Intel vs. AMD - Today's Generation Compared

Bender writes "The Tech Report compares 15 Core 2 and Athlon 64 processors from Intel and AMD — from sub-$200 to a cool grand, from slower dual cores to fast quad cores — in 32 & 64-bit apps in Windows Vista, including the new, multithreaded RTS game Supreme Commander. 'The release of Windows Vista and a round of price cuts by AMD prompted us to hatch a devious plan involving Vista, a new test suite full of multithreaded and 64-bit applications, fifteen different CPU configurations, and countless hours of lab testing. That plan has come to fruition in the form of a broad-based comparison of the latest processors from AMD and Intel... from the lowly Athlon 64 X2 4400+ and Core 2 Duo E6300 to the astounding Athlon 64 FX-74 and Core 2 Extreme QX6700.' Folding@Home in Linux, power use, and energy efficiency are tested, too."

Comments

Summary - too blanket

[Visaris]

Intel > AMD at high end, Intel >= AMD at low end, Core 2 > A64, Intel finally has a lead in both architecture design and process (65nm).

I would agree with that as a generalization, but I still think it is very important for people to consider the applications they use most often. TR's benches clearly show that someone working primarily with POV-Ray would get better performance for $599 with AMD than for $999 with Intel. I agree that Intel takes the overall win, but blanket statements like this really fail to catch the areas where some chips shine and others do not.

Re:Hidden away on page 14

[AmigaBen]

"...the list of games that really use four cores is approximately zero."

"That's the most interesting part of the article for me... they are really pushed to find any real-world reason for having 4 cores."

Excuse me? Games=real world?

Sorry, must have missed the memo.