i wonder if any of you can help me out, i currently game using an Athlon x2 270 3.4ghz

whats the best budget AMD cpu around the £60 - £70 range?

i am currently looking at this http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-334-AM its an Athlon x4 3.2ghz one of the selling points for me  is its low power condumption

for genral all round use plus gaming will it perform better than my Athlon x 2 in all tasks? i know the clock speed is a little quicker on my x2 but with 2 extra cores will i notice a tangable difference? plus would there be any benifit on keeping the x2 over the x4?

i use a samsung syncmaster with max resolution of 1440 x 900 and games look pretty neat if im being honest(much better than my ps3) so full 1080p is out of the question anyway the 1440 x 900 is suffice.

my graphics card is a radeon hd 7770

just a few screen grabs above to give you an idea how my set up currently runs, i would ideally if the cpu permits is turn up individual graphics seeting up higher

thanks for any input

I did a swap out AMD CPU a couple months back. What AMD socket do you have on your motherboard? Is it AM3+?

Without telling us which socket you have we could suggest the wrong CPU.

Edit: The link didn't load initially but now it has I see the socket is FM2.

That is pretty much what I use, see below.  My Grpahics is the AMD HD6870, RAM is 8GB DDR3 Overclocked to 1920mhz or something like that.

As far as AMD CPUs go it is very good.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/AMD-Processor-AD760kWOHLBOX-Technology-Virtualization/dp/B00D7BYMB2/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1383747581&sr=1-1&keywords=amd+athlon+socket+FM2

http://www.msi.com/product/mb/760GM-P21--FX-.html#/?div=CPUSupport looks like your right, il have to keep looking which CPU i can find thats compatible with the mobo ive put a link for - id prefer to buy brand new TBH £60 range ish

it does state something about unlocking a core on the mobo description but i dont know if current CPU will?

It basically supports all AM3 and AM3+ CPU's that have a 95W TDP and lower.
Thus, if you can pick up a Phenom 2 x6 1035/1045T/1055T or an FX 6100/6300/8120/8300 for your price range, go for them.
You might need to perform a BIOS update with the FX chips though.

As for Core unlocking, it's essentially a game of chance, I've had a few that unlocked into full Phenoms such as an Athlon 2 x4 620, Phenom 2 x4 960T that unlocked into a Phenom 2 x6, etc'.
Basically, just go into your BIOS and enable/set to All - "Advanced Clock Calibration" also known as ACC.
If you run into issues just reset the BIOS by disconnecting the power from your PC and removing the battery off the motherboard or finding the Bios reset jumper.

Or download CPU-Z and take a screen shot and I'll tell you if it's possible. :P

i was having a look at the fx-6100 its £79.99 http://www.amazon.co.uk/AMD-Bulldozer-FX-6100-Socket-Processor/dp/B005UBNKWO

but on a comparison site the FX is only 1% faster in graphics application and games? i may stick with what ive got if theres not a tangable difference. i may possibly swap out my 7770 for a 7790 and swap out a 4gb ram stick for a 8gb giving me 12gb total

AMD Athlon II X2 270 advantages

The Athlon II X2 270 is 21% faster in single-threaded tasks. It can be up to 35% faster in some applications. The processor has 3DNow! technology enabled. Even though the 3DNow! instructions may enhance performance of certain old games, they are now obsolete, and they are not utilized by modern programs. Power consumption of the CPU is lower.

 AMD FX-6100 advantages

In multi-threaded tasks, the AMD FX-6100 is 74% faster. Memory performance of the FX-6100 microprocessor is better. The FX-6100 processor performs 1% faster in graphics applications and games. The CPU incorporates SSSE3, SSE4.1 and SSE4.2 instructions. The FX-6100 supports AES, or Advanced Encryption Standard, technology. This extension provides hardware acceleration of AES encryption and decryption, and is beneficial if you need to protect your disk or network data. The microprocessor features AVX and XOP instructions. These extensions are not extensively used by programs yet, however their support should improve in future applications. The processor incorporates FMA4 instruction set extension. Only AMD processors offer this technology, thus not many software vendors may support it in the future. The clock multiplier on the microprocessor is not locked. Therefore, the CPU can be effortlessly overclocked on most motherboards to get higher performance.

There is a tangible difference, just not in lightly threaded tasks, I.E. It will dominate with anything that uses more than 2 threads, gaming included.
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/cpu-charts-2013/compare,3150.html?prod[5789]=on&prod[5808]=on

edited the 6300 will cost u about 89.99 so its only 10 more the the 6100 although that is alittle bit out of your price range. you might not get the performance out of the fx cpu due to it being made for am3+.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-338-AM

I would suggest getting atleast 4 core CPU and AMDs mantle API apparently likes more cores and can use them for rendering purposes too. Since your have 7770 your system will get a performance boost from the Mantle API that should hit sometime in december first for BF4.

two cores are just not going to cut it anymore

Definately switch to 8gb of ram and into a 64bit system too, newer games will likely require both, or atleast give you better experience.

He lives in the UK, prices will be different and thus he can't buy from newegg.