Radeon HD Dual Graphics question

RikuoAmero

Hey guys, I'm almost ready to build a new media centre/web browser/email/light gaming rig. The only component I'm waiting on delivery for is the power supply, everything else is ready.
The components are
Gigabyte GA-F2A55M-DS2 rev3.0 mATX motherboard
AMD A8 5500 APU, 3.2GHz Quad Core
AMD Radeon HD 7560D integrated graphics
4GB RAM
Sound Blaster X-fi Surround 5.1 Pro USB sound card (had this left over from a previous machine)
Windows 8.1 64-bit

At the moment, I have an old XFX Geforce GT 240 512MB I can throw in that I'm not currently using. However, I heard of Dual Graphics, how the integrated graphics can work with select Radeon discrete cards. I looked it up on the AMD website, but their page doesn't say anything about the APU I have
http://www.amd.com/en-us/innovations/software-technologies/dual-graphics#desktop

Would the Radeon R5 230 be able to take advantage of Dual Graphics? I can pick one up tomorrow from Elara.

Thanks.

TerrorFirmer

I wouldn't bother personally, APU and GPU crossfire isn't great. It might be viable if you already had an A10 or similar, but the 5500 is a really weak processor and the R7 230 is a joke altogether, so the two working together would still struggle their way through pretty much any new release.

You'd be far better off just spending €90 on a GTX750 or 260X type card which would be so much faster.

The A8 and A10 lines are not designed for someone who wants to add a card straight away, more along the lines of 'I might add a card six months down the line'....buying an A8 and a dedicated card in a new build for gaming makes no sense. The Intel i3 is only a little more expensive than the A8 and it's so much better in games (the integrated graphics are weaker though but the point is totally moot if you're planning on adding a card anyway). Even a €50 G3220 would be a better choice for games, and the cost of that plus motherboard can be bought cheaper than the A8-5500 on its own.

RikuoAmero

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

I wouldn't bother personally, APU and GPU crossfire isn't great. It might be viable if you already had an A10 or similar, but the 5500 is a really weak processor and the R7 230 is a joke altogether, so the two working together would still struggle their way through pretty much any new release.

You'd be far better off just spending €90 on a GTX750 or 260X type card which would be so much faster.

The A8 and A10 lines are not designed for someone who wants to add a card straight away, more along the lines of 'I might add a card six months down the line'....buying an A8 and a dedicated card in a new build for gaming makes no sense. The Intel i3 is only a little more expensive than the A8 and it's so much better in games (the integrated graphics are weaker though but the point is totally moot if you're planning on adding a card anyway).

When I said light gaming, I didn't mean anything along the lines of twitch shooters or something where you can toggle graphics settings. At most, on this machine, I'd be playing indie games like say Minecraft, Binding of Isaac, Terrarria and the like. I was just looking to get something that could at the least run these games without me having to go to my GTX 770 4GB gaming rig.

TerrorFirmer

But why want to add a dedicated card on top of the integrated radeon?

I get it'll boost performance but then you end up turning the whole build into a poor value for money machine.

An A8-5500 + FM2 Mobo + R7 240 would be about €180 and performance would still be very poor. (forget the R5 230 altogether)

For the same price, you could get a G3220, S1150 mobo + R7 260X which would destroy it in games.

APU+GPU Crossfire is terrible value for money for a new build - it only works when you want to increase the performance say 12 months down the line. It doesn't make any sense otherwise.

The integrated graphics on the a8 would be fine for those games you've mentioned though.

RikuoAmero

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

But why want to add a dedicated card on top of the integrated radeon?

I get it'll boost performance but then you end up turning the whole build into a poor value for money machine.

An A8-5500 + FM2 Mobo + R7 240 would be about €180 and performance would still be very poor. (forget the R5 230 altogether)

For the same price, you could get a G3220, S1150 mobo + R7 260X which would destroy it in games.

APU+GPU Crossfire is terrible value for money for a new build - it only works when you want to increase the performance say 12 months down the line. It doesn't make any sense otherwise.

The integrated graphics on the a8 would be fine for those games you've mentioned though.

As I said in the OP, I've already got all the components, except for the power supply, so there's no point in telling me about Intel components. I know NOW that Intel CPUs are better, but at the time of ordering the AMD APU, I didn't know that AMD clock speeds don't mean the same as Intel clock speeds.

