<$100 2core Athlon II AMD? X2 240e? or undervolt X2 250?
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<$100 2core Athlon II AMD? X2 240e? or undervolt X2 250?
What's the best value AMD dual-core AM3 CPU under $100 (CDN) for combination of low power and fast processing speeds? Going to use the MSI 785GM-E65 main board.
Should I get an e CPU and undervolt/tinker or should I get a regular Athlon II and undervolt. I see mixed responses. Some people say the e CPU's are better, and use less power than undervolting an equivalent non-e CPU, while others say you don't save much power.
For example, here are a few different CPU's I could use with the MSI 785GM-E65:
Athlon II 240 $66, 245 $71, 250 $76
Athlon II 235e $79, 240e $89
Could I undervolt the X2 250 and get the power down to the level of the 240e? ...or would that require underclocking too?
Any thoughts?
Should I get an e CPU and undervolt/tinker or should I get a regular Athlon II and undervolt. I see mixed responses. Some people say the e CPU's are better, and use less power than undervolting an equivalent non-e CPU, while others say you don't save much power.
For example, here are a few different CPU's I could use with the MSI 785GM-E65:
Athlon II 240 $66, 245 $71, 250 $76
Athlon II 235e $79, 240e $89
Could I undervolt the X2 250 and get the power down to the level of the 240e? ...or would that require underclocking too?
Any thoughts?
240e
I am going to resurrect this older thread rather than start a new one about the same subject.
I know Mike C. uses a 240e in his HTPC, or he did a short while ago. But where are these cpus being sold? There are lots of articles at various websites, but none for sale that I can see.
And what about "morkys" question? I too would like to know if undervolting a 240 would yield the same results as an "e" model as far as total system power consumption.
*Also living off the grid at 3kwh per day.
I know Mike C. uses a 240e in his HTPC, or he did a short while ago. But where are these cpus being sold? There are lots of articles at various websites, but none for sale that I can see.
And what about "morkys" question? I too would like to know if undervolting a 240 would yield the same results as an "e" model as far as total system power consumption.
*Also living off the grid at 3kwh per day.
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I just bought one from buy.com, it should arrive any day now. Looks like they are still in stock. Kind of a premium over a regular 240, but I wanted to check it out. I'm sure many/most 240's can undervolt well, but it could be hit or miss and I didn't want to deal with the hassle.
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Yes... the "e" processors are just cherry picked. The regular ones can undervolt to about the same level. Also, like greenfrank said, they are hard to find. I think someone on here said Tigerdirect carried them, but there was about a 30% mark up over regular non-"e".greenfrank wrote:the "e" processors are hard to find, in my experience. Maybe are slightly better, but "regular" athlons if undervolted can perform also very well in power consumption.
This is what I can get on my Athlon II X2 250:
in a Shuttle SA76G2 barebone
AMD 760G + SB710
There is no FSB or voltage control in BIOS so all undervolting was done in K10stat
Stock: 3000Mhz 1.440V
Speed __ K10stat CPU-Z
3000Mhz 1.1500V 1.168V
2800Mhz 1.0875V 1.104V
2200Mhz 0.9500V 0.976V
1500Mhz 0.8000V 0.816V
0800Mhz 0.6750V 0.688V
There was an article on the 240e:
AMD Athlon II X2 245 vs 240e dissected
At stock, the 240e is 1.240V @ 2800Mhz and 0.920V @ 800Mhz. They further manually undervolted to: 1.040V @ 2800Mhz and 0.816V @ 800Mhz.
So there's even some more room to further undervolt on the "e" chips. The only downside for the regular chip is it has a crazy high voltage at top stock speed, 1.440V. Article even mentions it:
So even if you get an "e" chip, there's still further undervolting to be done. The only benefit I can see if that they could undervolt to 1.040V @ 2800Mhz 240e vs 1.104V @ 2800Mhz regular 250.As usual AMD CPUs have an ridiculously high VCore. Why a dual-core CPU needs 1.4250V is beyond our understanding. The so called energy efficient CPUs have a reduced VCore of 1.2500V. Also in idle the voltages are quite high. We don't like that at all.