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AMD's Athlon-64 Benchmarked With UT2003
Sander Sassen writes "Wondering about the performance of AMD's Athlon-64? Want to how well it runs in 64-bit mode? Hardware Analysis managed to run a few benchmarks on a AMD Athlon-64 demo system using the 64-bit version of Epic' Unreal Tournament 2003. There's also an update with the latest about Athlon-64, Opteron and mobile Athlon-64 including streaming video and pictures of a quad Opteron server."
AMD is soon to be followed by Intel with the introduction of the Unobtainium chip.
~S
Who's gonna reach 2048 first, the Microsoft Windows version number, or the AMD bit number?
how to slashdot an innocent server in the dead of night.
...a 64-bit CPU is totally *pointless* unless I can spawn at least 500 bots on a map designed for 7 at playable speeds with it. Telefraging madness!
"To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit." -Stephen Hawking
As promised we'll give you an update on the performance and other features of the AMD systems that we reported on yesterday. Naturally AMD wasn't very keen on disclosing clockspeed or detailed system configurations of the demo systems they had running, but we took advantage of a few fellow journalists entering the room and keeping the AMD PR people busy to run a few quick benchmarks on the Athlon-64 system. The Athlon-64 demo system we already reported on yesterday had a 2GHz clockspeed and used the SuSe 64-bit Linux operating system and was running the 64-bit version of Unreal Tournament 2003 as a demo.
(pic of monitor playing UT2k3, FPS = 42)
Fig 1. The Athlon-64 system running SuSe 64-bit Linux and the 64-bits version of Unreal Tournament 2003.
Naturally we're intimately familiar with the workings of Unreal Tournament 2003 engine and after a quick look at the display settings, which were set at a 1024x768x32bit resolution with all other features at default, we measured a mere average 42fps and maximum fps around the 55...60fps mark. Considering the fact that this is a 2GHz Athlon-64 processor teamed up with a GeForce Ti 4600 we honestly expected a whole lot better. A 1.6GHz Pentium 4 with that very same GeForce Ti 4600 videocard would have no problems clocking in a similar score while running under Windows XP.
(pic of a white laptop with the terminal showing)
Fig 3. The Athlon-64 notebook running CyberLink's PowerDVD actually showing the first Harry Potter movie.
But there's more, we managed to take a closer look at the notebook too and quickly found out that this indeed is a proof of concept. It plays DVDs very well, mostly courtesy of the ATi M9-series graphics card, and unfortunately all our questions about whether we could do something else with it were answered with a resounding 'no'. We did however manage to find out what was inside in terms of chipset, memory and graphics card. The notebook apparently used a Via K8T400M chipset teamed up with an ATi M9-series graphics adapter and was using PC2100, DDR266, memory. The screen was a standard 14.1 inch running at a 1024x768 resolution and the DVD software they used was none other than CyberLink's PowerDVD.
(naked pizza-box style case)
Fig 2. The quad Opteron server with the top cover removed, the PCI-X slots in the back and a the four CPUs hidden underneath the huge heatsinks.
(two white LCDs next to each other, left showing a web browser and right showing UT2k3.)
Fig 3. The quad Opteron with the SuSe 64-bit Linux operating system running some sort of a database benchmark, right next to the UT2003 demo machine.
We naturally also took a closer look at the quad Opteron as that's definitely something AMD is currently pushing hard. They're putting all their weight behind the launch of their server products and have postponed the launch of the desktop version of the Opteron, the Athlon-64, back to September. The server parts, including completely pre-configured two-way Opteron systems, should be available in late April, right after the April 26th launch of the Opteron server CPU family. Clockspeeds will initially range up to 1.6 or 1.8GHz and performance is expected to be similar to Intel's Xeon offerings. But as always, we'll reserve judgement until we can actually evaluate two similarly configured servers side by side, for now all they have given us are SpecInt-2000 and SpecFP-2000 scores without disclosing the system configurations, so that doesn't tell us anything.
Nevertheless it looks like AMD is indeed trying to get some new and innovative products out of the door. Whether they'll be able to make a lasting impression, both in terms of features and performance, with their new 64-bit products remains to be seen though, we'll be sure to keep a close eye on any future developments.
Sander Sassen.
It's much more entertaining to keep refreshing the page and watch the user count rise
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Looking for hardware (Currently need: Large Etch-a-Sketch) Have one? See my journal!
Ok, wait.
I'm the developer that did the 64-bit port of UT2003 (and the Linux port, and the Mac port...).
