AMD FX-4130 Black Edition Processor Review

Bulldozer has been a chip that has had end users a little divided for a while as it doesn’t offer up blazing performance and granted this is the case, but what they do offer up is performance on a budget. The choice to refresh the existing line of FX chips with improved models that offer slightly higher clocks and improved coolers is a welcome sign to the entry-level market and for basic home/office users or those that are generally on a tight budget we can’t but not recommend the FX line of chips. Its not just the chips that are cheap, the boards to go with them are also significantly cheaper, meaning that you can either save more money, or the money that can be saved on the core two components can be put to other uses such as storage, graphics or a better quality PSU.

Across all the tests we can see that the FX-4130 has done as AMD stated it would, giving the little bit extra over the older generation FX-4100, and given it is retailing for around the same price point, overclocks a bit better than before and comes with a far superior stock cooler, then all in all its a great deal.

Large number of the FX-4130 CPUs are rumoured to be able to hit 5GHz with ease, unfortunately this wasn’t the case with our particular sample, but this is the joys of the silicon lottery, you just don’t know until you try it. Either way though achieving a 25+% overclock is great in terms of free extra performance. OK so this was done with a high end board and cooler and it did mean that the power consumption rocketed, but even overclocking to a more modest 4.4 or 4.5GHz on the stock cooler will act as an added bonus, after all we all like extra performance for free.

Bottom line, AMD have rekindled the entry level FX line of CPUs and given them a new leash of life, the still highly competitive price point and good performance for that price, makes the FX-4130 a great budget ship for not too demanding environments.