Our test benches consist of the following components:
AMD Piledriver FX-8350 Test Bench
CPU - AMD Piledriver FX-8350 Eight-Core Processor
Cooling - Noctua NH-D14
Motherboard - ASUS M5A99X EVO
Memory - G.SKILL RipJawX DDR3-1866MHz CL9
Graphics - ZOTAC GTX 570 1280MB
Storage - Corsair Force F120
PSU - FSP Aurum CM Series 750W 80PLUS Gold
CPU - AMD Piledriver FX-8350 Eight-Core Processor
Cooling - Noctua NH-D14
Motherboard - ASUS M5A99X EVO
Memory - G.SKILL RipJawX DDR3-1866MHz CL9
Graphics - ZOTAC GTX 570 1280MB
Storage - Corsair Force F120
PSU - FSP Aurum CM Series 750W 80PLUS Gold
AMD Bulldozer FX-8120 Test Bench
CPU - AMD Bulldozer FX-8120 Eight-Core Processor
Cooling - Noctua NH-D14
Motherboard - ASUS M5A99X EVO
Memory - G.SKILL RipJawX DDR3-1866MHz CL9
Graphics - ZOTAC GTX 570 1280MB
Storage - Corsair Force F120
PSU - FSP Aurum CM Series 750W 80PLUS Gold
CPU - AMD Bulldozer FX-8120 Eight-Core Processor
Cooling - Noctua NH-D14
Motherboard - ASUS M5A99X EVO
Memory - G.SKILL RipJawX DDR3-1866MHz CL9
Graphics - ZOTAC GTX 570 1280MB
Storage - Corsair Force F120
PSU - FSP Aurum CM Series 750W 80PLUS Gold
Before we start any overclocking, we will be setting the BIOS to the following defaults before beginning any overclocking.
Overclocking Settings
RAM speed - 1066MHz
CPU/NB and HT Links - 1600MHz (8x CPU bus)
RAM speed - 1066MHz
CPU/NB and HT Links - 1600MHz (8x CPU bus)
For all of our AMD CPU reviews, we will be running the following benchmarks to give you a varied array of results to best portray the CPU(s).
AIDA64 - CPU benchmarks
X264 HD 5.0.1 - 1st and 2nd pass encoding
SiSoftware Sandra 2012 - CPU and Memory benchmarks
CineBench 11.5 - CPU score
3DMark 11 - DX11 3D Performance and Extreme preset
Games - Crysis 2, DiRT Showdown, Skyrim and Sleeping Dogs
X264 HD 5.0.1 - 1st and 2nd pass encoding
SiSoftware Sandra 2012 - CPU and Memory benchmarks
CineBench 11.5 - CPU score
3DMark 11 - DX11 3D Performance and Extreme preset
Games - Crysis 2, DiRT Showdown, Skyrim and Sleeping Dogs