AMD has been laying more and more emphasis over its mid-range processors, adding another member to the 8-core CPU family, the FX-8370. For people who are looking to build a new PC in budget or upgrading the their old FX processor, this seems to be a great option.
| No. of Cores | 8 |
| Processor Model | FX-8370 |
| Compatible Socket | AM3+ |
| Clock Speed | 4 GHz |
| Max Turbo Speed | 4.3 GHz |
| Power Consumption | 125W |
| Cache Memory Details | L2 – 8MB L3 – 8MB |
With the same Piledriver architecture as certain old FX chips and the same base clock speed as the FX-8350, the 8370 offers a slight upgrade in terms of maximum clock speed and functionality. It is certainly a great choice if power consumption is not much of an issue and you want to upgrade from your previous quad or hexacore processor. Also, it opens up avenues for people who are building a PC from ground up and want to pair up the CPU with a decent graphics card. It is easier to bundle it with a good GPU than it is to do the same with the similarly priced i5 or the much costlier i7 CPU.
The 8370 is a reasonably good performer when it comes to processes and applications that can make use of all its 8 cores. Another great advantage is that its relatively easy to overclock, compared to its intel counterparts. So, you can achieve even greater performance with a decent air or liquid cooler.
Geekbench 32-bit single-core benchmark
Geekbench 64-bit single core benchmark
3D Mark 11 score comparison for similar price range
As can be seen from the 3D mark 11 as well as Geekbench benchmark scores, it is evident that for similarly priced processors, the FX-8370 provides at par performance and is great for a budget build. However, it was still outperformed by the new i5 processors. But the i5 processors are more expensive than the 8370, hence reiterating our point.
Talking about the Wraith Cooler, stock heatsinks often don’t sound that great under load, and they usually turn in thermal performance that’s best described as “good enough.” Even affordable third-party coolers offer a big step up in cooling and acoustic performance. AMD seems to be aware of this problem, and seems to solve it with the Wraith Cooler. It looks great, and has an LED backlit AMD logo, which seems hidden as long as the cooler is off. For a stock cooler, the Wraith sounds pretty good (meaning it doesn’t sound so much). To handle a processor temperature topped at 69 C, the Wraith Cooler worked at about 1320 RPM, less than half of its roughly 3000-RPM rated maximum.
Considering that the 8370 is based on the same architecture and base speed than the previous 8350, we didn’t expect it to be a huge improvement. But if you plan to run media crunchy applications that utilize all the cores well, and do not care much about the power consumption, the FX-8370 will be a nifty little addition to your new PC.
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