There is more to computing than games though and there are certain workloads where an FX 8320 is very good value indeed. Like running lots of virtual machines, or similar things where having 8/4 cores is an advantage.

Anyway, the thing is that an FX-8320 costs £120 and for that price on the Intel side you can't even get an i3-6300 (£135+). So yes, an i7-6700K is faster but for close to £300 vs £120 you would expect it to be. The old adage: there's no such thing as bad product, just a bad price. And AMD have been forced to price their CPUs low enough for them to have specific niches.

So, hopefully ZEN will put an end to this kind of automatic "AMD=bad" prejudice.

what si the normal price?

ram =about 40 quid so good discount there

Product TypeMotherboard - ATX
Chipset TypeAMD 990X / AMD SB950
Data Bus Transfer Rate5.2 GT/s
Processor SocketSocket AM3+
Max Processors Qty1
Compatible ProcessorsSempron, Phenom II X3, Athlon II X2, Phenom II X2, Athlon II X4, Athlon II X3, Athlon II, Phenom II X4, Phenom II X6, FX

AMD, no thanks :disappointed:

no point as new AM4 Zen is out in 3-5 months.

Penny-wise, pound foolish then. Since when he asks for an upgraded CPU in a year or two you'll have to buy a new motherboard AND RAM (since DDR4 will be what AMD will be using) as well as the new CPU. It's all about that upgrade path for me I'm afraid, even for budget rigs.

Going by benchmarks the FX-8320 is 20% faster than my 5 year old i5-2500K. If they bought this mobo and that CPU, I can't imagine they would need to upgrade it for a good few years yet.

Thanks OP.

I'd previously thought about the board but didn't think it was worth it as I'd need to get new ram (yep still on DDR2). This gives me some sort of upgrade path and works with my current chips.

I find it runs smoother when I have different programs on multiple monitors with an FX-8350 compared to my old Intel rig.

That's not the first time I have heard that. It's possible that the FX CPUs have faster context switching, or (since not many things use FPU) having 8 integer cores is better for multi-tasking than having four (i5, quad i7 with HT).

Thing is, no site measures stuff like this. Think one site used to run DPC latency for motherboard reviews but that's rare and of course adding any new hardware or updating drivers can change the results.

For a multimedia rig, separate from my gaming rig, this is a great motherboard for the feature set compared to a Z170 board at the same price, plus you are getting 8GB of memory for free. Partner it with a used FX 8320e, perhaps, to keep that infamous FX high power draw down a bit and frugal nvidia graphics card so that you use a budget PSU that still fits the systems power requirements and... whether I turn down the central heating a notch or not, I have a room to heat, so I am not particularly concerned about power draw, that money is going to be spent keeping me warm, either way, you know? I would prefer that it was a M-ITX or M-ATX format board for a living room multimedia build but for the features and free memory, it's a good deal.

We are already 4 years down the line. The best CPUs for this board were released in October 2012.

During the the AMD Athlon XP era I upgraded my CPU twice and during the Haswell era I've upgraded my CPU twice again. Maybe I'm an outlying case.

Ordered one as I did the math and my current AM3+ board (Asus M5A78L-M USB3) though a few years old still sells for around £30 to £40 used (I paid about that when new...), and if you sell on the ram for around £40 the board itself is costing very little at all. New board, better specs, very little expense after selling off the un-needed parts, so hot from me.

My current CPU costs more now than it did then too (FX-6300). Not looking for a full new build until I have the cash for a good one. Will see how the Zen offerings and boards fare when released too.

All this arguing over CPU's whilst my 8 year old AMD x4 955 OC'ed to 4.0ghz is still chugging along well for all my needs including gaming. Next year I'll definitely be upgrading my Mobo, CPU, Ram and GPU.

Is this motherboard better than an asus m5a99x evo r1?

Has anyone who has this motherboard had any issues with the north bridge being very hot?

Im no fanboy but for years amd drivers did and still do my crunch in. Also the new GFs are still dire for htpc and stll cant decode some formats correctly! Didnt stop me buying shares in them last year, made a killing thx amd!