You need to keep two things in mind:
1) The OpenGL renderer is not as fast as the Direct3D renderer at this time. This is not the Athlon64's fault. You can see this on 32-bit Windows, since it can use both renderers. Since this is a Linux port of the game, we're using the GL renderer on the Athlon64 at this time.
2) The "stat fps" command isn't really a good benchmarking method.
3) This is a prerelease version of the game running on a prerelease version of SuSE running on prerelease drivers running on prerelease hardware. Please don't consider this "benchmark" to be representative!
--ryan.
Don't say, "don't quote me," because if no one quotes you, you probably haven't said a thing worth saying.
let's hope hardwareanalysis.com is not running on one of those 64-bit AMD's... would be pretty embarrassing.
-- This sig for rent.
The site, with just a few comments on /., is already showing signs of slashdotting. I'll quote the most important parts about the UT 2003 benchmark, just in case:
"The Athlon-64 demo system we already reported on yesterday had a 2GHz clockspeed and used the SuSe 64-bit Linux operating system and was running the 64-bit version of Unreal Tournament 2003 as a demo."
-snip-
(at 1024x768x32...) "we measured a mere average 42fps and maximum fps around the 55...60fps mark. Considering the fact that this is a 2GHz Athlon-64 processor teamed up with a GeForce Ti 4600 we honestly expected a whole lot better."
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
You're obviously not a real geek. The fact that the streaming video and pictures are of the quad Opteron server made me click. Unfortunately, it is already /.ed.
I was about to chime in with similar comments- but it's so much better when the person that did the work (and knows what in the Hell he's talking about) says it.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
" You're obviously not a real geek."
A real geek is never straightforward. He's got lots of hidden depths(!), is shy, reticient and timid. He hides his talents and pretends to get kicks, like 'normal' folks. Obviously, you're not a real geek, since you couldn't figure out my deception.
Most moderators are Morons. Sensible moderators are Oxymorons.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
I'd like to know if it will run nice and frosty like my AMD 2400+ (plus what? Beats me!)
Any more fans and my computer may levitate. That would be just as cool as a good UT2003 framerate!
I saw that and determined that they were more Windows type people and plain flat didn't know that the OpenGL renderer is much weaker (not due to the API, but due to this being much the first cut of the thing...) than the D3D. What they measured was pretty good considering that detail.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
The reason you keep losing at UT isn't because your processor is too slow.
I have been pwned because my
i would have to say that this article is about as worthless as the bill gates quotations earlier, int terms of actual usefullness and truthfullness. since everything is prerelease and the details are fairly sketchy, im gonna wait for solid numbers before i decide once and for all who i will be loyal to in the proccesor world.
how well are the drivers for the gefore card working? are they playing nice with that k8t400? are the nvidia drivers 64bit or are they being run in "32-bit" mode? how well is OpenGL playing with the 64-bit OS, 64-bit Chip combo and again, how well are the nvidia drivers playing? is the OS running the AGP in AGP mode or is it PCI mode?
i bet i could easily get a P4 2.7 with this graphics card to product similar numbers, or even worse in linux with some effort to use least optimized drivers and setting the graphics card to PCI.
in fact, my P4 2.4x133@2.7x150 with a GF Ti 4600 doesn't post much better numbers, 55fps by stat fps. and thats on a 32bit "system" with fairly mature drivers and everything work "correctly/fullspeed"
im not an AMD zealot, but i wont make me decision based on a game that is notoriously bad at opengl and on a system that is running all beta software/drivers.
Let's not get over-excited... This is of course interresting information, but it's information of a premature chip on a premature platform.
I doubt that any proper conclusions can be drawn from this, apart from what is already known: The Athlon 64 isn't ready yet. If was the release date wouldn't be set for September.
Much like with Doom III, there is always a cool-factor, but the actual facts at hand are very scarse. One thing is probably for sure though... The Hammer core can't compete with the Barton core on the desktop at this point. Otherwise we'd have the Athlon 64 waiting to be released much sooner.
.: Max Romantschuk
If one compares the claimed 42fps with other cpu:s, it seems it is at a level of a Celeron 500 MHz...
There is something fishy here as the UT2k3-makers themselves claimed there is a 15% increase in 64-bit mode (on Windows). Normally Quake3Arena for Linux is on par with the Windows version, so it should not be the OS' fault either.
the real benchmarks I'm interested in:
How many *C does the CPU run at?
What size PSU does it need?
