Conroe vs. AM2: Memory & Performance

by Wesley Fink on 7/25/2006 12:05 AM EST
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  • HSuke - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    quote:

    This fact will make our memory testing much simpler, and we plan to perform all upcoming memory testing on the currently more flexible Core 2 Duo test platform. AM2 buyers can expect similar results with the same DDR2 memory on their AM2 motherboards.


    I hope this means that you're going to do the tests on the Core 2 Duo test platform IN ADDITION to your current platforms.

    I hope this does NOT mean that you're going to do the tests EXCLUSIVELY on the Core 2 Duo test platform.



    So are you going to stop doing memory tests with AMD processors? How scientific is that? If you go to page 7 and look at the performance charts, you'll see that memory speeds have a much greater impact (pertage-wise) on the AMD setup than the Core 2 Duo setup.

    Well, I'm quite surprised that memory even made a difference. But since that is true (according to your tests), shouldn't be testing on AM2 instead of Core 2 Duo processors in the future because the difference is more marked? If there wasn't any significant difference on an Intel system, but a significant difference on an AMD system, you'd probably suggest that memory doesn't make a difference, commiting a type 2 error.

    Now, I don't care about memory. I always buy whatever is on sale. But making that conclusion would just piss off so many memory enthusiasts and memory sellers. And aren't those guys the ones that would be reading this article?

    Think about it.
  • Wesley Fink - Friday, July 28, 2006 - link

    As we explained in the article, AM2 currently does not support the DDR2-1067 speed, while the Intel chipset for Core 2 Duo DOES support 1067. Since most memory we test can reach 900 to 1067 or 1100 or greater the 1067 ratio is an advantage. Also the current AM2 memory controller does not support settings of 2 for Ras-to-Cas or tRef - AM2 only supports to 3. Core 2 Dupo supports faster timings of 2 at these settings. Since these lower settings are often usable in fast memory they can be very important.

    For these reasons, we will be using the Core 2 Duo platform for testing DDR2 memory, since we can test more of the options that are available and may be important on high-performance DDR2 memory. If and when AM2 upgrades their DDR2 memory controller we will reconsider testing on AM2.
  • Kiijibari - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    Hi everybody,

    first of all I have to admit that this is the best Anandtech article for a long time. Everybody blamed me for being an AMD fanboy latley, however I do not have any problems to admit that Core2 is faster.

    If Intel would not have anything faster than AMD after 3 years of AMD lead, Intel would be best adwised to stop making CPUs and become an AMD chipset company ;-)

    I have one question left: Which BIOS version did you use with the AM2 board ?
    I recoginzed that DDR2 bandwidth scores increased quiet much compared to the initial tests. Now we have Sandra scores around 9.3 GB/s, however I remember that the initial ones were around 7.4 GB/s max.

    In conclusion I assume that there is some optimization going on, due to bios seetings.

    There was also a little test over at lostcircuits:
    http://www.lostcircuits.com/motherboard/foxconn_c5...">http://www.lostcircuits.com/motherboard/foxconn_c5...

    There the Asus board scored just ~7 GB/s, but a tested Foxconn board is again in the 9GB/s area.

    It maybe that the BIOSes are optimized for different kind of RAMs, too, as lostcircuit used OCZ memory, not Corsair.

    Anyways, I think the results are interesting enough to dig a little bit further ;-)

    Thanks again for the great review.

    regards

    Kiijibari

  • Wesley Fink - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    P5W-DH Deluxe BIOS is 701, dated 7/08/2006. The Corsair memory used in this review can do 4-3-4-11 timings at DDR2-1067, where most high-end DDR2 can only reach 4-4-4 timings at that speed.
  • Kiijibari - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    Sorry, looks like you misunderstood me, I was wondering about the AM2 platform bandwidth results @2.8Ghz and DDR2-800(page3). The Core2 scores are the same as "usual" ;-)

    So can you also say which bios you were using for the Asus M2N32-SLI ?

    thanks a lot

    Kiijibari
  • Gary Key - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    quote:

    So can you also say which bios you were using for the Asus M2N32-SLI ?


    0603 - 6/29/06
  • OcHungry - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    But I dont understand why you need DDR2 800 or 1000?
    DDR2 667 w/ tighter timings can run @ 333 1:1 ratio (333x9 for FX62).
    Tell me what I am missing here?
  • zsdersw - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    quote:

    I dont understand


    Understatement of the year.

  • zsdersw - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Intel would be best adwised to stop making CPUs and become an AMD chipset company ;-)


    Interesting notion. If it ever came to be, you can kiss price cuts (and innovation) on AMD chips goodbye.
  • Shizen - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Intel Core 2 comes out and AMD slashes prices across the board... the months ahead look like a great time to buy a new rig! Finally, I can retire my aging 2.8GHz Northwood and move on to PCI-E and DDR2. *_*

    Many thanks to the AnandTech dudes for keeping us abreast with the CPU wars, and I personally hope you guys come out with more articles geared for the midranged ($1000-$1500) buyer.

    Yeah, I like the idea of being a PERFORMANCE fanboi rather than a brand-centric one. o_o
  • Coogcheese - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Is the latency issue really due to intelligent look-ahead or the vast cache size difference between the two processors? I'd like to see a benchmark comparison between an 2MB cache opeteron and an equally cached/clocked/timed Conroe. That would settle some debate (yea, yea...wishful thinking).

    It could also help lend some insite to what AMD might do in the short & long term as a response as well.

    The author of the review seems to give alot of credit to "look-ahead" but I found this benchmark comparison to be interesting: http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=6256&am...">http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=6256&am...

    Opteron doesn't seem to have same problem that the Athlon does in terms of latency performance. Which could be why amd execs seem less than panicky at this point. It would allude to a market war similar to the megahurtz war that led to amd coming out with the model # system...this time it could be intel taking advantage of their capacity by laying the cache size smack down on amd instead of megahurtz.

    If it is cache size and not "look-ahead" then amd could (could mind you...but would they? and how many could they?) respond much quicker I'd think. If its new technology or a combo of cache and new tech then amd will be in a much worse position imho.

    Whatever the case its great for the consumer(me). Thank goodness for competition. Daddy needs a new pair of cores...and the price just got a whole lot better!

  • ChronoReverse - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    It would indeed be very interesting to see a 2MB L2 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo E6200 compared against 2MB L2 1.6GHz Opteron 160.

    The shared L2 cache of the Conroe will give it a nice advantage though.
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Anyonehave any speculation as to how much the initial Conroe's will cost? We pretty much know that the motherboards will be expensive but what about the CPU's?
  • ChronoReverse - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    The pricing has been out for a while already. They're relatively reasonable considering the performance. Only the Extreme Edition as usual is really expensive (but still not as expensive as I'd have thought).


    Too bad the motherboards are so expensive. I'm taking a look at that Asrock board, but I doubt it'll have any good overclocking capability.
  • Gary Key - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Too bad the motherboards are so expensive. I'm taking a look at that Asrock board, but I doubt it'll have any good overclocking capability.


