AMD's Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition
by Anand Lal Shimpi on August 13, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
The Problem at 245
The problem with the $245 price point that AMD’s flagship sells at is one of positioning. It is dangerously close to the $284 price of a Core i7 920, which is generally a faster chip.
| CPU | Price |
| Intel Core i7 920 | $280 |
| Intel Core 2 Quad Q9650 | $320 |
| AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition | $245 |
| Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 | $220 |
| Intel Core i5 750 (Unreleased) | $199 |
The Core 2 Quad Q9650 simply doesn't make any sense, it's a wonder that Intel still sells it. The Q9550 can be had for around $220 and is generally slower than the 965 Black Edition. The i5 750 is the wildcard; if it does debut next month at $199 and is as competitive as we're expecting, it could force AMD to compress its upper end pricing.
Until Lynnfield arrives, the only things AMD has to worry about are the Core 2 Quad at the low end and the i7 at the high end. The more expensive Core 2 Quads don't really seem to matter, the Phenom II dispatches with them fairly easily. To fight off the i7, instead of lowering profit margins, AMD is going to be offering a number of bundles to help reduce total ownership cost.
While AMD wasn’t specific as to what bundles will be available, starting today Newegg, Tiger Direct, ZipZoomFly, NCIX and MWAVE will all be offering bundles on the Phenom II X4 965 and certain motherboards. AMD is estimating the bundles to knock off around $40 from the total combined price. There will also be Corsair memory and AMD GPU bundles, but AMD was even more vague on what we should expect there.
A quick look at Newegg shows that currently you can save about $30 if you’re buying a Phenom II X4 945 and a Gigabyte 790FX motherboard. Unfortunately it looks like the bundles don’t kick in if you’re buying any of the cheaper motherboards. It remains to be seen what sort of 965 bundles will be available.
Pressure from above with the i7 920 is relieved by lower prices, but next month pressure from below with the i5 750 is sure to make things difficult. AMD sweetens the pot by making its flagship part a multiplier unlocked Black Edition. Like the 955 before it, our 965 easily hit 3.8GHz without so much as an added millivolt. We just increased the clock multiplier and off we went.
The Test
| Motherboard: | Intel DX58SO (Intel X58) Intel DX48BT2 (Intel X48) MSI DKA790GX Platinum (AMD 790GX) Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-DS4H (AMD 790GX) Gigabyte GA-MA790FX-UD5P (AMD 790FX) |
| Chipset: | Intel X48 Intel X58 AMD 790GX AMD 790FX |
| Chipset Drivers: | Intel 9.1.1.1010 (Intel) AMD Catalyst 8.12 |
| Hard Disk: | Intel X25-M SSD (80GB) |
| Memory: | G.Skill DDR2-800 2 x 2GB (4-4-4-12) G.Skill DDR2-1066 2 x 2GB (5-5-5-15) Qimonda DDR3-1066 4 x 1GB (7-7-7-20) Corsair DDR3-1333 4 x 1GB (7-7-7-20) |
| Video Card: | eVGA GeForce GTX 280 |
| Video Drivers: | NVIDIA ForceWare 180.43 (Vista64) NVIDIA ForceWare 178.24 (Vista32) |
| Desktop Resolution: | 1920 x 1200 |
| OS: | Windows Vista Ultimate 32-bit (for SYSMark) Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit |
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brybir - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
I did notice on newegg that AMD is releasing some of its Phenom II's with lower TDP.They have a Phenom II 945 that was rated at 125WTDP now with the same processor just rated at 95W TDP.
I figure they will goose the clock speed a bit more if they can and continue to work on getting their power consumption lowered on the rest of their line so by the time their new processors come out the Phenom II's can pull up low power budget duty.
Taft12 - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
I was going to mention this new part from AMD as well (945 95W edition). Anand you would do well to draw attention to it as well where you talk about AMD's current product lineup. This is a more interesting and notable introduction to me than this 140W behemoth.I was surprised to see the 965 only consumes 3W more at load than the 955BE however. Yes it draws the highest power on the chart, but only just barely.
werfu - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
What AMD needs is a way to improve performance per clock, that's it, either K11 or something new. There's no way they'll be able to scale much past the 4Ghz point. Imagine the boost they would get, if they could provide 10% more clock efficiency, at the clock they are currently that would be a huge boost. They also need to improve the IMC. Going for 4 memory stick with AMD for now is a no go if you want to have high ram speed. Memory bandwidth is definitely a huge Intel advantage. And something like Hyperthread could be nice too.TheHolyLancer - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
uncore? isnt this HTT?JumpingJack - Sunday, September 21, 2014 - link
No, uncore is not HTT....medi01 - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
"The problem with the $245 price point that AMD’s flagship sells at is one of positioning. It is dangerously close to the $284 price of a Core i7 920, which is generally a faster chip."Sorry, but shouldn't you also include motherboard price into calculation?
C'DaleRider - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
Well, really depends upon where you buy your parts from, doesn't it?Given that I have a MicroCenter and Fry's handy, the price for Intel's Core i7 cpu is $200. Combine that with an inexpensive X58 motherboard, like the MSI X58M, that has gotten quite good reviews for what it is, retails for $170.
That gives a $370 price for mb and cpu to move to i7....cost of DDR3 memory is a wash due to both platforms requiring it.
Of course, for those that depend upon Newegg's pricing for cpus, I feel for you....getting ripped off and all. Horrible how the 'Egg gouges on cpu prices these days.
mohindar - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
How you can fit this processor onto socket LGA775, as mentioned in the final page...mohindar - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
Sorry, wrong comment.Ben90 - Thursday, August 13, 2009 - link
the SYS Mark 2007 Chart has the i7 920 @ 2.8 ghz... dont know if its on purpose or a typo