Core 2-Compatible Chipsets Compared

theraindog writes "Intel's Core 2 Duo is clearly the most attractive processor on the market, but which motherboard chipset is it best paired with? The Tech Report has rounded up four of the most common Core 2-compatible chipsets on the market to find out. The chipsets' features are compared and their performance is tested in a wide range of application, peripheral, and even power consumption tests. One emerges as a lemon, two as solid options, and the other as a clear winner." From the article: "Some fanboys still stubbornly cling to their favorite underdog, but most enthusiasts have seen the light and are looking at Core 2 for their next upgrade or system build. The prospect of a Core 2 system build can seem a bit daunting for enthusiasts who have spent years focused solely on the Athlon 64. Core 2 processors need new motherboards for those switching from the Athlon 64, and that requires navigating a whole new world of core logic chipsets. Since the Core 2 processor relies on the chipset for its memory controller, one's chipset choice can also have a much more profound impact on performance. "

Comments

"Stubborn" eh?

[gentimjs]

Ok, so some of us are "stubbornly" clinging to AMD? Intel had what, 5 years to top K8 and 5%-10% better speeds (in SOME benchmarks!) was the best they could manage? I'll stick with AMD thanks, Intel totally underachieved on Core Duo despite what most casual observers may think .....

and you have to be a fanboy to get it right?

[twitter]

Since the Core 2 processor relies on the chipset for its memory controller, one's chipset choice can also have a much more profound impact on performance.

Since I'm not really a fanboy and don't have time to research memory controllers, I might end up with a dog system? Screw that. I'm not going to be playing chipset roulette, especially with a company that's infamous for not cooperating with the free software community outside of slower graphics chips. Hardware zealotry is almost as expensive as software folly, but I have a feeling that the two are linked.

I run Debian and have been thinking about moving to AMD 64. Prices on the AMD 64 one systems are very cheap. Yesterday I saw a mobo + processor for less than $200 and the mobo will use my crusty old DDR memory. I doubt core duo can touch that kind of price to performance ratio. I'm not really in a hurry because the five year old computer I have is still more than adequate. The biggest performance hit was disk latency, and I fixed that with an 80MB/s scsi drive mounted as /usr. I'll move when my current system dies. At that time, I'll look around to see where the bargain is.