    The less expensive boards for Conroe will fully hit the market near the end of August. ;-) We expect to see ECS, Foxconn, MSI, Epox, and others fully ramped up in a couple of weeks on the value boards. Until then, the Gigabyte DS3 is a really good board for overclocking the E6300/E6400 series and our Biostar and Abit boards continue to improve with each bios release. All three are under $145 now with others joining them shortly if the P965 is interesting to you. The ASRock board actually surprised us, but remember the VCore voltage cannot be adjusted. The $50~$100 market will be very interesting as the 945P, 946PL, and NV570SLI chipsets will dominate this section until the G965 boards start arriving in September if decent intergrated graphics are on your wish list, if not all of the boards will offer good performance for the money. The under $55 market will consist of VIA and SIS chipsets from PC-Chips and ASRock with a few majors like ECS and MSI having boards based on these chipsets.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Everest Scores have been rerun with Version 3.01, which was released on July 16, 2006. Since the scores from the new version can not be compared to older Everest scores, we reran all the Everest benchmarks. 3.01 is said to provide full and complete support for Conroe and Merom. Values are different in that Memory WRITE and READ scores are reported as much higher than past Everest testing. Latency is also reported as closer between AM2 and Core 2 Duo with the 3.01 version of Everest. Charts and commentary have been revised using the new results.
  • jjunos - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Thanks for the update wes! It always shows the quality of the website when they listen to their community and and willing to rerun all their tests in the sake of being correct! kudos!
  • TonyB - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    is it just me or did AMD just get pwned?
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    is it just me or did AMD just get pwned?
    I personally don't care about who owns who. I just want competition so I can get this stuff for cheap. I'm a best bang for the buck guy.
  • goinginstyle - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Everyone benefits here with the performance improvements Intel has brought to the table and an AM2 3800+ at $150 is just an incredible value. Conroe made it easy for AMD users to upgrade their performance for very little money.
  • TonyB - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    so ive been hearing a lot of people use this argument, "oh competition is good, i can get a so-and-so cpu now for xyz price!!". what an incredible value!

    cant you bring that a notch higher and say, "dang, Intel just whooped AMD, i'm going to purchase an amd K6-2 400mhz cpu now for $5" yes! horray for competition! what an incredible value only $5!

    at what point does reality set in that you're investing in obsolete technology? or does the old rationale, "i dont want the fastest, this old crap is good enough for me" still apply.
  • OcHungry - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    You waited 4 years to say that "crap" about AMD's bargain value? but please dont tell us about your 4 years venture in finding a better way to exhust your P4 hot air.
    very nice.
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    Unfortunately, the current production processors don't reach that low a value (the AM2 semprons have a price of around $70+, and the Socket A semprons have a price of around $50). You might want to invest in new obsolete technology (with a longer warranty), or you might want to invest in old obsolete technology (or in old current technology, see refurbs).
    As long as your performance needs are reached, you could be certain to a degree that a failure in your computer could be repaired/replaced in short time, you are ok to go with Pentium MMX or so processors. Anyway, finding SDR RAM for your K6-2 might not be so easy (and SDR DIMMs were a new memory standard then). Good luck finding enough SIMMs to put the memory at 128MB
  • BPB - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    How about an article spending $200 on both the CPU and video card ($400 total) and then look at what various motherboard and memory combos get me. You could spend $100 to $250 on motherboards and show me what I get, with memory hopefully being the same for the Intel and AMD systems. That's really the bottom line for myself and many, many others. Many if not most of us set a price range for CPU, video card, and memory and then go from there. Either that or simple overall cost is set. I know you give us buying guides where you spend X amount on systems, but I don't think you show us the power each system gets.
  • photoguy99 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    They already have those articles - They periodically release CPU and Graphics card guides that analyze the bang for the buck at different budgets.
  • BPB - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I know they do that, but I don't think I've seen both "here's what $1000 gets for an AMD/Intel system" and "here's how fast each system is". That's what I'd like to see. I know how much individual parts cost and how fast they are in and of themselves, but put it all together and show me systems and compare those systems. If they've done that in the past I've missed it. But the past no longer matters, so I'd love to see one that's current as of today's new prices.
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    The computer price guides did just that - taking a budget of $$$ or $$$$ and building systems. There was the budger guide, gamer guide and "all out" guide (this last one had price ranges at $2000+)
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    What was the purpose of this article? Was there something that was left out of the tons of earlier benchmarks from various websites?
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Thanks guys. I don't remember seeing info about memory either.
  • rjm55 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    There were a lot of things that I hadn't seen anywhere else. No one I have read shows that Conroe is lower in Bandwidth than either AM2 or Netburst. I find that surprising looking at Conroe's big performance lead. This is also the first time I've seen AM2/Conroe compared clock-to-clock in the same configuration using the same memory/settings - and at 2.93GHz. The new graphs for memory speeds show directions and provide more info that bar charts. Suggest you use them more in other reviews.
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    I wonder if Conroe is losing a part of its bandwidth to the prefetcher. It might be so (the prefetcher is busy bringing things that will be or won't be needed, and discards some of them. Meanwhile, the memory bandwidth usable decreases).
  • defter - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I don't recall that other benchmarks contained DDR2-400, DDR2-533, DDR2-667, DDR2-800 comparison.

    Basically, this review shows that if you don't want to pay a big premium for DDR2-800, Conroe is even more attractive. This isn't very suprising, because Conroe's 1066MHz (8.4GB/s) FSB can be saturated by dual-channel DDR2-533 (2x4.2GB/s = 8.4GB/s).
  • classy - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    The Conroe buying guide was a great article, much like the Anandtech of old. But this review is too much like the recent ones absolutely of little or no value. What was the purpose of this read? We know already know core is faster.....we know already know as it is has been shown numerous times around the net memory scaling. Where is the originality at anymore? Want an example? There is a clear price difference between the two now. If a person goes AMD, they will be able to afford a better graphics card then say someone who goes Core. So why not a comparison along those lines. There is so much more to the puzzle then the same old lets run some benchmarks.
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I would like to see more articles on memory and motherboards myself for the Conroe.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    From the conclusion : "The deep price cuts announced by AMD yesterday will definitely help. The new numbers indicate AM2 will be very competitive at the low end to low-mid of the processor food chain - a spot they have held in the past and where they have still managed to survive. The low end looks very competitive, and AMD is positioned close enough to mid-range in performance to keep Intel honest. There is no mistaking, however, that Intel Core 2 Duo owns the mid to high-end of the current processor market."

