Best AMD CPU

[bigjer73 2]

Hello, I'm looking for suggestions on which MEDIUM PRICED AMD CPU you would recommend.

All of the AMD CPU's recommended on search pages seem to be outdated.

[Der Zeitgeist 1,575]

17 minutes ago, bigjer73 said:

Hello, I'm looking for suggestions on which MEDIUM PRICED AMD CPU you would recommend.

All of the AMD CPU's recommended on search pages seem to be outdated.

If you don't want to wait for the Zen 3 generation of Ryzen CPUs, something like the 3600 or the 3700x are probably your best bet. They are six core / eight core processors that should be enough for anything MSFS will throw at them, if paired with a capable GPU and some fast RAM.

[Redge 240]

Before you make your choice, I recommend you read this article posted yesterday on Tom's Hardware, all about MSFS performance: https://www.tomshardware.com/features/microsoft-flight-simulator-benchmarks-performance-system-requirements

As I've read elsewhere, the better CPU for MSFS (at the moment at least) appears to be Intel.

[MrFuzzy 2,117]

Intel CPUs have higher frequencies and perform better than AMD in games. MSFS does not use a high number of cores efficiently and with a higher IPC/frequency in single core operations Intel has an advantage with this game too.

Edited August 25, 2020 by MrFuzzy

[F737MAX 5,509]

22 minutes ago, Redge said:

I recommend you read this article posted yesterday on Tom's Hardware, all about MSFS performance: https://www.tomshardware.com/features/microsoft-flight-simulator-benchmarks-performance-system-requirements

I haven't relied on Tom's Hardware for reviews for a long time due to dodgy evaluation of tech and this won't change my opinion of the site:
 

 

1 hour ago, bigjer73 said:

Hello, I'm looking for suggestions on which MEDIUM PRICED AMD CPU you would recommend.

All of the AMD CPU's recommended on search pages seem to be outdated.

I wouldn't recommend any CPU right now. We're on the edge of a new generation of CPUs about to make their appearance with the Ryzen 4000 series. If nothing else, the arrival of these new AMD chips will drive down the prices of current gen CPUs of both manufacturers (as we saw last year).

If you absolutely cannot wait a couple of months, then medium priced* CPUs are either Ryzen 3600X or 3600 from AMD, or the I5-10600K or I5-9600K from Intel.

(*It's hard to know what you mean by "medium priced", it's highly subjective and really depends on your budget. So I just picked the CPUs in the middle of the offered range.)

[Redge 240]

 

11 minutes ago, F737NG said:

I haven't relied on Tom's Hardware for reviews for a long time due to dodgy evaluation of tech and this won't change my opinion of the site:

I must admit, it's been a long time since I paid attention to PC tech, but back when I last did (15 years ago, maybe?) I thought Tom's was considered to be among the best back then. I revisited it a month or two ago when I decided I'd like to built a custom rig just to run this thing.

Also, in my defence, the article had been corrected in the offending section by the time I got around to reading it 😉:

Quote

"It's more than a bit weird that not even Microsoft, the creators of DirectX, supports DX12 right now in this game, though that's perhaps developer Asobo Studio's fault. If anyone should have access to some quality DX12 software engineers, though, you'd think it would be the people making the latest Microsoft Flight Simulator. The game is also available on Steam, however, also with DX11 support, which is perhaps part of the newer, open Microsoft approach to gaming."

 

[G-RFRY 1,705]

The best bang for buck at the moment is the i5 10600K, will match the i9 10900K in some games ,TomsHardware never included the i9 10th Gen CPU`s for some strange reason.

[Anthracite 131]

Medium ranged amd is the 3600. The next gen consumer (zen 3) chips probably won’t hit until 2021. I expect the data centre zen3 to hit this year. 
 

ipc gains are said to be around 15% with a possible 5% increase in clock speeds. This will make them noticeably better in all tasks gaming included.

[mazex 419]

11 minutes ago, Anthracite said:

Medium ranged amd is the 3600. The next gen consumer (zen 3) chips probably won’t hit until 2021. I expect the data centre zen3 to hit this year. 
 

ipc gains are said to be around 15% with a possible 5% increase in clock speeds. This will make them noticeably better in all tasks gaming included.

Yes - if the leaked numbers of the IPC gains are correct and the engineering samples of Zen 3 running at 4.9Ghz are correct it shold be the CPU to beat for MSFS. And especially when they get their DX12 support sorted out so all cores get used better.

The latest official news from AMD this summer is still late 2020 for Vermeer (the Zen 3 desktop CPU) and production has been started. So the 2021 must be your own impression based on the fact that they have been silent for quite a while now? I have a bit of that feeling as well based on gut feeling but not more than that... 

Link to information about Vermeer delayed to 2021?

Edited August 25, 2020 by mazex

[Anthracite 131]

1 hour ago, mazex said:

Yes - if the leaked numbers of the IPC gains are correct and the engineering samples of Zen 3 running at 4.9Ghz are correct it shold be the CPU to beat for MSFS. And especially when they get their DX12 support sorted out so all cores get used better.

The latest official news from AMD this summer is still late 2020 for Vermeer (the Zen 3 desktop CPU) and production has been started. So the 2021 must be your own impression based on the fact that they have been silent for quite a while now? I have a bit of that feeling as well based on gut feeling but not more than that... 

