Intel Pentium 4 6xx and 3.73EE: Favoring Features Over Performance
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Derek Wilson on February 21, 2005 6:15 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Final Words
So what conclusions do we draw from all this?
The 600 series is more about feature set than performance. Decreasing the cache miss rate and increasing the cache latency isn't exactly the best path to follow in the consumer market. Most PC workloads don't push enough threads or large enough data to really take advantage of the larger cache. We can see the potential improvement in the 43% increase under Maya, and looking back at the Irwindale benchmarks, it's obvious that strapping 2MBs of higher latency cache onto NetBurst has its place. But that won't be the draw of the 600 series on the desktop.
The introduction of EIST and EM64T on the desktop (from the mobile and server space respectively), is a point in the 600 series' favor. Dropping very powerful processors into SFF boxes is more of a possibility with the better heat management features. Of course, the faster the chip, the larger the differences in power as all of the processor models drop to the same frequency and voltage. As for EM64T, we still don't have a 64bit OS from Microsoft. We are on a release candidate, so hopefully we will see a shipping product soon.
The value of these new processors isn't terribly greater than that of the 500 series. If 32bit performance is your only worry, than the 600 processors are not the place to look until the 3.8GHz model becomes available. For those who are interested in the new technology from Intel, it may do to wait and see if prices on the new parts fall after being on the market for some time. Intel wants both of these lines to coexist, but, without a 64bit Windows, there just isn't enough to sell the 600 series over the 500 series yet.
The new 600 series isn't as much of a step forward in performance as it is a step sideways for Intel. As the 600 series core will be the one on which dual core chips are based, it does make sense for Intel to introduce power saving features and a larger cache. Our advice is to look at your favorite application and pick the part that offers the performance you need at the best price. For those who need EIST and EM64T now, even though there is a price premium, performance under the 600 series is generally on par with (or better than) the 500 series.
And if you feel like paying for Intel's 65nm fab plants, feel free to buy the new Pentium 4 3.73GHz Extreme Edition, but if you want the same performance and still want an Intel CPU, the Pentium 4 660 will do just as well.
With dual core coming this year, performance where it is, and street prices showing up higher than we would like to see them, we have trouble recommending the Pentium 4 600 series to anyone who doesn't need it.
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johnsonx - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
Is there no merit at all in running a few A64 vs P4 6xx benchmarks with the current RC build of XP x64? While I've found too many things I need don't work with XP x64 to use it, I did see that 3dMark03 ran fine. I know 3dMark itself isn't 64-bit, bit it does making heavy use of 64-bit DirectX and graphic driver calls. There must be a few more apps and games that could be called on...Maybe just limit the benchies to two processors, say an A64 3500+ vs. a Pentium 4 650, running the same benchmarks in 32-bit and 64-bit Windows, using just one GeForce 6xxx and one Radeon X8-something.
It'd just be interesting and useful to see which processor runs 64-bit code better, both absolutely and compared to each processor's 32-bit performance.
When the final release version of XP x64 does come out, it may be interesting to have benchmarks from the RC version to see what's improved (though I agree it wouldn't actually be useful in any practical sense).
Or perhaps Anandtech knows something I don't, like the release XP x64 is so close that running benches on the RC would be moot....
SLIM - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
#30 and 36Hans is right, the 3000 and 3200 cores in the graphs are not available in retail (downclocked 130nm cores) and are meant to show power consumption scaling with speed increases. It's unfortunate that they left out the more interesting comparison (the 130nm 3500+). The only 90nm AMD chip in the power graphs is the 3500+.
coldpower27 - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
Very strange your the only guys so far that show an increase in power consumption of the P4 6xx Series over the 5xx Series.Regs - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
Wow, a lot of good comments here. mlittl3, most of the Anandtech's population know that the EE's are just overpriced Northwood's on steroids (Big heads, small balls). And the crayon wax melting comparison made me laugh out loud.I just find it funny Intel is trying to slap on everything but the kitchen sink on these processors to make them more appealing. What's next? Are they going to come with a microwave toaster oven combo? With all do respect to Intel, to add on such features is not an easy thing to do at a engineering level but once again I feel that their marketing team is still running the show.
But what is AMD doing while Intel performs CPR on their Prescott's? All this news on Intel for the past few months left me nostalgic in what AMD is doing behind the scenes. SSE3 was their latest slap-on feature, but as we saw in your recent AMD article it offered little to no performance gain. AMD's next core has to offer lower L1-l2 Cache latencies. This is the only way I see AMD cornering Intel's Cores performance in every application. But im afraid we won't see any such thing until long-horn comes out in a few years. Until now we have to settle for worthless add-ons features for the desk-top consumers while we see both Intel and AMD battle the server market where Intel is mostly threatened.
HardwareD00d - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
In Soviet Russia, Prescott melts YOU!miketheidiot - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
why do the 3000 and 3200 have signifigantly higher power consumption than the 3500? I thought all 3200 and 3000 are also built on 90nm soi.RadeonGuy - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
Even With All the processors haveing 2mb cache they still suck assHans Maulwurf - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
#30 I think the 3000 and 3200 are not really Winchester cores. Maybe clocked down 130 nm cores.I´m interested in the memory timing of the A64. Is it 1T or 2T? This is an important information, you should always(!) give it the configuration part of reviews.
DerekWilson - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
One thing to remember about out power tests --We measure power draw at the wall. Power supplies are inefficient and magnify power draw at the wall. Power input to the PSU does not scale proportionally to power output.
Brian23 - Monday, February 21, 2005 - link
I thought that all winchesters were 90nm SOI.