  • OcHungry - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    Now wait a minute- The E6800 costs ~ $1200 (if you find one), the FX62 is $800, which is 50% less. According to your review/benchmarks you propose E6800 is about 20% better performer than FX62. Considering price/performance ratio, FX62 should be the ideal choice for high end users/enthusiasts as far as price/performance is concerned.
    Am I wrong? This is without considering motherboard and video card limitation(s) of Intel platform. The high end enthusiasts would not run single graphic card or IGP system. Have you figured into price/performance of CPU, Motherboard and video card? Or SLI and Crossfire?
    What about 4x4?
    AMD is releasing 4x4's on several x2 CPU's (I think other than FX62) that will cost less than $1000. Are you saying a $1200 E6800 is a better performer than a less than $1000 4X4?
    wouldn’t a 4x4 make the top end of the enthusiast’s market?
    In my country a 4x4 make a stronger candidate for "the new king to be born".
  • DigitalFreak - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Give up, Wesley. :-)

    The AMD fanboys will keep trying to destroy your conclusions, since it doesn't benefit them.
  • duploxxx - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    why would they, you might call me a fanboy but for sure the statement of wesley is true.
    the high performanmce market is for now (ehh from the moment you can buy them) back at the intel site... (the low-mid market is for both altough amd has an advantage here on lower price in combination with lower price on mobo's and global availability) the perfromance crown for the e6700 and xe6800and will remain there until amd pulls out something new, even if it is by 4x4... perfromance crown is performance crown... some people just do and buy anything as long as it is the fastest... same with gpu cards.. they'll buy them every month.
  • drebo - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    the high performanmce market is for now (ehh from the moment you can buy them) back at the intel site...


    If you consider an Athlon64 X2 5000+ or FX-62 "low-mid" tier performance, I suppose you could come to this conclusion.

    Fact is, on a dollar-for-dollar basis, AMD still leads in, or atleast matches, performance. If I look at my main processor vendor's future pricing on Core 2 Duo processors(they're not scheduled to get any in until August 18th, by the way) and compare them with Athlon64 X2 processors under the new pricing scheme, this is what it looks like:

    Athlon64 X2 3800+ @ $149
    Athlon64 X2 4200+ @ $183
    Core 2 Duo E6300 @ $199.58
    Athlon64 X2 4400+ @ 219.79
    Athlon64 X2 4600+ @ 235.00
    Core 2 Duo E6400 @ 239.58
    Athlon64 X2 4800+ @ 279.74
    Athlon64 X2 5000+ @ 294.74
    Core 2 Duo E6600 @ 334.32
    Core 2 Duo E6700 @ 553.26
    Athlon64 FX-60/62 @ 811.00
    Core 2 Duo X6800 @ 1021.68

    Now, that gives us a few pairing(on which Athlon64 X2 processors always come out below) by which to compare: 4200+ vs E6300, 4600+ vs E6400, 5000+ vs E6600. Now, according to Anandtech's own Conroe vs Athlon64 benchmarks, the Athlon64 meets or exceeds the corresponding Conroe processor in probably 90% of the non-synthetic benchmarks. THIS is the important thing. I can take an FX-60 and just as easily compare it to a Pentium D 930 and say that the FX-60 is better, discounting the fact that the FX-60 is nearly 4x the cost.

    The same is true here, and I've seen countless review sites doing it. Yes, the E6700 and X6800 processors outperform anything AMD has to offer, but they also cost more than anything AMD has to offer. AMD no longer has a processor at the $1000 price point, and down the line, AMD processors consistently cost less than Core 2 Duo processors they perform just as well against. It is this that is the important thing and it is this than none of the review sites or press has addressed. AMD is still quite competative dollar-for-dollar, particularly when you factor in motherboard cost.
  • coldpower27 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Try meets or is slightly behind. AMD processors rarely "exceeds" in real world applications in the slightest.

    an E6600 is faster then the 5000+

    an E6400 is faster then the 4600+

    and E6300 is faster then the 4200+

    as has been shown by Anandtech.
  • drebo - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Excuse me, but the E6400 wasn't even IN the benchmarks Anandtech ran, but by extrapolation(considering the E6700 did not beat out the 5000+ by a large margin), it cannot perform better than the 5000+.

    And, in the majority of benchmarks, such as the ones http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?...">here, which are benchmarks that have traditionally favored Intel processors in the past, the AMD chips do not fall as you paint them. They fall as I have painted them. The 4200+ outperforms the E6300 in ALL of them...and costs LESS. The 5000+ matches performance in 2/3 of them with the E6600. And costs LESS.

    Sorry, but this isn't about which company is better or provides a better product. This is about which company provides a better product at a better price. We all know the X6800 is the best desktop processor available. NO ONE is disputing that. The dispute is that review sites are proclaiming that the Core 2 Duos are god's gift to Intel and that Athlon64s are completely worthless now, which is NOT the case.

    In the $1k processor range, sure, Core 2 Duo is the king...but AMD doesn't have a processor in that range anymore. There is no competition to the X6800 anymore. At every other price point, however, the Athlon64 X2 processors are extremely competative.
  • coldpower27 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Take a look at these benchmarks show the E6400 in them, and for the most part it beats out the 4600+

    http://xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-...">http://xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-...
  • coldpower27 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Oh please, you looked at 1 page of benchmark to make your conclusion??

    Did you just look at 3D Rendering to draq your conclusions?

    What about the encoding and gaming performance? Did you look at those?
  • IntelUser2000 - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Oh please, you looked at 1 page of benchmark to make your conclusion??

    Did you just look at 3D Rendering to draq your conclusions?

    What about the encoding and gaming performance? Did you look at those?


    It is obvious you haven't seen both of my posts fully. Please do. Core 2 Duo outperforms.

    This is type of performance increase people would have been crazy about, but somehow its different. Maybe its conspiracy to kill Intel??
  • coldpower27 - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    IntelUser2000.

    Chill. I am reply to drebo in this reply not you. Anandtech comment posting system is just strange.
  • IntelUser2000 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    And, in the majority of benchmarks, such as the ones here, which are benchmarks that have traditionally favored Intel processors in the past, the AMD chips do not fall as you paint them. They fall as I have painted them. The 4200+ outperforms the E6300 in ALL of them...and costs LESS. The 5000+ matches performance in 2/3 of them with the E6600. And costs LESS.


    Please stop being an idiot. If you see Anandtech's benchmarks you can clearly see that E6600 is FASTER overall than FX-62. That's why the saying of $316 FX-62 came about.


    For those that are in denial about the FACT that E6600 with $316 price beats FX-62

    Application Performance using SYSMark 2004 SE
    Average performance: 18.6% in favor of E6600

    Application Performance using PC WorldBench 5
    1.4% advantage of Core 2 Duo E6600

    Application Performance using Winstone 2004
    2.9% advantage of FX-62, E6600 equal or faster than 5000+

    3D Rendering Performance using 3dsmax 7 & CineBench 9.5
    2.7% advantage of FX-62, E6600 faster than 5000+

    Encoding Performance using DivX 6.1, WME9, Quicktime (H.264) & iTunes
    6.0% advantage of E6600

    Overall Gaming Performance
    11.6% advantage of E6600


    Total Performance increase of E6600 over Athlon FX-62
    Core 2 Duo E6600 is 9.9% faster overall than Athlon FX-62!!
  • IntelUser2000 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Normally, the kind of performance advantage E6600 gives over the FX-62 would have meant people would have flocked over to E6600 even if it was previous high-end mainstream price for Intel processors, which is $637.

    Stop spreading false info people(anti-intel, and i am saying lightly), cause not only your beloved Athlon 64 X2 5000+ slower than E6600, so is AMD's top end offering, the FX-62!!!

    I remember people saying Core Duo was worth it(yes the Yonah). Based on the logic people are spreading for Core 2 Duo argument, Core Duo wasn't worth it at all. $637 for the top end Core Duo(Yonah), and being barely faster per clock than FX-62 when clocked outrageously high(30% over stock, while FX-62 is at stock), plus expensive motherboards that are hard to find.