I curious... how do the extra bits per clock cycle supposed to increase performance? I mean the number of instructions per second don't increase...
Yuioup
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I've worked inside a handful of medium-sized machines, including a couple Microway dual Alpha "rugged racks" and a Compaq ES40 Model II. The 8u (or 9?) ES40 is nicely laid out, but removing the motherboard or messing with drive cables is a pain. The 4u "rugged racks" are a disaster of fans and wires. We've had 4 or 5 fans go out on those, and it takes approximately 45 screws (I counted) and about 60 minutes of fast work to remove and replace a midboard fan.
That opteron case, on the other hand, appears to have plenty of cooling that is easy to reach. I don't see any wires permanently attached to the case. It looks very clean and easy to service, except possibly getting the motherboard out.
-Paul Komarek
its not a good pic it shows the front of the case on its side with a bad profile. nothing to see
The article said that there will be benchmarks. And there are none. A screen shot of a game does not qualify. I want to see the whole spec or at least the basic ones. And after that I can look at the game snapshot.
Moderator seriously why this posted with such a misleading title?
>> Sure it will run faster, but do you seriously need that speed?
Sure, just like I needed more than 512K of RAM.
I recently got into video editing. Until now, I've never needed anything faster than a single CPU system.
Now I understand, completely, what those who do rendering gripe about when it comes to CPU speed never being fast enough.
2:57 of video takes my 1GHz w/ 1GB RAM machine nearly 2 HOURS to render. Just for 3 stinking minutes of video!
The fastest current single CPU would only decrease that number to about 40 minutes, which is still too slow.
A dual CPU solution would bring it down to 20 minutes, but again, if I ever wanted to render even 15 minutes of video, that would be 1 hr 40 mins of CPU time.
And forget doing anything else with the computer while it's rendering. It will start dropping frames like mad, and you have to start over.
Now a 4-way workstation is something that would work. With a 4-way 3GHz Opteron system, I could render in near real-time, and a regular sized MB, if not slightly oversized, could handle 4 procs.
SuperMicro is the only MB mfg. I know of that makes a 4-way board, but it's for Xeons and is insanely expensive ($1800 +/- $100) and that's before you add the overpriced CPUs.
If AMD came out with a moderately prices 4-way workstation, they could get the CAD/CAM, video editing, 3D modeling, rendering and compiling crowd all at once, in addition to the freak gamers and Gotta Have The Best Even Though I'll Never Use It crowds.
The 4-way system is a neglected niche. AMD should fill it.
Talisman
"Study your math, kids. Key to the universe." -The Archangel Gabriel
The article said there would be benchmarks of UT2003. I click the link and see a single screenshot of UT2003 running. No benchmarks. Where are they ? Am I blind ?
Mozilla has crashed on this page 3 times, just totally hanging, requiring a kill. Anyone else having this problem? Are they using some strange Flash or something? Can't get to the page to find out.
Put identity in the browser.
"Considering the fact that this is a 2GHz Athlon-64 processor teamed up with a GeForce Ti 4600 we honestly expected a whole lot better. A 1.6GHz Pentium 4 with that very same GeForce Ti 4600 videocard would have no problems clocking in a similar score while running under Windows XP."
...Which you would expect if you were under the false impression that internal bus bandwidth, addressing mode and clock frequency have considerable impact on a 3D game-quality rendering system.
The graphics hardware does most of the work (ie. the computationally intensive rendering), the CPU is used for game logic, culling and feeding data to the graphics card.
I would say the bottleneck is AGP bandwidth and limited on-board high-speed memory on the graphics card.
And forget doing anything else with the computer while it's rendering. It will start dropping frames like mad, and you have to start over.
Unless you're talking about capturing, which you *will* have to be able able to do in real-time to avoid losing frames, how exactly do you manage to lose frames during rendering? The only way I can think of is by working on a preview while the "real" render is made from tape, but that'll require you do to the actual render in real-time too. Frankly, you're not making any sense to me.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I have a spare notebook i could use, but it has win98 on it. I have cygwin on it too. Would i use distcc with cygwin or just by itself?
even have a grain of salt to spice up this 'analysis'. someone must have thought this would drum up some hits to the site because there are not much facts to go with the article. the only nice thing was how it got my hopes up and them smashed them.
I know you are psychotic, but please make an effort.
