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I just upgraded my 3 year old "AM2+" with a X4 640 AM3 (it needed a BIOS update).

Only problem is the north bridge heatsink wasn't designed for that much IO so I'm going to have to install a fan (it's literally too hot to touch).

That plus the fact that they dominate the PassMark's CPU/$ benchmark means I'll be buying AMD for a long time...

Except if it's their GPU offerings. They need to pull their heads out of their asses and catch up with Linux Support to Nvidia.

AMD has the top 10 of CPU Value Benchmarks. of available CPUs. I've been looking at upgrading my AM2 system and my final choice came down to the top 2 CPUs before I even found that list.

I think Intel has 4 out of the top 30 on that list. Intel does not have parts similar to AMD performance wise for the same price.

Thats funny because (A) I have had no trouble getting motherboards that support 6-core AMD's out of the box, (B) Flashing the bios is painless these days unless you are using some shitty assed brand of motherboard, and (C) AMD clearly wins the price/performance competition with all of the top-20 being AMD.

Hmm. For 400 bucks less from dell:

core i7 980 3.33 GHz http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html
12 gigs of ram
2TB HDD 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive
same video card
Dual Drive: Blu-ray Disc Drive (BD/DVD/CD burner w/double layer BD write capability)+16X DVD+/-RW
mouse, keyboard, users guide (lol, good thing you put that there)

Of course, without the smug-ass attitude that comes out-of-the-box with the Mac...where would you be?

This is why every douche who wants Macs in public education or enterprise needs to be punched in the face.

Even if Intel's compiler does better for Intel's own chips, which I'm sure it does, it is still the best compiler out there by a long shot.

This isnt about not putting effort into optimizing for non-Intel. This is about intentionally putting effort into sabotaging non-Intel performance. They have been convicted of this act, and so far have not honored the courts ruling on the matter.

Remember when Microsoft intentionally sabotaged competing DOS clones? Yeah.

They only care how it does in the apps they actually use. So if all their apps are ICC apps and they run better on Intel processors, well hten that's all that matters.

Who claimed that all their apps are ICC-based? The claim is that most BENCHMARKS use ICC-generated code at some point, and this claim is DEMONSTRABLY true (simply changing the CPUID VendorID string to "GenuineIntel" proves it, as many have done.)

Most apps for Windows are compiled with VC++ and most apps for Linux are compiled with GCC.

In spite of Intels unfair benchmarking advantage, AMD is still king of price/performance. Thats how killer AMD's are on the very metric we are talking about.

The first Intel showing is only 75% the price/performance value of AMD's best and of the top 20 or so CPU's on that chart, only two of them are from Intel. Quite frankly, Intel fanboys such as yourself should be embarrassed for not realizing how badly you are getting ripped off.

Those prices are just for the CPU as well, so doesnt include the higher price that Intel users pay for motherboards.

With CPU speeds like these, it almost seems like they just didn't want to say the word 'Atom'.

The fastest available Intel Atom is the D525 which is dual core. It gets 709 on PassMark.

An Intel Core 2 Duo U9400 1.4Ghz, on the same benchmark, gets 963.

For reference, an Intel Core i3 330UM @ 1.20GHz scores 1196 and an Intel Core2 Duo U9600 @ 1.60GHz scores 1129.

CPU speeds on these new Macbook Airs seem to be... rather pathetic

That's like asking for a big rig with a trailer to pull 1G on a skidpad or a Tesla Roadster to tow a big rig trailer.

Is the Air underpowered? Of course. But you find me an 11" form factor laptop that doesn't look like a giant brick and has a 2ghz+ i7. Not even the Dell Alienware M11x offers more than a 1.06ghz i7 or 1.3ghz Core 2.

With CPU speeds like these, it almost seems like they just didn't want to say the word 'Atom'.

The fastest available Intel Atom is the D525 which is dual core. It gets 709 on PassMark.

An Intel Core 2 Duo U9400 1.4Ghz, on the same benchmark, gets 963.

For reference, an Intel Core i3 330UM @ 1.20GHz scores 1196 and an Intel Core2 Duo U9600 @ 1.60GHz scores 1129.