    If Core Duo was worth it at all, well... Core 2 Duo is like a dream.
  • Accord99 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    And the E6300 does better in other tests, such as the Sysmark, video encoding and games. And the E6600 doesn't compete with the 5000+, it competes with the FX-64.
  • drebo - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I don't know what benchmarks you're looking at, but they sure as hell aren't posted on any review site I've ever seen.

    I never expected my opinion that AMD is not dead and Intel is not master of all to be popular, but I atleast expected some constructive responses. Yes, Intel has the best performing processor. We know this. No one cares. I'm sure AMD could spin a 3.2ghz FX-70 or something and sell it for $2000. But why bother, for 2% of the population to use? The vast majority of computer users are looking for performance-per-dollar, and there is no difference between Athlon64 X2 processors and Core 2 Duo processors in that ratio...except, of course, motherboard...which tends to cost near to twice as much on the Core 2 Duo side.

    Yes, Intel released a competative platform. We're all very happy with them, and once they're available, it'll be great...but they're hardly a nail in the coffin for AMD. AMD still holds the superior chips for single-core, and performance-per-dollar is just as good as Core 2 Duo, and I can tell you from personal experience, that's what matters.

    Go go objectivity!
  • Accord99 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I'm just looking at all the Anandtech benchmarks. It's quite clear the E6300 is faster than the 4200+ overall, while the E6600 is faster than the FX-62 overall.

    So performance/dollar is higher for Conroe, the current motherboards are more expensive but that can be made up from purchasing less high-end memory. And Conroe uses less power.
  • duploxxx - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    please give us edit...

    powerconsumption is only less in 100% load.... when powermode kicks in the amd is much less consuming... how long do you think a system runs in powermode against full load....
  • duploxxx - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    wrong... the conroe gains from the memory speed the amd more thats a fact... the ones you are referring to are probably 4200 and 5000, well we can say that they perfrom better when using 533/667 because then they don't have the devider issue running the memory on 742 in stead of 800.

    so the performance/price ratio on those chips is better with 553/667
  • zsdersw - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    Conroe's performance isn't merely a function of memory bandwidth or memory speed.
  • PeterR - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    If you could actually go out and BUY one ?

    Peter R.
  • michal1980 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Wow. AMD fanboi's pulling out all the crap that the intel fanboi's have pulled in the past.


    wake up!. Right now, Intel core 2 duo is faster then AMD 64 right now.

    Its like video card fanboi's but worse, because the difference here is clear.

    If I was building a gaming rig this year, I would build with a core 2 duo.

    Just like a few months ago, it would be with an AMD 64.

    I go with what company is faster. I used both nvidia cards, and ati Cards. I use pentiums, and p2's, I used athlon xp's when you over clock them 50% ease and they were dirt cheap. I use a opty dual core right now because it was faster then the p4's. I use p-m lappys because of performance/battery life.

    If I was building a rig right now. I'd switch to an intel Core 2 duo. Why? because its faster. I could care less about who makes it.

    if apple comes out tommorow with a magic pc that runs all pc games run 20% faster, I'm buying an apple.
  • Pirks - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    if apple comes out tommorow with a magic pc that runs all pc games run 20% faster, I'm buying an apple
    I'd buy a iMac or Mac Pro right this second if it were running all PC games at all without rebooting between OS X and XP.
  • yacoub - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Two things:

    1 - I think I like the new font used in tables and charts.

    2 - In the SuperPi chart you say Lower is Better but then inverse the graph such that it is actually the line higher on the graph that is better. Unless the reader looks closely at the numbers, they could infer that the AMD chip wipes the floor with the Conroe.
  • redbone75 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Seriously, though, here we have a completely new architecture from Intel, the same Intel that is this massive company with enormous resources and huge R&D departments, and these AMD fanboys are still all upset because Intel has not only achieved parity with but also exceded AMD in performance. Come to think of it, this is the exact same argument that AMD fans were using when preliminary benchmarks came out on Conroe. "It's not fair to compare Intel's new architecture to AMD's old one, because they have an advantage." Hey, you want some cheese with that wine? I'll tell you what: AMD enjoyed the performance lead for a while. Now, Intel is having a go at it and, with any luck, AMD will come out on top in the future, at least I really hope so. Why do I hope so? Do any of you think AMD would have lowered their processor prices so much if Conroe wasn't such a threat? Do you think Intel would have released Conroe at these prices if they didn't have to take back the crown from AMD? Hey, with the X2's we still get a great range of processors at much lower prices. Hell, even the Pentium D's are going to be attractive at lower prices. That makes me happy, not some benchmarks saying this processor is faster than that processor. And really, I don't know about you but I don't care about which processor wins memory latency benches, I only care about the end performance in applications I actually use.
  • DigitalFreak - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Amen, brother!
  • TravelMug - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    As said by several people before - you are not testing latency but the prefetch abilites of the CPU. Same has been said about the original Conroe article, you don`t seem to listen though.

    "Everest from Lavalys shows latency improvements in the new CPU revisions, but it shows Latency more as we would expect in evaluating Conroe. For that reason, our detailed benchmarks for latency will use both Everest 1.51.195, which fully supports the Core 2 Duo processor, and ScienceMark 2.0."

    Really? That is a 2 years old version, there have been countless new version since then. Also, if that version "fully supports" the Core 2 Duo processor, how come this is what the developer says about the latest version 3.01?:

    http://www.lavalys.com/products/whatsnew.php?pid=3...">Support for Intel Core 2 "Conroe" and "Merom" processors
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We purchased Everest and believed we were using the latest release version. The version we used for testing does support Core 2 Duo, but not with all the features supported in 3.01. We will update to version 3.01, rerun Everest tests, and post the new results in the review. This was an honest oversight, not a conspiracy.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Version 3.01 was just released July 16, 2006.
  • saratoga - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    The introduction of AM2 merely increased the AMD latency advantage. AM2 latency was slightly lower than DDR latency on AMD.

    However, Core 2 Duo did what most believed was impossible in Latency. One of AMD's advantages is the on-processor memory controller, which Intel has avoided. It should not be possible to use a Memory Controller in the chipset on the motherboard instead and achieve lower latency.


    Your instincts are right, those latency numbers are impossible. The prefeter is outsmarting your benchmark, and you're not measuring memory latency because a lot of the fetches are coming out of the L2. The reason latency numbers look so low is because L2 is quite a bit faster then memory ;)

    quote:

    Intel developed read-ahead technologies that don't really break this rule, but to the system, in most situations, the Intel Core 2 Duo appears to have lower latency than AM2, and the memory controller functions as if it were lower latency.


    I'm not sure that Intel actually developed prefetching. Its been used by the entire industry (Sun, Intel, AMD, IBM) for many, many years. What you have here is just a poor benchmark, not a breakthrough.

    Which is the problem here. The page says "memory latency" which is flat out wrong. You simply are not getting 36 ns access time out of the combined FSB, memory controller and DRAM cells. It is not possible, and its a pretty big oversite IMO to claim otherwise.

