Athlon or Phenom? (1 Viewer)

[lubbe75]

Sorry, I have many questions right now, many choices to make...

Let's say you are building a HTPC, smaller than full-tower but not tiny. Let's say you put in a mobo (or graphics card) that handles most or some video decoding, and let's say you want to be able to play everything (including 1080p and 1080i).

Now, does it make sense to choose a Phenom instead of Athlon CPU?
Is Phenom overkill if all I want to do is to play video, blu-ray and HD-TV?
What about heat?

My choice right now is between these two:

AMD ATHLON 64 X2 5600+ 2.9GHZ 65W
AMD PHENOM X3 8450 2.1GHZ 95W

What would you choose, and why?

 

[disaster123]

If you want to buy a mainboard with onboard graphic acceleration for example 780G chipset you need a phenom for good picture quality. Otherwise take an Athlon EE or BE.

 

[lubbe75]

That's a quick and clear answer! Thanks!

 

[Stutch]

A lot of people opt for the Athlon X2 4850e because it is cheap, runs 1080p content fine, and is a 45W processor.