Link to information about Vermeer delayed to 2021?

Yeah it’s my opinion on it, leaked roadmaps suggest Vermeer late 2020 and Warhol mid 2021 (zen3 refresh).

My opinion is that nvidia are about to announce some powerful gpus and probably a flagship that want a powerful processor to keep up with them. Right now people will buy intel to go with those in any gaming centric use cases; amd can hit both intel and nvidia where it hurts if they were to announce some solid cpus even if they weren’t due for release until nov/dec. It could make people hold off on a gpu purchase until they announced rdna2 officially, it could make them hold off on a full system upgrade until zen3 was released. It would also take some wind out of the sails of nvidias massive marketing push. This suggests to me that they’re not quite ready with the new processors or they’re not quite ready to knock their own zen2 platform out of its current foothold in the market. That or they’re not confident that they can take that crown from intel and therefore announcing them now would just hurt them and help intel.

All in all it makes me feel like these new processors are going to be good but not steal the gaming crown good OR we’re not going to see them until 2021. As I’m really hopeful that they do take that crown I’m going with the latter, early 2021. Could be that Warhol will take the crown or perhaps that won’t happen until zen4 if it happens at all of course. If it does come in 2020 we’re sitting pretty anyway, lots of new hardware choices.

(e: and they can still say they hit their target of 2020 if they release a data centre processor that’s zen3)

Edited August 25, 2020 by Anthracite

[mazex 419]

33 minutes ago, Anthracite said:

Yeah it’s my opinion on it, leaked roadmaps suggest Vermeer late 2020 and Warhol mid 2021 (zen3 refresh).

Yes - I hope for December at least. Have been sitting on my 4790k for ages now as I normally but a new CPU every 3 years the Intel tick-tick-tick-tick 14 nm fiasco has made me wait for the 10nm. And then Zen 2 came and disrupted. If Zen 3 is what it looks to be I will buy it instantly 🙂

[Farlis 2,277]

2 hours ago, MrFuzzy said:

Intel CPUs have higher frequencies and perform better than AMD in games. MSFS does not use a high number of cores efficiently and with a higher IPC/frequency in single core operations Intel has an advantage with this game too.

That advantage is clearly so marginal that the much higher prices of Intel make this a no-brainer.

[ChaoticBeauty 6,692]

AMD have confirmed client Zen 3 CPUs in 2020, which is probably Vermeer since Threadripper usually comes later. However it seems likely that they will be launching the 12- and 16-core variants first, which means the mainstream SKUs could slip to 2021. This is because it is expected that Zen 3 will have the single-threaded gaming performance lead over both Comet Lake and Rocket Lake, so it would make sense to keep it behind a premium price wall for a good while.

Warhol is looking to be a Zen 3 refresh for the AM5 socket with DDR5 memory, similar to Rembrandt. However the Warhol information does not come from a reliable source, and in the most recent roadmaps from a couple of weeks ago there is still no mention of a Zen 3 refresh. So I would take that with a grain of salt, though if it is real, it will likely exist to introduce the AM5 platform before Zen 4 is ready, and will be a very small refresh similar to Matisse 2, not worthy of a mention in roadmaps. It could even use the exact same CCDs with a new IOD.

[mazex 419]

10 minutes ago, ChaoticBeauty said:

AMD have confirmed client Zen 3 CPUs in 2020, which is probably Vermeer since Threadripper usually comes later. However it seems likely that they will be launching the 12- and 16-core variants first, which means the mainstream SKUs could slip to 2021. This is because it is expected that Zen 3 will have the single-threaded gaming performance lead over both Comet Lake and Rocket Lake, so it would make sense to keep it behind a premium price wall for a good while.

Warhol is looking to be a Zen 3 refresh for the AM5 socket with DDR5 memory, similar to Rembrandt. However the Warhol information does not come from a reliable source, and in the most recent roadmaps from a couple of weeks ago there is still no mention of a Zen 3 refresh. So I would take that with a grain of salt, though if it is real, it will likely exist to introduce the AM5 platform before Zen 4 is ready, and will be a very small refresh similar to Matisse 2, not worthy of a mention in roadmaps. It could even use the exact same CCDs with a new IOD.

Yep - I have waited for the Zen 3 a long time now. My wallet is wide open for a 12 core Ryzen 4900X in November 😉 Unless Tiger Lake is a surprise... It might cling on to the single thread crown by a hair vs the Zen 3, but that is so 2015 🙂 

[Anthracite 131]

36 minutes ago, mazex said:

Yes - I hope for December at least. Have been sitting on my 4790k for ages now as I normally but a new CPU every 3 years the Intel tick-tick-tick-tick 14 nm fiasco has made me wait for the 10nm. And then Zen 2 came and disrupted. If Zen 3 is what it looks to be I will buy it instantly 🙂

This is where I was until my 2500k failed on me. I’ve got 3600 as a stop gap but if Vermeer doesn’t offer significant benefits I may just be holding onto it for the foreseeable. Msfs not using dx12 was a real bummer when I read it. So much benefit from the parallelism offered in dx12, not to mention the vendor specific benefits of dlss and the architecture independent ray tracing. Considering msfs is published by Microsoft I find the situation bemusing.