    If you want to test prefetcher, then go for it. Just don't call it memory latency, because the two are not the same thing.
  • sld - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    So now ScienceMark is a turncoat too, after showing AMD superiority for the past year or so?

    Get a grip, people, as Everest has shown, memory latency on the Core 2 Duo is still higher than that on the K8.

    What ScienceMark shows is that the prefetchers on the Core 2 Duo are brilliant, the results bear out and the Core 2 Duo beats the K8 in most (if not all) games convincingly (if I use superlatives, even if they are true, I'll contract rabies, you know) and does that clock-for-clock (not to mention $-for-$ until AMD generates a significant price crash).

    All the while, I've been tolerating Intel fanboys crapping about non-existent benefits about their Netbust crap, and now you want me to tolerate the beginnings of AMD fanboyism too?
  • mino - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    These numbers clearly show that siencemark developer does not tak into account 4M caches.
    It quite simple, at a the time of its creation 512k was considered a big cache.
    As for SuprePI 1M - the same, 1M was chosen as standard no because it is a nice number, instead it was chosen because at the time there was no need for bigger datasets. Datasets for 1M _were_ simply big enough to show also memory perf., not just the size of the cache.
  • redpriest_ - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Actually, ScienceMark tests up to 16 MB of memory. See, I forsaw a day where this would be a problem and sized the test appropriately. What you're seeing is that the prefetcher is clever enough to pick up all the patterns we use to "fool" hardware prefetchers. This in itself is a great indicator of performance.

    Of course, our next revision will have a harder algorithm to fool, but I think we'll also keep the old one (because it still shows an important data point).

    1 of 3 authors of SM2.0
  • mino - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Boys give us EDIT ..
  • duploxxx - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Last months have given drastic changes in the cpu world for performance king and price.

    but the conclusion quality and review headers of anand are going further down day by day. (as a review site you should bring info to the world not fanboyism and sponser)come on such a statement to begin "Core 2 Duo (Conroe) launched about twelve days ago with a lot of fanfare. With the largest boost in real performance the industry has seen in almost a decade it is easy to understand the big splash Core 2 Duo has made in a very short time" do you really believe what you are saying or are you paid for each overmarketing comment you publish.

    the article concept is nice looking at memory latency, but what cas level do you use at a rated speed, we al know that conroe is a better performer with any memory used but things change when the real cas latency is used, so a whole article without additional cas info is just a half article off no use. When things get realy interesting in page 7, you just stop performance comparisson on ddr2 1067 and 1112. i know its difficult because for now there is no devider to bring this memory to equal speed but you can clearly see that k8 is much more memory dependent that the conroe. conroe is saturated. in half life and quake bringing the memory to 1200 would give an equal performance.

    looking at page 8 you convert the chart of page 7 to a nicer way to look :)
    but for sure you changed the cas on the oc'ed fx down because looking at the linear performance gain from ddr-2 400 till ddr2-800, there is only gain due to the oc'ed fx and not due to the added memory bandwith. the gain is not linear to the performance gain on page 7.

    I will hold my comments on for example the superpi... we all know wat its worth.

    A review on 64bit or multithread performance would be nice to see how well the design is made for the future or are you as a review site restricted to some type of benchmarks?

    same i asked on the server woodcrest. you bring benchmarks that are unable to compare. here you bring reviews where in the first line of the review you already have a conclusion and the benchmark contains not enough info to reflect in real life what to buy for memory and cas latency for example to get the desired performance.
  • OcHungry - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I concur with you. It is interesting that memory timings used was not mentioned in the review.
    Using 266x11 helps but it is not enough for AMD’s powerful IMC . If 330x9 was used instead it would have given AMD a considerable boost in performance. Anandtech is trying to show Core 2 duo is a better cpu, but fails to notice any improvement through utilization of IMC, memory latency and mem speed. What's funnier, is that the data provided, clearly shows a substantial increase in performance if memory speed is changed to 266mhz, 1:1 ratio. The increase in performance is at least by 5% across the benchmarks. My calculations show: for every 10% increase in memory speed, performance increases by 2%. Hence, running FX62 @ 330x9 amounts to 11% increase in performance. We know AMD is releasing an Improved IMC capable of utilizing memory speed in1T. 1T will increase performance by another 3-5%. The memory latency is another crucial factor for AMD. According to the author of this review: “ memory speed does not affect Conroe’s performance”. Great. But since latency tremendously affects AMD’s platforms it should have been considered to give us meaningful comparison. Most probably The timings used were: 4-4-4-12 (corsair DDR2 800). Tightening the timings to 3-3-3-8 would have given another 7% to 10% boost in FX62's performance.
    If we add all the mentioned optimal settings for FX62: (11%+3%+7%) = 21% increase in performance should have resulted- which is fair, accurate, and represent the true comparison of FX62 against E6800.
    Further more, 64bit OS and window vista is reported to give AMD about 16% improvement compared to 10% for conroe. This will give another 6% boost in performance for AMD’s platform that brings the total increase in performance to 27% washing clean all the superficial benchmarks(that were tilted ).
    As far as gaming is concern, we know vid card is the deciding facto. So I believe AMD has position itself perfectly for every corner of the market.
    To say Intel has captured the mid and high end of the market, is as erroneous as when Intel was pushing Netburst to capture gaming enthusiasts. We know that marchitecture and All that PR failed then, and will fail agin now.
  • IntelUser2000 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    I concur with you. It is interesting that memory timings used was not mentioned in the review.
    Using 266x11 helps but it is not enough for AMD’s powerful IMC . If 330x9 was used instead it would have given AMD a considerable boost in performance. Anandtech is trying to show Core 2 duo is a better cpu, but fails to notice any improvement through utilization of IMC, memory latency and mem speed. What's funnier, is that the data provided, clearly shows a substantial increase in performance if memory speed is changed to 266mhz, 1:1 ratio. The increase in performance is at least by 5% across the benchmarks. My calculations show: for every 10% increase in memory speed, performance increases by 2%. Hence, running FX62 @ 330x9 amounts to 11% increase in performance. We know AMD is releasing an Improved IMC capable of utilizing memory speed in1T. 1T will increase performance by another 3-5%. The memory latency is another crucial factor for AMD. According to the author of this review: “ memory speed does not affect Conroe’s performance”. Great. But since latency tremendously affects AMD’s platforms it should have been considered to give us meaningful comparison. Most probably The timings used were: 4-4-4-12 (corsair DDR2 800). Tightening the timings to 3-3-3-8 would have given another 7% to 10% boost in FX62's performance.
    If we add all the mentioned optimal settings for FX62: (11%+3%+7%) = 21% increase in performance should have resulted- which is fair, accurate, and represent the true comparison of FX62 against E6800.
    Further more, 64bit OS and window vista is reported to give AMD about 16% improvement compared to 10% for conroe. This will give another 6% boost in performance for AMD’s platform that brings the total increase in performance to 27% washing clean all the superficial benchmarks(that were tilted ).
    As far as gaming is concern, we know vid card is the deciding facto. So I believe AMD has position itself perfectly for every corner of the market.
    To say Intel has captured the mid and high end of the market, is as erroneous as when Intel was pushing Netburst to capture gaming enthusiasts. We know that marchitecture and All that PR failed then, and will fail agin now.