CPU speeds on these new Macbook Airs seem to be... rather pathetic

That's like asking for a big rig with a trailer to pull 1G on a skidpad or a Tesla Roadster to tow a big rig trailer.

Is the Air underpowered? Of course. But you find me an 11" form factor laptop that doesn't look like a giant brick and has a 2ghz+ i7. Not even the Dell Alienware M11x offers more than a 1.06ghz i7 or 1.3ghz Core 2.

Passmark has a great bang per buck graph.
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_value_available.html
The PC I just bought my wife has a AMD Athlon II X4 620 in it. It rates pretty high in bang per buck, and I will say it's worked well for her. Bone stock, her PC boots Kubuntu in 30 seconds. Win7 takes 1.5 minutes.

"The Core i7-860 spanks everything AMD has at $280 @ newegg, there's only a few odd benchmarks AMDs $300 top six-core CPU wins. "

Why was this informative instead of troll? There's no links, no data, no proof, just a blanket INTEL RULZ! statement but of course he throws in that there are some tests where the AMD wins so anyone that attempts to refute his INTEL BESTEST OMG!!! statement with proof could be told "well, that's the few odd benchmark I was talking about".

Guess PassMark must be one of those "few odd benchmarks", where the 1090T is 10% faster than the i7-860 and it's only $8 more, or save $72 (more ram anyone?) with the 1055T which is only 7% slower than the i7-860.

We already know how slow the Phenom II quad core is. This "new" six core design is almost identical, only with two more cores slapped on. So yes, we can easily gauge its performance without ever touching it.

Also, this.

The PassMark Intel vs AMD CPU Benchmarks - High End show the AMD Phenom II X6 1075T as being nothing unusual in speed or price.

According to the Passmark benchmark, a 3.20 GHz scores 524, compared to 10221 for a 3.20 GHz Core i7 970 six-core CPU. That works out to 3.14 times faster per core than the Pentium 4. While short of 4-5, the GP is not as far off the mark as your ridicule would suggest.

I actually think YOU (and the cretin who modded you insightful) fail.

According to the Passmark benchmark, a 3.20 GHz scores 524, compared to 10221 for a 3.20 GHz Core i7 970 six-core CPU. That works out to 3.14 times faster per core than the Pentium 4. While short of 4-5, the GP is not as far off the mark as your ridicule would suggest.

I actually think YOU (and the cretin who modded you insightful) fail.

Intel's hexacore offering features hyperthreading technology, which allows each core to execute two threads simultaneously. This means that Intel's hexacore chips actually have twelve logical cores, while the AMD hexacore chips only have six logical cores.

I think you may be misunderstanding what hyperthreading is. A processor (or core) can only execute one instruction at a time, hyperthreading or not. All hyperthreading does is allow for two sets of instructions to be queued up, so if one thread (or queue) gets hung up for whatever reason, like waiting over a cache miss, the other instructional thread can proceed, rather than patiently waiting in line.

Think of it as one of those tumbling thingies you have to pass through to get into Six Flags or the subway. It's like that, but hyperthreading has two lines instead of one. If one moron has to stop to find his ticket at the front of the line, the other line may move until he finds it.

Your number of physical cores comparison is meaningless...

Um... no. I believe your "virtual" core comparison is meaningless. I'll take a quad core anything over a dual core hyperthreaded-anything-else any day, thank you. Virtual cores don't mean shit until a thread stalls.

and actual performance benchmarks show that the Core i7 980X is more than twice as fast as the AMD Phenom II X6 1055T. [1]

From the site you linked:

Intel Core i7 980X @ 3.33GHz: Score of 10,325 at $989.99*
AMD Phenom II X6 1055T: Score of 5,146 at $194.99*

Hmmmm... Twice the performance at over 5x the cost. Strange, I don't know why you chose that AMD chip. It's odd that you would choose the fastest Intel chip and a middle of the road AMD Chip. Why not this one?
AMD Phenom II X6 1090T: Score of 6,057 at $289.99*.

Oh, I know. Thenyou wouldn't be able to use the 2x faster line. I get it now.

