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AMD Shows Upcoming Phenom II CPU At 6.0 GHz+
Vigile writes "Today during a press briefing at AMD's offices in Austin, TX the company showed off some upcoming technology that should be available sometime early in 2009. What was most impressive was the overclocked speeds of the pending Phenom II X4 45nm processors. On air cooling AMD showed the quad-core CPU running at nearly 4.0 GHz while with much more extreme liquid nitrogen cooling help the same CPU reached over 6.0 GHz! It looks like AMD's newest processor might finally once again compete with the best from Intel, including its recent Core i7 CPUs."
This is far from impressive. Showing the overclocking results, especially on liquid nitrogen, is not a good indication of the day to day performance of the processor.
For example, here is a video from 2006 where a Pentium 4 processor is overclocked to 5 GHz.
So no, it doesn't look like "AMD's newest processor might finally once again compete with the best from Intel."
Will it run Vista?
If you need liquid nitrogen to boost it to 6 GHz, it's not all that interesting. Nehalem 2.66 GHz offering has also been shown to overclock to 4 GHz on air cooling, and some people have got the 3.2 GHz offering up to 4.5 GHz on air. On GHz they're roughly the same, possibly with a slight Intel edge.
I thought both companies were ditching the GHz war and fighting for actual performance supremacy? What's with the silly "my GHz is bigger than yours" competition? Do we have PPW numbers, or just press releases that mean nothing?
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what's the power rating for this thing at 4 ghz? 250 watts?
If you actually read the article you would have seen "AMD could theoretically have a 3.4 to 3.6 GHz processor at moderate TDP levels (think 125 watts)"
Anyone ever tried cooling a CPU with a continuous flow of liquid helium? :)
That's for the current generation Phenoms. You likely want this article, which covers the Phenom 2 procs.
TDP spec at 3.0ghz is 125W, so don't think he's exaggerating that much. I'd guesstimate 150-200W at 4ghz.
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The Phenom II will fit in my AM2 motherboard (which started with an Athlon 64 2.0GHz and currently has an Athlon x2 2.6GHz) and use my existing RAM. The intel i7 will not. The intel i7 is significantly more expensive than anything AMD has too.
Yep. And that means a dual-core version will leave you limbless.
everything in moderation
Theoretically, he may have been wondering about 4GHz. He, theoretically, may have wanted the power rating of the one they actually demonstrated. Of course he may have theoretically read the article too...in theory that is.
-=Bang Bang=-
First, I can put together an AMD box equivalent to an Intel for about $200 bucks cheaper. That money goes into my Video Card and I wind up with a better overall System.
Second, AMD clearly differentiates their product. An XP 6000 is faster than a 5000, etc. Buying an Intel CPU is a chore (and make sure you get the right board, That's not always clear either).Basically I'm Lazy, and Intel's made it a pain to pick the right processor.
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For games, doesn't much matter. Get a dual core chip that's reasonable and you should be fine. Games do use the CPU but the GPU is by far more important. You can get a quad if you really want but at this time very few can use it at all, and those that can don't tend to be that efficient. A good dual core from the mid range area from either manufacturer should work well.
65 vs 45 nm isn't that important except in terms of energy usage. The 45nm chips are going to use less power for equal performance. However this again isn't a huge deal since the GPU is likely to be the big drain in the system.
Cache isn't all that big a deal. Again, just get whatever the midrange is. Games aren't an area where cache seems to make a large performance difference.
More or less, while these things can make a difference, they don't make enough to justify that much worry or money. You will probably find that a $250 processor works pretty much as good as a $1000 processor, whereas a $300 graphics card is going to be 50% faster than a $150 graphics card. Thus it is clear where your money should go.
Personally I have a Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz 65nm chip and it works just fine on all the games I've thrown at it. In general, when games are limited it isn't the CPU it is either the refresh rate of the monitor (it isn't useful to go above that and as with all LCDs mine is set at 60Hz) or the GPU. Now keep in mind the GPU I have is a GeForce GTX 280. So even a GPU that heavy hitting doesn't really seem to need more CPU, for all the games I've messed with.
If I were to build a gaming system today my strategy would be as such:
--Get a midrange CPU. Something probably not more than $300, but not less than $150. Maybe a quad core since I also do audio work, but I'd be looking more at dual cores. I'd make sure it supports DDR2 RAM, since DDR3 is currently too pricey to justify the small gain.
--Get 4GB of RAM. It's cheap, why not.
--Get a nice big drive since bigger drives are faster and games are not getting any smaller.
--Get a video card such that I can afford to get a new one of the same price once every 12-18 months or so.
That last one is key: Your video card is important to games, and it gets outdated real fast. You can't buy one that won't, because new technology comes out all the time. You can drop $2000 on an insane multi-card setup, and it'll still be outdated soon. So, the right answer is to buy less card, more often. I say make it a yearly target. You aren't necessarily going to buy that often, but that's a good target to make sure your price is realistic and you really don't want to buy more often than that. So whatever you can afford per year, get that. Then, when the next worthwhile upgrade in that price range comes along, get it.
That's what I did. Prior to my 280, I had an 8800. They both cost me about $400. I can afford to spend that every year (I spend a lot on my computer, it's important to me). In that case, it was more like 16-18 months, which is fine. You keep your card until there's a new one worthwhile and/or you find a game that doesn't run well, but you are ready to upgrade yearly. Used to be I couldn't afford so much, so I used more midrange cards. I had a GeForce 3 Ti 200 back in the day. Wasn't top of the line, but I could afford to get it, and then to replace it next year if needed.
So get a midrange CPU, plenty of RAM, and a video card that you can upgrade and you should be fine. CPUs have pretty good life these days. It's videocards that are obselete all the time. Good news is that videocards can be gotten for reasonable prices. For example an ATi 4850 will run you about $150, less after rebate. However it is enough to run any game out there at high detail at a reasonable rez. My bet is it lasts more than a year, but at $150, it isn't unreasonable to replace next year if you need.