    My calculation says you are wrong. As much as my calculation is wrong, your logic/calculation is even moreso.

    Have you looked at the performance gain that Athlon 64's gain with lower latencies?? Granted it was a single core Athlon 64, but people were still spreading bullshit that Athlon 64 will gain a lot from lower latencies. Yes it was in Anandtech forums!!

    Tech-Report: http://techreport.com/etc/2005q4/mem-latency/index...">http://techreport.com/etc/2005q4/mem-latency/index...

    Looking at Core 2 Duo, you can get BETTER performance with LOWER COST memory modules than A64. That means price/performance ratio goes FURTHER in Core 2's favor.

    Not very many people think super ultra low latency is important, they are not stupid enough to spend extra $200 on memory that gives MAYBE 5% performance increase.

    XS also telling you not to be stupid: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php...">http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php...
  • OcHungry - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    As far as expensive DDR2 is concerned, apparently you dont understand my logic.
    You dont need DDR2 800, 1000, and so forth for AMD.
    You can buy DDR2 667 which is cheaper and has better timings than DDR2 1000.
    With IMC in play, you can and should run FX62 @ 333mhz (FSB and mem speed) using 1:1 ratio. AMD gives us this option thru. IMC and we are not overclocking and being unfair to E6800, just increasing the mem/cpu link to what it should be. Althoug, Running FX @ 200 HTT/FSB compared to E6800 @ 266 would be unfair to AMD. If Intel could run @ 333mhz, so be it.
    My calculations are correct and were based on the benchmarks provided by the anandtech review (here).
    The only thing that need to change is the % gaine from memory timings (which was not mentioned first in the article). scratching off the memory % gain from my calculation, The new figure put FX62 at about 7% slower than E6800.
    But I am amazed how people are forgetting that we are comparing old architecture w/ the new and do not consider K8L or 4x4.
    4x4 is due shortly- Lets see if "the new king" willingly hands over the crown.
    Must have felt good crowning for less than a month (considering retail not available yet, and less than a month 4x4 is due).
  • zsdersw - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    I'm amazed that you're expecting us to compare what's soon to be out with what's not-as-soon to be out (K8L, 4x4).

    If you're going to keep shifting the goal posts to suit your AMD fanboy desires, then you're never going to be happy with anything that doesn't tell you what you want to hear.
  • Gary Key - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    If we add all the mentioned optimal settings for FX62: (11%+3%+7%) = 21% increase in performance should have resulted- which is fair, accurate, and represent the true comparison of FX62 against E6800.


    The true comparison of the FX62 against the X6800 is 2.8GHz against 2.93GHz as they are shipped from AMD and Intel. That is the absolute base comparison and is about as fair, accurate, and truthful as it can get at this time. If you insist on optimizing (overclocking) the FX62 platform then you must realize it is equally fair to do this on the Core 2 Duo platform as well.

    quote:

    Most probably The timings used were: 4-4-4-12 (corsair DDR2 800). Tightening the timings to 3-3-3-8 would have given another 7% to 10% boost in FX62's performance.

    The timings used at DDR2-800 were 3-3-3-9. You will not see a 7% to 10% increase in performance.

    quote:

    As far as gaming is concern, we know vid card is the deciding facto. So I believe AMD has position itself perfectly for every corner of the market.To say Intel has captured the mid and high end of the market, is as erroneous as when Intel was pushing Netburst to capture gaming enthusiasts. We know that marchitecture and All that PR failed then, and will fail agin now.


    If the GPU is truly the deciding "facto" for gaming then your logic is up for debate. So, based upon your stated logic it should not matter what CPU is utilized, which equates to Netburst being equal to Athlon 64 in this performance sector. That means Intel was correct for marketing Netburst to the gaming enthusiats. We all know that is not true but are we to now believe it is based upon your statements? It sounds like a $42 Celeron D will perform equally to a $999 FX62 in gaming based upon your logic. I disagree of course but if it is okay to argue that Athlon 64 is a superior performing processor to the P4, then explain to us why is not okay to show Core 2 Duo being a superior processor to the Athlon 64 at this time.

    We are performance centric, the same conversations and excitement about a processor series occurred when the FX-51 was released and continued to occur for three years afterwards. Intel has finally countered with an excellent processor series and now it appears to be an issue to discuss peformance advantages without resorting to "My calculations show an overclocked CPU can beat a stock clocked CPU." If you know for a fact that at 9x330HTT and 3-3-3-8 1T settings the FX-62 will match or exceed the performance of a X6800, then please post the screenshots as I am sure all of us would be intrigued by this. However, also post the comparison of your X6800 running on stock voltages at 3.46GHz in order to reflect the true capability of the X6800 also.
    I look at it this way, everyone but AMD and Intel win this summer. I know a couple of AMD machines in the house are getting 3800+ X2 upgrades and my primary machine will be sporting a E6600. However, this price matching and slashing is going to have a long term effect on both companies and in the end that might not be healthy for this industry in a couple of years.

    quote:

    Further more, 64bit OS and window vista is reported to give AMD about 16% improvement compared to 10% for conroe. This will give another 6% boost in performance...


    Not seeing this difference in build number 5472 of Vista.
  • OcHungry - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I see, the moderators keep Editing the review article. the mem timings were not there when 1st read it. oh well
  • goinginstyle - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Dear OC-Sharikou,

    "Memory timings were DDR2-400 - 3-2-2-5; 533 - 3-2-2-6; 667 - 3-2-3-7; 800 - 3-3-3-9; 1067 - 4-3-4-11; DDR2-1112 - 5-4-5-14." As posted by Wes earlier and hopefully he will place these in the review shortly to shut you the hell up. Your calculations are already incorrect since you ASSumed the DDR2-800 memory was set at 4-4-4-12 and therefore your calculations of the FX62 being another 7 to 10 percent faster are WRONG. Do you understand yet that calculating instead of testing means you are going to be WRONG. You consistently make false and misleading statements here and elsewhere on the internet. We now understand why Intel fired your lazy calculating ass. You were probably the one who devised their P4 marketing scheme to compete against the Athlon 64. I bet all of your calculations at the time proved higher core speeds and memory bandwidth resulted in higher scores against the AMD processors. It was obvious that calculation was WRONG.

    Let's see some benchmarks on your FX62 instead of some asswipe musings about percentage based benchmarking. Answer this simple question, why is AMD shipping their CPUs at a 200HTT base? How do you honestly expect to compare a highly HTT overclocked FX62 against a stock Conroe? If their 2.93 Conroe runs at 3.5GHz on stock voltages then would it not be fair to test the Conroe at this speed and the FX62 at your holy 9x330 setting? By the way, in real application land, 1T over 2T might mean a 1% difference at DDR2800, try it yourself. Oh yeah, I f@$&ing forgot you do not own a FX62 or Conroe so you have to use pencil and paper to make your wet dreams come true.
  • drarant - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Think of it this way, X6800 will perform about 10-20% higher than a FX-62 whether its a set of DDR2-667 or DDR2-1067, roughly $150 ram vs $250 ram. Whereas, in your proposal, You would need RAM to run at 330 x 4 = DDR2-1320... even if it does exist in the next 6months, it will have to be run @ 2T and 4-4-4 at the tightest.