Here, take a look at THIS chart and pay attention to the price/performace graph. You'll see that your chip performs about 2.5x less than the AMD Phenom II X5 965 when price is a consideration. Oh, and for nearly everyone that is not living off their mommy's credit cards, price is a consideration.

AMD just came out with Six-Core processors for $200, how is that stagnant? Intel's only 6-core processor is still $1000

I can't tell if you're trolling or not.

Intel's hexacore offering features hyperthreading technology, which allows each core to execute two threads simultaneously. This means that Intel's hexacore chips actually have twelve logical cores, while the AMD hexacore chips only have six logical cores. Your number of physical cores comparison is meaningless, and actual performance benchmarks show that the Core i7 980X is more than twice as fast as the AMD Phenom II X6 1055T. [1]

[1] http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

Yet you can buy two Opterons for a 60% of the 980X and get almost the same level of performance in highly threaded applications I bet. The only truth is that anything beyond the i7 860 is overpriced, whatever way you look at it.

"Your number of physical cores comparison is meaningless, and actual performance benchmarks show that the Core i7 980X is more than twice as fast as the AMD Phenom II X6 1055T. [1]"

Trolling much? Comparing a $200 CPU with a $1,000 CPU isn't really fair, is it? Someone shopping for a $200 CPU isn't going to even consider a $1,000 CPU and vice versa. Might as well compare a $100,000 Porsche Turbo to a $20,000 Ford Focus.

Might want to follow your own link and look at the far right column with the prices and compare it to where the CPU ranks compared to price:
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

AMD just came out with Six-Core processors for $200, how is that stagnant? Intel's only 6-core processor is still $1000

I can't tell if you're trolling or not.

Intel's hexacore offering features hyperthreading technology, which allows each core to execute two threads simultaneously. This means that Intel's hexacore chips actually have twelve logical cores, while the AMD hexacore chips only have six logical cores. Your number of physical cores comparison is meaningless, and actual performance benchmarks show that the Core i7 980X is more than twice as fast as the AMD Phenom II X6 1055T. [1]

[1] http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

i5 750 non-gaming benchmarks?

The Phenom II x6 1055T scores 5153, sells for $200 (491 systems benchmarked)
The i5-750 scores 4211, sells for $195 (3098 systems benchmarked)
The Phenom II x4 965 scores 4261, sells for $177 (2574 systems benchmarked)

So there we have a SIGNIFICANTLY better benchmark on AMD for $5 more, and SLIGHTLY better benchmark for $18 less.

..and unlike most benchmarks, these
(A) include benchmarks of many systems across many motherboards and memory sticks,
(B) do not include any overclocking (the site keeps overclocked benchmarks separate and those can be viewed too),
(C) the benchmarks are very detailed and if you have the passmark benchmark program, can compare systems in all catagories to see whats better and whats not,
and most importantly
(D) these systems are not chips "donated" by manufacturers, so no conflicts of interest.. they are chips from stocks available to and sold to consumers, and benchmarked by consumers.

i5 750 non-gaming benchmarks?

The Phenom II x6 1055T scores 5153, sells for $200 (491 systems benchmarked)
The i5-750 scores 4211, sells for $195 (3098 systems benchmarked)
The Phenom II x4 965 scores 4261, sells for $177 (2574 systems benchmarked)

So there we have a SIGNIFICANTLY better benchmark on AMD for $5 more, and SLIGHTLY better benchmark for $18 less.

..and unlike most benchmarks, these
(A) include benchmarks of many systems across many motherboards and memory sticks,
(B) do not include any overclocking (the site keeps overclocked benchmarks separate and those can be viewed too),
(C) the benchmarks are very detailed and if you have the passmark benchmark program, can compare systems in all catagories to see whats better and whats not,
and most importantly
(D) these systems are not chips "donated" by manufacturers, so no conflicts of interest.. they are chips from stocks available to and sold to consumers, and benchmarked by consumers.

i5 750 non-gaming benchmarks?