I'll take your R7 240 suggestion under advisement. I'll try out the GT 240, if I'm unhappy with it, then I'll get the R7 (it's only 60 quid on Elara right now). Thanks for your help.

TerrorFirmer

The R7 240 is terrible performance wise, I have one here and it can't even run Battlefield 4 at lowest settings online. I know you're not planning on playing Battlefield, but more as an indicator of how poor the card is. To make any meaningful gains on the APU, I would say you'd have to be looking at an R7 250/250x at a minimum - otherwise you'd be better off just getting a dedicated card and forgetting about the APU and crossfire.

The GT240 would be about the same as the 7560D APU. I have one of them as well and I could get Battlefield running OK at 720p (its basically a rebranded 9600GT).

I would probably just stick with the APU though, less noise and power consumption. You can keep an eye out for something like a 2nd hand HD7750 which you should be able to get for about €50 and crossfire with the APU would be pretty strong.

Another decent cheap option would be a 6670 (GDDR5 model) which can be found for about €30 and that should give decent crossfire performance as well - just check the xfire compatiability options, not every card works

RikuoAmero

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

The R7 240 is terrible performance wise, I have one here and it can't even run Battlefield 4 at lowest settings online. I know you're not planning on playing Battlefield, but more as an indicator of how poor the card is. To make any meaningful gains on the APU, I would say you'd have to be looking at an R7 250/250x at a minimum - otherwise you'd be better off just getting a dedicated card and forgetting about the APU and crossfire.

The GT240 would be about the same as the 7560D APU. I have one of them as well and I could get Battlefield running OK at 720p (its basically a rebranded 9600GT).

I would probably just stick with the APU though, less noise and power consumption. You can keep an eye out for something like a 2nd hand HD7750 which you should be able to get for about €50 and crossfire with the APU would be pretty strong.

Another decent cheap option would be a 6670 (GDDR5 model) which can be found for about €30 and that should give decent crossfire performance as well - just check the xfire compatiability options, not every card works

Hmm...according to this site
http://www.cpu-world.com/info/AMD/Recommended_graphics_cards_for_AMD_dual-graphics.html
the Radeon HD 6570 would work with my APU, and not the 6670.

TerrorFirmer

That's strange, could be worth investigating as I am almost sure I saw a 6670 somewhere before, as well as the 7730 and 7750 (though looking now, it appears that scaling is rubbish with these cards so there's no point).

7560D + 6570 is still going to be pretty slow, so I would probably just stick with the 7560D for now, and in 6-12 months if it's needed, just think about a decent dedicated card like the 250X or GT740 upwards.

RikuoAmero

Okay, just to thank you guys for all the help, and to let you know, whoever shipped me the mobo bundle messed up. Instead of the A8 5500 APU, I got the A10 5700, with Radeon HD 7560D. I'm not sure whether to send the A10 back. It's only a dual core, not quad core as was advertised on Amazon, but it is 3.4GHz, versus the A8's advertised 3.2GHz.

TerrorFirmer

The A10 is definitely a quad. If that's what you got, then it's your lucky day! It's much better than the 5500. It should be the 7660D graphics.

It's the A4's and A6's that are dual cores.

RikuoAmero

Nope, dual core. It's what Windows is reporting back to me. Cores: 2, Logical Processors: 4. Yes, I did make a mistake up there though, it is the 7660D.

Weird, just checked AMD's site, and they're reporting that it's quad core
http://products.amd.com/en-us/DesktopAPUDetail.aspx?id=45

TerrorFirmer

Download cpu-z and see what that says. It is definitely a quad core processor.

Unless there's a setting in your bios restricting it to two cores, but more likely it's just not being detected right by Windows.

RikuoAmero

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Download cpu-z and see what that says. It is definitely a quad core processor.

Unless there's a setting in your bios restricting it to two cores, but more likely it's just not being detected right by Windows.

Tried that just before I saw this message, CPU-Z says Cores 4: Threads: 4. I'm going into the BIOS to have a look.

BIOS shows 4 cores, but it doesn't elaborate on whether these are 4 real cores, or 2 cores with hyper-threading (or whatever it is AMD calls their version of HT)