    So even though almost all of your speculation is wrong (i.e. 4-4-4 > 3-3-3 does NOT give a 7-10% boost) and the rest is assumption (i.e. 4-4-4 2T is what was used) you still cannot do what you propose to reach a Stock Intel CPU. (Get over it, I did)
  • zsdersw - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Pretty much everything you've said is erroneous.
  • zsdersw - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    That was for OcHungry, not Wesley Fink.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    When AMD was the performance leader I was called an AMD fanboi, now when Core 2 Duo is top performer I am called an Intel fanboi. That means things are balanced as they should be. Does it ever occur to some that we are fans of PERFORMANCE - carefully compared and measured performance. We did a more than fair comparison overclocking AM2 to the same speed as Conroe and increasing clock speed to 266 to run an unsupported DDR2-1067 - which should favor AM2 as it appears to improve more with memroy bandwidth than Conroe. AM2 still lost by a wide margin.

    I could even understand your argument if you compared a 4GHz Core 2 Duo, which I am personally running on air, to the highest overclocked AM2 - or even AM2 to Core 2 Duo at the same overclocks and "bus" speeds. I am left to conclude that you surely know more than AMD since they have reduced prices in-line with performance credible review sites have found on AM2 and Core 2 Duo. If AMD believed yours was a realistic comparison the prices would never have been reduced.

    An apples-to-apples comparison is not a mystery. Comparing a super-overclocked and bus increased AM2 to a STOCK Core 2 Duo is fanboi.
  • duploxxx - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    I understand that there are several comments of fanboy'ism that might not be correct, but from the moment you guys went to the click the button visit the comments/conclusions/headers just became no longer "balanced" for example "a new king has born"... the woodcrest isn't that better then the current opteron sure it will have the highest clock cpu and best performance on that 3.0 (when we even can buy it) but compare apples with apples and put a 2,6 versus a 2,66. and making such a statement knowing that the competitor comes with a new revision just a month after.... (not sure if you posted the review btw... its just global anand) same with conroe, it has the performance crown. like amd had it for 3years. never saw a statement when a new fx arrived like "The empire is kicked again". now just new performance blabla.
  • Zebo - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Nice one Wes and it makes sense no matter what to have memory testing done on the top dog platform, Conroe.
  • Mclendo06 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Is there any reason that either company, Intel or AMD, couldn't design a future processor both with an intelligent pre-fetching algorithm such as is seen in the Core 2 Duo and an on-die memory controller like on the AM2 processors? Seems like the apparent memory latencies could be dropped very significantly by combining these features.
  • Calin - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We are hoping in the next big update to AMD processor (the K8L) to have some kind of intelligent prefetching (it is entirely possible, but it costs a number of transistors). Possibly that "intelligent prefetching" means reordering loads from memory, and this happens before the memory controller
  • Ingas - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Possibly that "intelligent prefetching" means reordering loads from memory, and this happens before the memory controller


    How can Core 2 Duo do prefetch before memory controller?
    I miss some point, do I?
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    I wasn't clear enough. The memory controller gets requests for memory, and returns that memory. Nothing more, nothing less.
    All the logic for preordering is housed in the proper microprocessor, and not in the memory controller - as such, it has no relation with the integrated/discrete implementation of the memory controller.
  • vailr - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Has anyone run: a Core2 Duo CPU comparison of DDR vs. DDR2, running on the ASrock 775Dual-VSTA? To determine how much slowdown would occur, by using the older DDR memory?
  • Ingas - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Interesting point!
    Maybe Core intelligent look-ahead so intelligent, that it even performs equaly on DDR!
    Hm.
    Very interesting!
  • Gary Key - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We will show this in our review. ASRock just released bios 1.4 that addressed a few issues we noticed in our preview of the board.
  • photoguy99 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    ...that AMD is thoroughly owned.

    It's amazing the arguments have still persisted up until now about excuses for Core2 doing so well.

    It was mentioned that AMD survived before at the lower end of the market - but remember how much trouble they had? There were losing money all the time back then. Now they have taken *all* of their 2.5B cash reserve and spent it on ATI. Nice.

    It hurt AMD's credibility even more when Dirk Diggler recently said 4x4 was going to be an answer to Core2. Right. After 30 years of dual socket systems being a niche they are finally going to take off and save you - good luck with that.

  • duploxxx - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    because you have no idea what is going behind the scene and only looking at performance of a desktop cpu and think this is the real world.

    almost no review site is proud enough to get up against the hyping marketing machine from intel. well then believe the marketing hype and own a cpu that has a crapy design when it comes to real multithread and 64bit. way to go to the future knowing vista is comming your way.

    multicore/multisocket is the future, even intel knows it.

    amd is in a much stronger position know and by the end of this year the make procs with a price tag 50% lower than intel intel can only counter this by going to 45nm end of 2007. knowing the cost of all the intel crew, fabs and size of the processors.
  • Calin - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I hate to rain on your parade, but the E6x00 and X6800 (Extreme) desktop CPU won't see a dual socket mainboard - for that you must use Xeons.
    As for multisocket, it was a niche market when multicore was not available, it is (maybe even more so) when multicore is available. Quad core will reduce it even more for desktop use. As for Intel knowing multicore is the future, I think their quad core will be on market before AMD's quad core - and if you are worrying about performance, keep worrying - we can small talk about this and that all day long.

    AMD is in a much weaker position now - they must sell processors at half (or less) the profit they sold them until now, and the future is grim if you regard their profits. They could survive a long way, but they again are the budget CPUs, the best choice for small money.

    As for 64-bit, you are certainly right - just that right now, 64-bit is of little use on desktop, the operating systems suffer from drivers problems, 64-bit applications are few and far between. You might need 64-bit and profit from it, but you are a minority now.
  • Ingas - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Maybe AMD in trouble.
    But not because of Core 2 Duo, but because of Woodcrest.

    AMD alwais said that only server processors giving profit.

    So ...
    With Dell's AMD Now - maybe it's not trouble for AMD at all.
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    Dell will only build enough AMD gear as not to lose business with their customers that WANT AMD gear. Even with higher performance losses on 4 sockets, Xeons Core2Duo (which are faster to boot) might put a fair fight against AMD - and then customers will choose based on other things than performance.
    I agree AMD Opteron scale better - but they start scaling from a lower performance
  • duploxxx - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    do you really think you're sure about that. compare the same speed of opteron vs woodcrest and you will talk different.. i know how it performs because i have a wood es system on my table. and i am not a big fan of hexus reviews but look at the site, the wood isn't so bright and shining knowing again it is a compare of 3.0 vs 2.6.
  • mesyn191 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    For 2S systems Intel will have the lead til' K8L becomes available, but for 4S AMD will have Intel beat and that lead will only increase when K8L becomes available. They're definitly gonna be hurting profit wise, but they'll be doing better than they were when it was P4C vs. AXP and they got through that so I see no reason to worry about them going into bankruptcy before K8L comes out in volume.
  • sld - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    What is wrong with a desktop user looking at the performance of a desktop cpu?