The Phenom II x6 1055T scores 5153, sells for $200 (491 systems benchmarked)
The i5-750 scores 4211, sells for $195 (3098 systems benchmarked)
The Phenom II x4 965 scores 4261, sells for $177 (2574 systems benchmarked)

So there we have a SIGNIFICANTLY better benchmark on AMD for $5 more, and SLIGHTLY better benchmark for $18 less.

..and unlike most benchmarks, these
(A) include benchmarks of many systems across many motherboards and memory sticks,
(B) do not include any overclocking (the site keeps overclocked benchmarks separate and those can be viewed too),
(C) the benchmarks are very detailed and if you have the passmark benchmark program, can compare systems in all catagories to see whats better and whats not,
and most importantly
(D) these systems are not chips "donated" by manufacturers, so no conflicts of interest.. they are chips from stocks available to and sold to consumers, and benchmarked by consumers.

Well, according to cpubenchmarks.net the X4 965 is slightly better than the i5 750 but slightly worse than the i5 760, but is $20 less than the i5 750 and $30 less than the i5 760.

Right now, that advantage is tilted so far in Intel's favor that 4 Intel Nehalem cores are generally going to be better than 6 AMD cores at the same clock.

The evidence doesnt support your assertion. Yes, Core2 is more efficient, but you are imagining that its 50% better clock-for-clock (that 4 Intel cores beats 6 AMD cores) You might be able to find some obscure task where thats the case, but in general its just not true.

They had expensive high end models back when they had the aces (when it was Athlon 64 / Opteron versus Inte'ls Pentium 4 line). Now they don't.

Um, now you are talking about server chips (what the hell do you think an opteron is) Intel had server chips too.. but you want to compare AMD server prices with Pentium 4 prices? Please. You arent even being honest with yourself here.

Lets talk about server chips, where AMD is beating the snot out of Intel with 12-core chips vs Intel's 8.

Intel isn't winning at the high end of servers because you simply cannot build a 48-core server built on Intel. The best you can do is 32 cores.

The mark of a liar is not being honest with others. The mark of a fanboy is not even being honest with yourself. Stop being a fanboy. Deep down you know that you are arguing without facts to support your assertions, so why do you do it?

I'm sorry rockoon, but a 1090T overclocked to 4GHz on air cooling won't out perform my i930 running at 4.5GHz on air cooling.

I spoke because I had first hand experience with both machines. While you are obviously an AMD zealot, I actually tested both myself and found that not only did the i930 perform better than the 1090T in most of my personal applications at stock speeds, but the i930 overclocked better as well giving it an even further advantage. If that wasn't enough, the i930, according to anandtech also drain less power at both idle and at full load than a comparable 1090T system.

Rockoon, how did your testing go between both systems, because I'm sure everyone would really like to hear it. Here's another link for you to follow: http://www.cpubenchmark.net/overclocked_cpus.html While I wouldn't consider that the end-all-be-all for performance comparison, it is better than anything you've posted other than your foul mouthed zealot response.

The benchmarks I've seen show even an i5 being competitive with a Phenom II X6

I am backing up my assertions.

Intel does not have any i5 that is even close in performance with the higher end 1090T, which is what the poster you were replying to said he was talking about. Read that? Not Even Close.
The lower end 1055T (which you are talking about) also beats the best performing i5, the 760, and it is cheaper than Intels chip too.

On top of that, the OEM special-edition 1035T, even cheaper than the 1055T, also outperforms all the i5's.

The only thing the i5 does better than the AMD 6 core offerings is better single threaded integer performance (and thats only the best most expensive i5), but is worse at single threaded floating point. For multi-threaded tasks it gets literally destroyed by AMD's 6-core offerings.

IIRC, the LX is just a warmed over GX with faster clock speeds - it's a descendant of the original Cyrix MediaGX family.

As for the efficiency of the Geode NX... nope. It's on decade-old process technology, too. Looks to be in the same ballpark as a 1.6 GHz Atom on raw speed: http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup.php?cpu=AMD+Geode+NX+1750

But, TDP on the Geode NX 1750 is 25 watts - TEN TIMES the TDP of an Atom N270.

..they have products in both segments.

