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Intel Lynnfield CPU Bests Nehalem In Performance/Watt

Posted by timothy on from the when-ndas-expire dept.

Vigile writes "Not many people have debated that Intel's Nehalem architecture is the fastest available for consumer desktop computers since it was released last year, but quite a few have complained about the cost of the platform. Intel just released new Lynnfield-based processors under both the Core i7 and Core i5 names and tests are showing the new CPUs beating Nehalem in both performance-per-watt and performance-per-dollar tests to a startling degree. And while raw performance probably still goes to the Nehalem-based Core i7 CPUs, the lower prices of motherboards and memory for Lynnfield processors will likely more than make up for it." Update: 09/08 14:03 GMT by T : There are more eye-wateringly exhaustive examinations of the new chips all over the Web; here's HotHardware's version, and Tom's Hardware's.

6 of 173 comments (clear)

  1. Lack of focus by BadAnalogyGuy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've begun to feel that Intel is lacking focus in their chip lineup. While it makes sense that they have different series for different markets, within those lineups they have too many disparate chips that just cloud the water.

    Atom Z vs Atom N is one such case. The Atom is supposed to be their embedded processor series, but they just can't shake off the PC market yoke and focus solely on embedded customers.

    They have server CPUs, desktop CPUs, mobile CPUs, and embedded CPUs. But within each segment there are just too many choices that make it difficult to understand the whole picture without true data analysis like this article.

  2. What are Intel's naming department on? by Lemming+Mark · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I don't understand how Core was an improvement on Pentium. Pentium was iconic and a household name (which is pretty difficult to achieve in such a low-level field, especially as Intel typically doesn't sell direct to consumers). Core is boring and misleading. For instance, Core 2 Duo ... whuh?! Doesn't sound that impressive but definitely sounds muddled.

    Now there's this i7 and i5 business. Maybe I'm just old but I preferred when "Pentium n" is the new processor and probably better than my "Pentium n-1". I can understand they may have wanted to avoid the Sexium but at least that would be distinctive. Core is about as boring as traditional IBM naming.

    Their hardware is excellent these days. They went through some doldrums but generally seemed to sort themselves out pretty effectively and come out with ace stuff. Their Linux support is usually great too. Maybe one of these will be my new PC...

    1. Re:What are Intel's naming department on? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      When the Pentium 4 came out, it performed worse then the Pentium 3. Towards the middle or end of the Pentium 4's life was the only time AMD clearly trounced Intel. The Pentium brand was largely ruined.

      Intel made an attempt to re-image itself and shack off any stigma associated with it's old, we're-the-biggest-so-we-don't-care-if-our-chips-suck selves, changing it's "Intel Inside" logo to "Intel Leap Ahead," dropping Pentium, etc.

      Not sure that the new stuff is necessarily better, but I believe that was the reasoning behind the change.

    2. Re:What are Intel's naming department on? by pohl · · Score: 4, Interesting

      These things happen. Sometimes words, and sometimes even letters, carry hype all by themselves. You wake up one day, and a capital letter X is all the rage. Apple buys NeXT, then you have MacOS X. Some agile methodology gurus want to sell some books and they invent eXtreme Programming. Microsoft, with a marketing department full of ironic hipsters from Seattle, decide that would make an awesome name for Windows XP too. X is everywhere. Fast forward a few years, and the X is out, and the word Core is in. Live on the bleeding edge of the RedHat-derivitive universe with Fedora Core. Apple APIs abound: Core Data, Core Animation, Core Image. The megahertz race gives way to multicore. X sounds cool. All by itself, it is one phoneme away from something that evokes coitus. Core is hip, central, musical: hardcore, grindcore, metalcore. Even the term for the captured state of an abnormally terminated computer program sounds cool: core dump.

      --

      The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...

  3. AES benchmarks by a09bdb811a · · Score: 3, Interesting

    These chips have some kind of AES acceleration, called AES-NI.

    Are there any benchmarks of this? I use dm-crypt on Linux w/ AES-128 and the throughput is pretty low, about 60MB/sec tops, not as fast as the disk itself.

    1. Re:AES benchmarks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      No, Nehalem/Lynnfield does NOT have AES-NI. Westmere will, but only in 2010. As a heavy 1Gbit+ encrypted network user, 3x AES speedup is enough for me to postpone my purchases until then.