There was nothing to this artice. Here is what I learned from reading this article: 1)there's a 64-bit linux port of UT 2003 2)amd likes secrecy 3)the people who were showing off the laptop like Harry Potter wow. now wasn't that informative?
the person who posted the story to slashdot, is also the guy who wrote the review? free traffic for his site (OK, a slashdotting)
Who's compiler did you use?
Does it do any reasonable optimisation on the opteron?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
"Some kind of database benchmark." Thanks for that insightful analysis of the 4-way, and pimping your own site on Slashdot. Tasteless!
If I remember correctly, this Athlon-64 was among the 65 CPU's recently tested by Tom's Hardware. *duck*
Wow! 2756 anonymous users online?! I wonder where they came from.
Send us your Linux Sysadmin articles.
Geeky modern art T-shirts
I only have 1.2Mb, but its backed by the cable company, the most fiercly incompetent band in the western world.
So bring it on brother. Bring it on.
Good work on the port(s).
Before the Intel/AMD fanboys go crazy. I wanted to get a few questions in:
1. Can you tell us what specific optimizations you have done/are planning to do for the 64 bit architecture?
2. What optimization benefit do get from a straight "re-compile" of the UT codebase in 64 bit mode?
cheers,
j.
"My cat's breath smells like cat food." - The Tao of Ralph Wiggum.
Anyone that has played the pathetic UT2003 port to Linux will know that it is many times slower than the Windows version. The game was coded for DirectX. It uses a wrapper in Linux to convert Direct3D calls to OpenGL in real-time, and it *REALLY* puts a tax on the host CPU.
In my experience, properly ported OpenGL games on Linux (like RTCW) were faster than under Windows, but UT2003 is definately not the case. For that reason, these comparisons are way too early. I can't speak for the port to the Athlon64 architecture, but when it comes to the 32 bit version of UT2003 for Linux, it's very slow in comparison to the Windows release. This is what happens when you code a game for one platform, one API, and then try to port it to other operating systems.
Back in the days when I was rendering things (not that long ago, ~11 yrs) I can remember rendering 1 frame for a magazine ad, and it took 6-8 hours!
Turn arround, walk 2 steps to your bed, lay down, and cry.
Blar.
I love when someone submits a story pretending like they weren't the ones that wrote it. It is either that or they are really Bob Dole. Bob Dole managed to benchmark the Athlon 64. Bob Dole can play Unreal Tournament. Bob Dole... Bob Dole... Martin Sheen wants to tell you what to do. Martin Sheen is president. Martin Sheen I say!!!
ignorance is bliss. googlefiberatx.com
Epic releases UT2003 text mode.
This has the advantage of being playable on all kinds of hardware specifications, from a measly 8086 to AMD's flagship AMD 64...
You hop Alice-in-Wonderland-like in a room full of bots. What do you do?
>
/. Where the truth
There have been some disappointed posters, wondering why it isn't faster. Stop and think about it: Why would a 64-bit CPU be faster than a 32-bit CPU? It's not bus width, because Pentiums have always had 64-bit busses. It's not FPU width, because x86 FPUs have always been 80 bits internally. It's not 64-bit integer registers, because it's very rare indeed to need to do 64-bit integer math. It's not 64-bit pointers, because this is a machine with less than 4GB of memory. What it comes down to is that this processor is using slightly newer tech than AMD's previous chips, including a larger cache. But it has nothing whatsoever to do with being 64 bits, and hence the results are not mindblowing.
There's a persistant myth that a 64-bit processor is twice as fast as a 32-bit processor, which is completely incorrect.
Bill Gates is great! Bill Gates is powerful! Netfunk is his prophet. Bow to your master!
Isn't he just saying that Unreal engine's Direct3D path is quicker/better than the Unreal engine's OpenGL path? - i.e. it's the Unreal engine's fault not OpenGL's?
... has more to do with being able to move around more quickly in UT2003 than raw cpu speed. You do really need the equivalent cpu horsepower of a P4 1.8-2.0GHz or equivalent Athlon, and a GeForce4 Ti 4200 or Radeon 9700 to be competitive.
I've been suffering with a P4 2.2GHz and an old Radeon 7500 for months, just installed a 9700 and it's made a very noticeable difference... not just placebo effect either.
Naturally we're intimately familiar with the workings of Unreal Tournament 2003 engine and after a quick look at the display settings, which were set at a 1024x768x32bit resolution with all other features at default, we measured a mere average 42fps and maximum fps around the 55...60fps mark. Considering the fact that this is a 2GHz Athlon-64 processor teamed up with a GeForce Ti 4600 we honestly expected a whole lot better. A 1.6GHz Pentium 4 with that very same GeForce Ti 4600 videocard would have no problems clocking in a similar score while running under Windows XP.