..and for the record, AMD is still ruling the very high end multi-CPU (aka server) benchmarks and of course, we all know that their GPU's are top notch.

AMD just isnt doing well in the high end consumer-grade space, but then again the chips that Intel is ruling with in that segment are priced well above consumer budgets.

Citing the first benchmark I could find, the Passmark CPU list
(http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+X3430+%40+2.40GHz) rates
-the Xeon X3430 @ 2.40GHz with 2,962 points
-and the AMD Athlon II X4 635 at 3,360 points

So without claiming that this benchmark is the final word, I'd expect the AMD to be at least on a similar performance level to the Xeon. If you have evidence to the contrary, please post it ;-)

You really can't build anything like a powerful gaming system or a 6-core processing behemoth, and expect it to remain silent inside of a MiniITX case (it's going to sound like a wind tunnel). But you have the potential to do this in a full-sized case.

You're generally right, but it is possible to fit a quiet full-fledged gaming rig inside of a mini-itx case. Not easy, but possible.

This case was designed in Sketchup and built from scratch using a CNC cut acrylic frame with water cooled internals that include a quad core processor and high end gaming card.

Here's the build log of the case:
buildlog

And since some of the pics seem to be down on the original thread, here's a link to a blog with a summary and pics:
pics and summary

I have nothing to do with case, just stumbled on it when I was researching a mini-itx HTPC and thought the build log was really interesting. My reason for wanting a mini-itx PC is so I could stuff the whole thing into carry on luggage and fly with it if I ever want to. Also I just like the aesthetics for HT purposes.

On a sidenote, while the low TDP atom procs really are ideal for Mini-ITX form factor cases, I don't want my hands tied in case I want to do more with the box like on the fly video transcoding, or audio mixing and editing.

From what I've found there are a couple of non atom routes you can go while still shooting for the lowest possible TDP:
This was a very useful reference: List of CPUs by power dissipation
To get an idea of the relative performance you might be sacrificing for power savings this is useful: benchmark charts Most of the ones I was looking at are in the High to Mid Range CPU Chart.

* So called "mobile on desktop" motherboards which are desktop boards that have sockets that support mobile processors such as the Jetway NC64-LF, which accepts core 2 duo mobile procs with TDP in the 35W range. This is a more expensive route, but easier to cool silently, especially when you consider that manufacturers cram these components into laptops which are way smaller than even mini-itx.
* AMD has several dual core procs in the AMD Athlon X2 line that have a TDP of 45W. They even have a 35W one, but it seems a little difficult to track down, and is probably just an undervolted version of a 45W proc.

I think if you do some planning it's possible to get a reasonably powerful PC into a mini-itx case while still keeping noise levels low. Naturally not ideal for hardcore gamers, but for others if aesthetics is a consideration, you can put together a cool little PC.

AMD does beat intel on the price curve... but not in performance.

AMD does seem to have an edge in the multiprocessor arena, although I am not sure why.

According to PassMark, the fastest machines clocked using their software is a 4 x Opteron 6168 (4 x 12 cores = 48 cores) system and a 8 x Opteron 8435 (8 x 6 cores = 48 cores)

The actual numbers are:

4 x Opteron 6168 : 23,784 Passmarks.
8 x Opteron 8435 : 22,745 Passmarks.
4 x Xeon X7460 : 18,304 Passmarks.
2 x Xeon X5680 : 17,910 Passmarks.

That $200 AMD chip that everyone is raving about, the Phenom II 1055T, scores 5,661 Passmarks. If AMD keeps that up, Intel might be in some trouble soon even in the high end market unless Intel can cut prices dramatically. Intel doesnt offer anything comparable for the money.

It was indeed a mere observation of conjuncture. That said, it has been an extraordinarily useful one in the form of a challenge to humankind. Without it we would not have progressed the way we have. Intel is using Moore's law as a road map, forcing other companies *coughAMDcough* to innovate just to keep up. And that is why we have the enormous speeds available today. So we have a prediction that shaped the future. Why bother? Because our dreams shape our world.

A server with this Intel Atom equipped mobo draws something like 25-35W under full load. And the performance of these D510 dual core processors is comparable to better Pentium 4 processors.