    When you can get a 4x4 at the same price/performance ratio curve as a Core 2 Duo, do please inform me.

    I still believe AMD vs Intel is a David vs Goliath, although like the real David, AMD is beginning to get complacent with just a taste of power, and Core 2 is just what it needs to wake up and start dropping prices. :)
  • sld - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I forgot to mention that Core 2 is worth a consideration over the K8, but if we really want to punish Intel for being the monster they are, we should institute a complete boycott over the purchase of their existing Netburst inventory. That should hurt them quite a bit...

    Picture a scenario where new chips go straight out of the warehouse and into the embracing arm of a bulldozer. When it comes to that point do you think they will resort to giving the cpus away?
  • mattsaccount - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Are the Super Pi scores on page 7 right? The text says Conroe wins everything, but the Super Pi bench is reversed (I'm guessing the colors are just backward)
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Since the lower score is better on Super Pi (faster time) the scales are reversed - from zero at the top to 90 at the bottom. The colors and values are correct, just upside down so the lowest score (fastest) is on the top like the other charts. You apparently caught that while I was typing this explanation :)
  • highlandsun - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Have you got 32M digit results for Super Pi? Curious to see if that will exceed Conroe's cache and therefore reflect the real memory bandwidth. Also, results for running two copies of Super Pi at once on each system.
  • sld - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Yes I second the importance of a 32M run, because I want to know how Core 2 Duo does when the dataset does not fit into the L2 cache. The Intel fanboys at xtremesystems are annoying me with their whoops of glee over the 1M and 2M results.

    The performance difference in games and superpi is large enough to be termed anomalous, simply because superpi is a feel-happy benchmark.
  • Calin - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I've had the same issue on understanding the graphic - but I think it is much better now (top representing better performance, with the scale inverted)

    Anyway, great article!

    As for the increases in cache helping AMD processors, I guess not - considering the small difference from 512k to 1M.
  • mattsaccount - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Never mind, I'm tired :)
  • goinginstyle - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Page 7 is going to upset a lot of AMD fans.

    Page 9 index description needs to be "conclusion".

    Great article and would love to see this comparison with the E6600 and E6300 CPUs against the competing AMD cpus. A lot of us will be buying these two processors and probably plain DDR2800.
  • OcHungry - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    Can I ask you what memory timings you used?
    Since you have stated that memory speed does not affect conroe, would it be fair to assess that you used tightest timings for AM2?
    If not: why?
    About what page is going to make AMD users upset or hate the page, I totally disagree with you. You actually brought some lights to the whole scheme of things, unintentionally and unknowingly. You have helped to prove that Conroe will only be a mere 1 or 2% faster than AM2, which is not noticeable in real life situation. Conroe is only faster in Spi- But again, AMD beats Intel in memory bandwidth by a great margin. Memory bandwidth is much more important than SPI in terms of game and general cpu task(s). I will prove to everyone, that AMD is just as fast as conroe and post my reasoning in the cpu section, as soon as I have analyzed your benchmark data and made my calculations. But I need to know what memory timings you did use thu. A screenshot of timings would be great.
    Again, thank you for this review that helped us open our eyes and see things in a better perspective.
  • Gary Key - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Can I ask you what memory timings you used?


    Wes replied earlier in the comments section but the settings are now posted on page 4 of the review.
  • goinginstyle - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    I will prove to everyone, that AMD is just as fast as conroe and post my reasoning in the cpu section, as soon as I have analyzed your benchmark data and made my calculations.


    Caluclations? I would like to see your benchmarks on actual hardware and not some scribbling on your Happy Meal napkin. I can caluclate that you are an idiot but really do not have the time to do it since I have a real life.
  • zsdersw - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    You have helped to prove that Conroe will only be a mere 1 or 2% faster than AM2, which is not noticeable in real life situation. Conroe is only faster in Spi- But again, AMD beats Intel in memory bandwidth by a great margin.


    1 or 2% faster? Please share with the rest of us what you're smoking.

    Conroe is significantly faster on almost all fronts... in spite of having lower memory bandwidth.
  • Calin - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    I suggest you to use a tractor and two trailers - one for persons and one for cargo. Even if you won't go faster than people with cars, you will have a huge bandwidth (persons and cargo bandwidth).
    If you buy your processor for bandwidth, choose whatever you want. If you buy it for speed, buy based on actual performance
  • bob661 - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Conroe is significantly faster on almost all fronts... in spite of having lower memory bandwidth.
    I thought you didn't care about this stuff?
  • zsdersw - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    I care about people making blatantly false claims.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We used the SAME memory timings on both processors if they were available. For the DDR2-1067 and DDR2-800 they were exactly the same on both processors in all tests, which is why they were used for our 2.93GHz comparison. At DDR2-667 and below, the Core 2 Duo could support timings like 3-2-2, where AM2 only supports 3-3-3. This article was to evaluate memory performance, so we did everything possible to keep all variables the same.

    Memory timings were DDR2-400 - 3-2-2-5; 533 - 3-2-2-6; 667 - 3-2-3-7; 800 - 3-3-3-9; 1067 - 4-3-4-11; DDR2-1112 - 5-4-5-14.
  • duploxxx - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    well those cas settings were to be expected when you saw the memory performance chart.
    you just killed the performance after ddr2 800 cas4 is ok but the minor step you have from ddr 1067 to ddr 1112 and again 1 cas higher is the end of good performance. so the memory of the fx to get to 2.9 was? that explains probably the lower performance vs the linear performance increase in the memory.....
  • Bingo13 - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    quote:

    you just killed the performance after ddr2 800 cas4 is ok but the minor step you have from ddr 1067 to ddr 1112 and again 1 cas higher is the end of good performance.


    The timings utilized by AnandTech were about the best you will see with current DDR2 memory. They did not kill the performance, the memory capability is what limited the testing. Tell me, where can you buy DDR2 that will do 3-3-3-9 at 1067. This review was more than fair in the settings it utilized for the tests and it took $450 memory to do it.
  • duploxxx - Thursday, July 27, 2006 - link

    yes i know but you don't get my point...
    we know fx34 will be 3.0 so its stupid to try and get an fx at 2,93.
    run an fx at 3.0 (multiplier change) with the nice cas3-3-3 like you did and the performance will be way better. now you killed the performance (speedbump cpu and memory) by dropping the cas to 4
  • Wesley Fink - Wednesday, July 26, 2006 - link

    DDR2-800 was 3-3-3-9 2.2V. The FX at 2.93GHz was running DDR2-1067 at 4-3-4-11 2.2V.
  • Gary Key - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We had a slight change in pages after the article went live. Page seven now represents stock memory performance on each platform with page eight now showing the overclocked FX62 (11x266, 2.93GHz) compared to the X6800 (11x266, 2.93GHz). A comparison that is quite revealing based upon numerous comments about what the expected results of running a high memory strap and low latency settings on the AM2 platform would even out the performance differences between the two platforms.
  • Wesley Fink - Tuesday, July 25, 2006 - link

    We were moving pages around as it posted. The page references should now be correct. The page that AMD fans will likely hate is now page 8.

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