AMD Launches Budget Processor Refresh
MojoKid writes "AMD has again launched a bevy of new processors targeted squarely at budget-conscious consumers. Though Intel may be leading the market handily in the high-performance arena, AMD still provides a competitive offering from a price/performance perspective for the mainstream. HotHardware has a performance quick-take of the new 3.2GHz Phenom II X2 555 and 2.9GHz Athlon II X4 635. For $100 or less, bang for the buck with AMD is still relatively high."
I agree, I have a Phenom x2 and my whole system cost me a mere €300, - including sound, HDD and good enough video to have a 3d gnome desktop.
i know we're not to rtfa, but you're off by ~100w
for both phenom ii processors in the review
which are 80w and 95w.
Would you please elaborate on the "poor performance". What are/were you doing? Gaming, video encoding, or what? I have a 64-bit X2 dual in a system I built for $300. The only reason I considered a 64-bit processor was so I could stick 4gb of RAM into it, so please further elaborate on how "they burned (you) with their 64 bit processors". What additional benefit were you expecting from 64-bit architecture? I've used this machine for some CPU-heavy statistical/programming work (Natural Language Processing), and it performed adequately. It even handles high-detail Civ4 games well, despite using only onboard video.
The Atom is FAR inferior in terms of performance, so to answer your question, no. The Atom is designed for mobile computing, so it sacrifices performance for power-saving gains. This is meant to compete with intels low priced desktop-orientated CPUs.
What are you talking about? AMD64, also known as x86_64 or EMT64T was invented by AMD.
The performance is absolutely stellar.
AMD did this so well, Intel decided to try to copy them, and came up with Intel 64T.
As a whole, there is barely a noticeable performance difference between the two platforms.
Of course there are some low-performing 64-bit procs for budget users, just like there are slow Intel procs for budget users.
But overall, Intel 64-bit procs are no better than AMD 64-bit procs.
Also, when it comes to hardware virtualization and IOMMU, AMD has a very significant edge.
Don't blame AMD because you bought the wrong proc model for your system, or misconfig'ed it. Processor is definitely not the only thing that impacts performance. There are many other ways you can screw your system's performance in picking hardware components -- not all procs are ideal for all configurations.
Hell, i'm very often getting better performance with Linux and Windows (dual boot) out of my AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ Windsor 2.6GHz than with my Intel Core2 Quad Core Q9400 2.66Ghz, and much better benchmarks for certain types of workloads.
Even though the Quad Core machine has 8gb of RAM, and my dual-core machine only has 4gb...
I blame it on the Linux and Windows kernels' poor support for multi-processing and seedy memory management.
From one who modded you down, I did so for the following reasons:
/. is to be a meaningful, intelligent, mature discussion of a particular article, and
1. Screaming and yelling at a poster for being a idiot because they do not agree with you,
2. Failing to recognize that the commenting system on
3. Not understanding that capitalization of words is to be done in accordance with proper rules of grammer, and not as a means to yelling louder over your percieved persecution.
Thank you, the AC who burned 3 mod points on one poster in one article. Posting as AC, obviously, to preserve my moderation.