"Really? My friend spend about $1000 bucks in 2005 or 2006 for a Quad Core from Intel and has upgraded the Ram Once and it's lasted him this whole time."

Does your friend also have a time machine? Because the first quad core was released Nov 2006, the 2.667ghz Core 2 Extreme QX6700, and it cost $999 just for the processor.. In terms of benchmarks, it's about half the performance of a modern $230 i7-930.

Quad didn't become popular until the Q6600 was released April 2007 for $266.

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/

Works for me. I sometimes want to check how a new processor compares to my existing one, if it isn't ten times quicker I wait a while.

Check out http://www.cpubenchmark.net/ and http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/ With a pinch of salt you can make a relevant decision based on those two, even if Googling around would make your decision even better. .

Isn't this what the article summary gets at ? I couldn't find anywhere in the conclusion how the P4 actually compares to present day processors.
I'm not about to read through 17 pages of all of that just to open my eyes.

Oh, and for CPU comparisons, I usually use:
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_list.php

It's quite reliable for my choices. I just need everything to boil down to a number these days. Too much choice out there. Was simpler when you could just look at Ghz and know which is better. Now a P7700 and T8600 (examples I just made up..) could be at the same clock speed, be called Core 2 Duo and have totally different performance numbers. Confusing!

Their benchmarks seem decent. The Athlon II X4 620 is a solid performer.

And the Athlon II X4 630 2.8Ghz 4-core processor is getting great reviews at newegg with good potential for overclocking, even with the stock cooler.
br> There's a few great motherboard/CPU combo deals going on right now at newegg. QuadCore for $170 and dual-core for $90.

I really don't understand why anyone would buy the Phenom.. At $245 it's $46 more expensive than the Core i7 920 and performs significantly worse. The 965 isn't listed there, but 955 is, and it's passmark rating is 3,571 while the i7 920 is rated at 5,440. And that's not even considering the fact that you are using triple channel memory access versus dual channel, etc..

Granted, you can get AM3 motherboards cheaper than X58 boards, but Intel is coming out with more consumer i7 chipsets very soon.

I've been something of an AMD fanboy ever since the Athlon came out, but I just bought an Intel Atom 330 for a lightweight file server, and I have to say I'm thoroughly impressed. 64-bit, dual-core, virtualization extensions, and low-power to boot for around $80 which includes the motherboard. Simply unbeatable.

Also wanted to mention that these guys have easy-to-read benchmark charts of a wide variety of CPUs. Certainly more than the 26 in TFA. Benchmarks don't tell the whole story of course, but it's a good start for quick-and-dirty comparison.

According to PassMark, you're wrong.

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/common_cpus.html

A 1.6Ghz Atom N270 sits between a Celeron 2Ghz and a Celeron 2.4Ghz. It's twice as fast as a Pentium III (though it doesn't give a speed rating, but the fastest PIII was 1.4Ghz.

The Pentium M was based on the Pentium 3 design, but it is more efficient. Since PassMark rates a 1.6Ghz Pentium M at 377 and the 1.6Ghz Atom 270 at 306.. it's probably closer to a 1.4Ghz Pentium-M than a 1.5, but in either case actual benchmarks do not support your claims.

Why that processor, it's the biggest waste of money ever. I built my 8-core system for $1600 with a 9800GX2 and 8GB of RAM. Check out http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup.php?cpu=Intel+Core2+Extreme+X9770+%40+3.20GHz and see that even though two of them cost $450, the E5405 tops out the QX9770

According to http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html I would say there are better deals than the X2 4000+ (The Q6600 is only $270 and can overclock nicely)

According to http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html I would say there are better deals than the X2 4000+ (The Q6600 is only $270 and can overclock nicely)

The article is extremely thin on the promised "benchmark" and looks like a fairly standard press release.

Information in real CPU benchmarks: http://www.cpubenchmark.net/
Information in the press release "benchmark": about:blank

Give me graphs, comparisons with other models in the same series & other CPUs, information about power draw & heat etc. Not adverts, details I can find out anyway and dont really care about etc.