Review on AMD Athlon II X3 400E Energy Efficient Rana 2.2 GHz 3x512 KB L2 Cache Socket AM3 45W Triple-Core Processor for Retail - AD400EHDGIBOX by Iori Yagami

Name: AMD Athlon II X3 400E Energy Efficient Rana 2.2 GHz 3x512 KB L2 Cache Socket AM3 45W Triple-Core Processor for Retail - AD400EHDGIBOX
Item: AMD Athlon II X3 400E Energy Efficient Rana 2.2 GHz 3x512 KB L2 Cache Socket AM3 45W Triple-Core Processor for Retail - AD400EHDGIBOX
Rating: 4

November 28, 2022

I'm completely satisfied with the product, it works.

Well, what can I say? The opinion, of course, is ambiguous - on the one hand, when I bought it, Bulldozer processors were already in full use and Zambezi and Vishera were starting to be produced, but they cost decently, and on my then Gigabyte M52L-S3P board, some Bulldozers would not work (they offered Phenom II x4 BE for 3k), socket AM2+, so I took an Athlon II X3 460 and chose a board. As a result, I settled on the current ASUS M5A78L-LE (for 1900) on AM3 + put this percentage on it, unlocked the fourth core, but the TDP became simply godless, the temperature rose above 62 degrees. I had to buy a decent Zalman CNPS 9900 cooler for 2k - it got better (now the sensors show from 54 to 57). Even in the BIOS, I turned on 10% overclocking, the 1333 MHz memory runs at a frequency of 1467. It also holds 1600, but in some games it throws it on the Desktop, so I stopped at moderate overclocking. At the same time, in the same BIOS section (unleashing mode), I set the "value" of each of the available cores to 0%, since at the maximum available + 12% the temperature rises even more.
As a result, now the frequency of the processor with four cores is 3.74 GHz, the memory frequency is 1467 MHz, the temperature of the cores is 55 degrees each. Let's see what happens in powerful games.

Pros

Price. I took it at the beginning of the year (almost at the end of the last) for 2500 or 2600, now it costs less than 2022. It is possible to unlock the 4th core and turn (for me personally) into a Phenom II x4 B60, on the Propus core, but this, of course, increases heat dissipation.

Cons

There is no third-level cache - what can you do, after all, today the technical process is already old, and even here you have to choose between the available fourth core or cache, one thing. After unlocking the fourth core, TDP becomes 125 watts (originally 95).