"Intimately familar"? Hardly. If they were intimately familiar with the engine, they would have known that it is not optimized for OpenGL, and that comparing Direct3D to OpenGL under Windows OR Linux is not a good or fair comparison.
Neither the Windows OpenGL renderer nor the Linux OpenGL renderer score the same as the D3D one.
You can see a real comparison of OpenGL and Direct3D here
Why do I keep typing pythong?
Are there any sites that consistently benchmark machines with server/java apps? That seems to be the market AMD wants to target, and I'd enjoy seeing the comparisons.
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:)
Someone really wants their mommy right about now!
Most likely this is a combination of SSE/SSE2 and the rate at which the P4's capable of accessing RAM. After all, unless spec's using lots and lots of SSE2, I'd attribute the P4's SpecFP scores mostly to it's RAM access capabilities.
Remember, with FP, it's generally not like you're working with JUST 1 number at a time and then jumping all over the RAM for the next, more likely, you're accessing a huge array of numbers where you can simply drag down data until you reach your end point (which explains why P4's tied to RDRAM still perform best in SpecFP--they avoid the critical first word).
So, when's lunch?
I wonder if something like a Matrox RT2500 would help you any.
So, when's lunch?
Which might indicate that vsync is enabled, effectively capping the the max fps while lowering the average. Whenever I run a benchmark and it tops out at 60 fps and I suspect, as these guys did, that the machine should be faster, I always double check the refresh rate settings and vsync.
-dameron
The main point of 64 it CPUs is to address more than 4GB of RAM per process.
This is and stays the main point for 64 bit processors.
And this is to almost NO use for most program that are used in day to day use.
A pentium can only use 2^32 (4 GB) bit memry adresses in a flat memory model. A lot of that (0,5 to 2 Gb) is used by the OS. if you need an application that adresses more than 4 GB 64 bits procesors come handy. The main applications for this are BIG databases.
64 bit arithmic is almost no use. If you need this big integers you might be better of with floating point, and the X86 already has optimized instructions for those (SSE/SSE2/MMX)
Programs might even become more slowly since pointers are now 64 bits instead of 32 bits so the cpu has to move more data arround and programs become bigger because of this.
64 bits has limited use on desktop pc's. Its main use will be for (more that 4GB) servers.
When desktop pc get more than 4GB of memory (or more than 2 GB) 64 bits cpu's begin to perform better.
Did anyone notice that the location of the video, keyboard, mouse, floppy drive, cd-rom,, and power cable are opposite from the pci slots? I have worked with quite a few different rack servers myself in the past, but this sure is one strange looking monster. Not to mention that it really does have some massive heat sinks and the RAM slots appear to be staggered around the motherboard, somewhat like the Sun's motherboards.
Perhaps someone has some insight into other types of rack mounted systems and motherboard configuratioins they can share?
I was about to start into an "AMD is a one trick pony" spiel, but that would explain a lot. It seemed like AMD got into a good position with the inital Athlon, but since then have been struggling. I'm wondering if the 64 bit systems are going to give them another jump on the game or it's going to continue to be a neck and neck race.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
You shouldn't be benchmarking with a game. The graphics card then plays a big role in the final results. There should be some cpu specific benchmarks that should be used. Wait for the Tom's Hardware tests. Guy has about 10 different benchmarks.
This is NOT how to get better cheeper blah blah blah!!!
Demand asyncrinous cmputers, insist on REAL multithreaded object orientated buzword enabled programs MINUS the %^&* bloat!
Is AMD a division of Intel? I have never heard of it.
Why pollute with decimal what is clean and beautiful hexadecimal?
how does it compare to other 32 bit cpu's in 32bit mode?
There was an old Indian belief that by making love on the hide of
their favorite animal, one could guarantee the health and prosperity
of the offspring conceived thereupon. And so it goes that one Indian
couple made love on a buffalo hide. Nine months later, they were
blessed with a healthy baby son. Yet another couple huddled together
on the hide of a deer and they too were blessed with a very healthy
baby son. But a third couple, whose favorite animal was a hippopotamus,
were blessed with not one, but TWO very healthy baby sons at the conclusion
of the nine month interval. All of which proves the old theorem that:
The sons of the squaw of the hippopotamus are equal to the sons of
the squaws of the other two hides.
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