moment, for most software, the difference in performance is very marginal. But I thought I read somewhere that in the future software/games might be in need for of that level 3 cache a lot more than now. So if you don't plan on upgrading any time soon I'd stick with the Phenom. If you think you'll upgrade in 2 (maybe up to 3) years, Athlon should do I think.

If I'm wrong about the difference between both CPU's, someone please correct me.


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## deleted10242017b (Dec 18, 2010)

There are no Athlon II hexa-cores but there is with Phenom II and plus Phenom II's go faster and can be overclocked more that Athlons and are as you say future proof.


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

The 5400 rpm drive is slow, look for a WD black drive, drop down to a 640 or 750 gig the price should be close to the same as the green drive.

The EA 650 isn't a good choice it's a OEM Delta unit normally often with mixed bag of capacitors, look to a Seasonic or Corsair 650TX. 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007657%20600014022&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&CompareItemList=58|17-139-005^17-139-005-TS%2C17-151-095^17-151-095-TS


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## gcavan (Aug 13, 2009)

For a primarily gaming computer, go with a Phenom II. Not for a hex core or even a quad but for the 6 MB of L3 cache. It allows the proc to do many more calculations on chip without going to system memory. If you are on a budget, go with a Phenom II X2 550 or 555. Under $100 and will 'out-game' any of the Athlon II quads.

Knock another $75 or so off the bottom line by chosing a Radeon HD 5770. It will handle any game out there at the resolutions you state (and higher).


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## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

And if your lucky the other 2 cores will unlock and run fine, if not you still have a good dual core CPU.


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## gcavan (Aug 13, 2009)

wrench97 said:


> And if your lucky the other 2 cores will unlock and run fine, if not you still have a good dual core CPU.


And there is that too.


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## Floobles (Dec 27, 2010)

wrench97 said:


> The 5400 rpm drive is slow, look for a WD black drive, drop down to a 640 or 750 gig the price should be close to the same as the green drive.
> 
> The EA 650 isn't a good choice it's a OEM Delta unit normally often with mixed bag of capacitors, look to a Seasonic or Corsair 650TX.
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007657%20600014022&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&CompareItemList=58|17-139-005^17-139-005-TS%2C17-151-095^17-151-095-TS


Oh yea, I was going to use a different PSU and a 7200 rpm HD suggested in another thread, just hadn't updated that screenshot.

The PSU I was going to use is actually the 650watt Corsair on that link.

So, I think I'll just stick to the Phenom II then?


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## 723869 (Aug 2, 2010)

Floobles said:


> So, I think I'll just stick to the Phenom II then?


Sounds good to me.


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## Drenlin (Dec 13, 2010)

wrench97 said:


> The EA 650 isn't a good choice it's a OEM Delta unit normally often with mixed bag of capacitors


Samxon mains, on that unit. Could be better, for sure, but they could definitely be worse as well. The rest of them are mostly Japanese, some Taiwanese. 

The TX is indeed a better PSU, I won't argue there. However, please don't blame Delta for capacitor choice. That was made by Antec. Cap choice is rarely made by the OEM, since the units are built to the buyers specifications. Delta's build quality is nearly always the best in the business, even better than Seasonic. While its performance may be a _little_ worse (+12V ripple), the Earthwatts is easily built better than the TX. Seriously, look at the PCB on this thing:












As for Athlon II vs Phenom II, it really depends on what program you're running. Sometimes there's little to no difference in them clock for clock, sometimes it's as high as 20%, though rarely. I'd say on average Phenom II's are about 10% faster clock for clock, and also are capable of much higher clocks. Athlon II quads tend to top out around 3.6GHz, while Phenom II's routinely hit 3.8GHz and above on air. The unlocked multiplier on most of the Phenoms doesn't hurt things either.


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

you surely are not going to find any 105C commerical caps in that Earthwatts unit

the TX has a much more proven record of success than any of the numerous internal changes of the EA units / Antec has a history of cheesing up the internal parts as soon as a model becomes popular, just like they did with the seasonic OEM trio's


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## stringcheese166 (Nov 27, 2009)

dont get the green caviar they die excessively fast mien died in a week 
phenom II definately


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## ebackhus (Apr 21, 2005)

I have a Green series. I've had it for about a year. No issues. My wife also has one and no issues there either.


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## linderman (May 20, 2005)

all hard drives and hard drive manuf's have their high failure rates; it comes with being forced to make big drive at dirt cheap prices; we as consumers cant have it in all directions.

1TB drive for $69.00 means you better get two of them / one for back-ups


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## stringcheese166 (Nov 27, 2009)

ebackhus said:


> I have a Green series. I've had it for about a year. No issues. My wife also has one and no issues there either.


what size?
i made the mistake of getting 2 tb >:/ would a good replacement be 3 seasonic 1 tb drives? i plannedon doing a raid with two of them


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## ebackhus (Apr 21, 2005)

We both use 1TB drives and I also bought a 500GB Green drive as well. Not a single problem and I use the drives in my machine constantly.


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