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Performance Comparison of Current Intel Core 2 CPUs
crazyeyes writes "Intel has way too many Core 2 processor models. No one really knows if it's worth paying $100 more for a Core 2 Quad, instead of a Core 2 Duo. And when tech websites start interjecting codenames like Wolfdale, Kentsfield and Yorkfield, you know the battle is lost. All we want is a simple guide on the REAL WORLD performance differences between the many Intel Core 2 processors. How do they perform in games like Crysis, 3D rendering software, video encoding software, etc.? Fortunately, there is such a guide — just simple comparisons of the relative performance of these CPUs."
Actually, it's not. The Core Duo is not based on the Core microarchitecture, the Core Duo is just 2 Pentium-Ms fused together and does not include 64-bit support. The Core 2 Duo is the first CPU to use the Core microarchitecture and includes 64-bit support.
Don't forget that the first Intel Quad didn't actually include Quad in the name, either. It was called the Core 2 Extreme QX6700.
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/
Well, maybe you should've thought about it for a few extra second before buying the card. The 7900 is indeed one generation older (the 7<8 part), but it's higher up in Nvidia's model range (900>600). Knowing this, I think it's unreasonable to expect the newer, but much cheaper card to be significantly/any (depending on exact configuratio) faster than the older one.
And not to be a complete dick, here's a handy chart for comparing graphics cards across several games.
US Government regulations require that Intel publish performance numbers for all of their CPUs. See the following links for the relative performance of all of Intel's CPUs. Make your own graphs if you need a pretty picture.
Intel microprocessor export compliance metrics:
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/
Almost every CPU compared. Now was that so hard?
You can do a spec comparison here http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php.
Not a real world comparison but it may be useful.
Try Tom's VGA Charts.
And even a passing understanding of how their model numbers work should make it obvious that an 8600 isn't necessarily even as good as a 7900; yes, it's a newer generation (7 -> 8), but it's a much cheaper part (900 -> 600).
Is the GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB used in the review any good?
From what I've seen, the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB cards are the best bang-for-the-buck at the moment. I just recently upgraded from a pair of 7950 GT cards in SLI mode to a pair of 8800 GT cards.
(Enough of an upgrade that I'm now CPU-bound instead of GPU-bound. Oops.)
Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?
Sorry, but that simply is not the case. The "Core brand did not use the new "Core 2" microarchitecture. The Core 2 microarchitecture *is* significantly different to the Pentium-M/Yonah microarchitecture. Intel marketing were total dickheads to label the warmed-over Pentium-M as "Core". If they had avoided doing so, we could have had a "Core" brand with the "Core microarchitecture" and avoided all of this confusion.
Core 2 was designed from the ground up (i.e. it isn't an updated Yonah/P-M), and incorporates ideas from both the Pentium-M design and the ill-fated Netburst architecture. The Core 2 execution unit is 4 issues wide unlike both Yonah/Netburst that were 3-issue cores. Core 2 is 64-bit across the board. It does single-cycle 128-bit SSE instructions. It has "macro-ops fusion" (the clever trick that combines a lot of "compare and jump" x86 instruction pairs into a single micro-op. It does memory-disambiguation to allow much more aggressive memory access reordering, etc. etc. Yes, it is logically a progression in the P6 family, but it was a very big jump architecturally. Ho hum.
ATI and NVIDIA guide