First Benchmarks of AMD Hammer Prototype

porciletto writes "As seen on Ace's Hardware, this article features Quake 3 benchmarks comparing an 800 MHz ClawHammer sample to Athlon MPs at 800 MHz and 1667 MHz, as well as a Willamette Pentium 4 (256 KB L2, 400 MHz FSB) at 800 MHz and 1600 MHz. The benchmark results indicate a 40% performance increase over an Athlon MP for the ClawHammer. Additionally, the 800 MHz ClawHammer manages to tie (actually outperform by 1 FPS) the 1667 MHz Willamette Pentium 4."

Comments

It would be more interesting if...

[xiox]

They tested some software which had been compiled for 64 bit mode. With the large number of 64 bit registers the hammer has there should be some significant speed improvement.

Non-Intel all the way!

[blankmange]

I have purchasing and building computers for over 10 years now and have yet to use an Intel cpu -- and have not missed out on anything. I cannot forsee abandoning the AMD platform anytime soon either -- bring on the Hammer (or Opteron or whatever they are calling it this month...).

ps -- where is the obligatory Beowulf cluster commentary on this??? I am shocked and appalled at this apparent oversight by my fellow /.'ers...

Re:Non-Intel all the way!

[jcoy42]

I have purchasing and building computers for over 10 years now and have yet to use an Intel cpu -- and have not missed out on anything.

If you don't have a basis for comparison, how would you know?

You certainly missed out on a whole slew of pentium FP bug panics.

Amazing performance from a clock-limited proto

[Thagg]

If you manage to get through the slashdotting, the story in the tecchannel web pages is amazing. The prototype Clawhammer, while limited to 800 MHz, performed shockingly well on the few, but varied, benchmarks they subjected it to. It's interesting that both Intel and AMD teach the same lesson, that MHz doesn't determine performance. Unfortunately for Intel, they demonstrate it by the P4 not running as fast as the MHz would imply, where the AMD chips run far faster than MHz would imply.

I can't wait for these chips to get out there.

thad

Re:Amazing performance from a clock-limited proto

[systemapex]

I think the release of the Clawhammer shows the great divide between Intel and AMD's philosophies widening. Mind you, Intel's strategy isn't entirely bad, although it seems highly inefficient at first glance. Intel will happily fire back when the Clawhammer is released. What will they do? Quickly ramp up the clock speed towards 3.4-4GHz. I wouldn't be surprised if they also enable hyperthreading on "consumer" P4s. And, they'll increase the memory bandwidth of the P4 platform by releasing dual-channel DDR chipsets. As for AMD, this looks like one great chip. If AMD plays its cards right, I think it would REALLY make a splash in the server/enterprise market. Whereas, Intel can stay neck and neck with AMD on the consumer end, we've seen how great AMD's SMP platform is. Imagine a 4-way AMD hammer computer:-)

Re:1667?

[Jugalator]

you've got to wonder what intel isn't doing to optimize.

FYI, we had a teacher in a processor architecture course that worked with optimizing algorithms and had worked for Intel. He left and started working for AMD instead. He openly said that Intel sucked. Guess what PR that gives when it's from the mouth of an insightful teacher. :)

So they must do something wrong over there. :) At least in the eyes of some optimizing guys. heh

Re:ya missed the point

[afidel]

If you had read the article (and many others) the industry expects that if they can work out some silicone problems the opteron will debute at 1.6Ghz, or twice what the demos are running at. Since the current 800MHz parts are matching the 1.6GHz p4, Intel would need to be at 3.2Ghz to match the Opteron at release, since quatity shipments of the Opteron won't happen till Q2 03 and Intel's roadmap says that's when the 3.2GHz p4 will begin production I would say it is likely we will have the same situation we have today where about once a quarter based on production schedules one of the manufacturers will take the speed crown from the other just to have it retaken a few weeks later. It looks like unless the marketing muscle of Intel can misinform people into believing that just because they come with a bigger number attached that the p4's are SO much better that the Opteron should do well. Add in the 64bit icing on AMD's cake and it things start to look good for AMD in the low to mid range x86 server portion of the market.

call me with the real benchmarks

[dutky]

<YAWN> wake me up when someone does a usefull benchmark on these systems. I don't trust proprietary micro-benchmarks and I have no use for Quake III fps numbers. I'd prefer a SPECint/fp score set, but will settle for kernel/gcc/ddd compile times and a stream run. (I don't do enough FP work to propose a poor-man's substitute for SPECfp and the entire question of DB/transaction benchmarking is a tougher nut than I'm willing to crack).

Still, I'm eagerly awaiting the ClawHammer release. Every x86 box I've built for the last 5 years has been pure AMD, and I've been quite happy with them.

why i cheer amd

[Indy1]

Quick background:

I am a long time system designer /upgrader / hardware IT geek. I've been working on Amd /Intel boxes since the 386 days. One reason why I cheer for Amd is that in the past few years, Intel seems bent on dragging all of us back into the 286 days of hardware being propeirty. Slot 1, Rdram memory interfaces, etc. Amd seems to have more of a commitment to sticking to industry standards, like (at the time) socket 7, sdram, ddr, etc.

Another reason why i tend to prefer Amd is the cynical marketing processor known as the P-4. The vast majority of benchmarks show that unless your running software thats heavily SSE-2 optimized, the Athlon's spank the P-4. Yet the P-4's are much more $$$$ due to all those wonderful Intel commercials with dancing morons in bunny suits, or some smucks painted up like a martian with a bad head cold. Instend of wasting all that money marketing, use it to improve your designs! Amd spends virtually nothing on marketing, and yet whenever they have a good design, their products sell extremely well. And dont get me started on intel's late ddr support, or the earily 845 chipsets that were sdram only, which had PATHETIC performace.

I guess the point of my whole rant is......I use Intel or Amd, or whoever, as long as they give me a good value for my (or my customer's) dollar. Give me a nice industry standard design. Dont foist some new marketing propierty design on me. If its gotta be propierty, it better be for one of two reasons: Considerably cheaper, or considerably faster. Intel in the past few years has NOT focused on giving the customer value. Amd has. Give me a 1000 dollars, and I can build either an Intel box, or an Amd box thats 20% faster then the Intel box, and just as stable. (I dont buy the Amd isnt stable arguement, it all comes down to knowing your hardware and how to configure it properly for stable operation.)

When Intel returns to delivering a product that is worth the price Intel charges for it, I'll use Intel again. Until then, I'll continue to laugh at ridiculous marketing schemes and do my research on which product is the fastest for the least money.