Phenom II x6 1045t and GTX 660 (not Ti) bottleneck? - Hardware & Software

The GTX 660 is quite a powerful card, I'm planning on purchasing these two and I'm wondering if the Phenom will bottleneck the 660. If so, how much? [editline]27th November 2012[/editline] This should be in PC building shouldn't it.

I wouldn't be able to answer that. Probably a bit in games that aren't multi-threaded (utilize more than one core) too well. My old Phenom II X3 (OC'ed from 2.7 to 3.4) bottlenecked my performance in a few games when using a single AMD HD 6950 ([URL="http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/510?vs=660"]your current card is better than it[/URL]). Games like Alan Wake were noticeably bottle-necked for me CPU-wise. Although your CPU is good enough to not have the bottlenecks I had (I guess?), cross-firing would most likely be limited by your CPU, though not too terribly. Just a select few games where CPU usage is very intensive. [B]You'll most likely be hitting around 60 FPS in almost all cases[/B] so the bottle-neck shouldn't be much of an issue as it currently stands. If you've run into games where your CPU has noticeably bottlenecked your gameplay, then you definitely won't see substantial gains with a second GPU. Monitor your GPU usage during play sessions (ATI Tools, or CCC), and if you're not accessing 100%, you're most likely getting bottlenecked, or have VSync on. [editline]27th November 2012[/editline] Oh, I misread. You don't have either yet? You should be absolutely fine with those two. Not many applications go past 2/4 cores, so if you can find a more powerful quad-core, go for it unless you plan on running programs on the side like FRAPS/broadcasting services, or do heavy video-encoding. I haven't heard of any games actually utilizing 6-cores as the benefits tend to lessen. This is the entire reason I left AMD and switched to Intel recently (I wanted the most calculations per-core due to those exact bottlenecking issues) as their mainstream processors only go up to 4-cores and their focus is performance per-core rather than quantity of cores. [editline]27th November 2012[/editline] The only game you'd actually notice a real bottleneck is Witcher 2. [URL="http://static.techspot.com/articles-info/405/bench/CPU2.png"]That game scales like crazy depending on your CPU.[/URL] (do notice how the Phenom II X4 outperforms the Phenom II X6 in the graph) If you have any questions, PM me. I might be able to help you out a bit more if you have any specific questions.

Wow, thanks man. That was quite an answer. I wanted the x6 for recording and video processing, so hopefully it will do well. If I were only going to game then I'd definitely go for an x4.

Yeah. As I may have mentioned, one of my regrets to the Intel CPU (I went for the 3570kk) but regret not getting hyper-threading (which increases performance in video-processing, and is in the 3770k) because I have a bunch of videos in 1080p that take a nice chunk of time to fully encode, as well as the nasty performance hit I take when recording with FRAPS or trying to live-stream my games using Procaster. I do have a question for you though, since you'd mentioned you're going for video processing. I currently use Virtual Dub because it's a free, powerful video encoder, but I've been trying to find out the best encoding solution. Any idea what the best codec for games? It would have to look good after going through to youtube as well. I record all my stuff in 1080p when possible, so having the greatest quality is the goal. I have heard of double-passing the video, but could not get that to work. Any thoughts? I have a backlog of videos waiting to be processed once I finally decide on the codec(s) and options.

I'm sorry but I wouldn't know. As far as my recording goes, I use the default lossless avi format that fraps is set to. My codec is Windows Media, and I haven't seen the need to switch it up.

[QUOTE=Cjmax;38614677]I'm sorry but I wouldn't know. As far as my recording goes, I use the default lossless avi format that fraps is set to. My codec is Windows Media, and I haven't seen the need to switch it up.[/QUOTE] If you still haven't bought it, I would recommend you a Intel processor. As many people will tell you it even at a lower clock just beats the most AMD processors.

[QUOTE=Killervalon;38625629]If you still haven't bought it, I would recommend you a Intel processor. As many people will tell you it even at a lower clock just beats the most AMD processors.[/QUOTE] He might currently have an AM3 motherboard that supports it.

Yeah I'm happy with the upgrade I'd be getting without having to fork over an extra $65+ for a semi decent intel mobo, and the extra price for an intel processor.

get an i3 3220. cheap, run cool, and beat the 1100T in most games