THG Tuning Test: Core 2 Extreme vs. Athlon 64 FX-62

[pschmid]

Tuned and tweaked to the max, the Intel 3.68 GHz processor faces off against AMD\'s 3.06 GHz all-purpose threat. Is the race over yet? Hasn\'t Intel won already? Let\'s see.

Speak out in the Toms's Hardware reader survey!

 

[1Tanker]

Tuned and tweaked to the max, the Intel 3.68 GHz processor faces off against AMD\'s 3.06 GHz all-purpose threat. Is the race over yet? Hasn\'t Intel won already? Let\'s see.

Speak out in the Toms's Hardware reader survey!

The link isn't working.

Fixed....Thanks.

 

[Mike995]

Well the amd system got thoroughly pwned. Even the E6600 outpaced the FX 62 @ 3.0 ghz in many situations, media encoding and the majority of the games tested. And thats at a 600 mhz clock speed deficit. ^^ your system by no way is mediocre, im sure its damn fast.

 

[TheTallGuy]

The Core 2 temperatures and power consumption were impressive too.

 

[1Tanker]

Tuned and tweaked to the max, the Intel 3.68 GHz processor faces off against AMD\'s 3.06 GHz all-purpose threat. Is the race over yet? Hasn\'t Intel won already? Let\'s see.

Speak out in the Toms's Hardware reader survey!

Wow..The overclocked x6800 is a Beast. It obliterated everything. Impressive, especially in encoding. :lol:

 

[torque79]

uh, those final performance analysis graphs need a little more translating to english. I believe the more common words needed are "Games", "Applications", and maybe "Total"?

 

[RedZone]

its unfortanate to see that the fx-62 cant get past 3 gig. heck my athlon 64 3200+ runs at 3.0 with an aftermarket air cooler!

on a side ntoe anyone know what performance difference there would be between my 3200+ at 3.0 and the fx 64 ?

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

Core 2 Duo simply overclocks much better than any of AMD's offerings.


PS - WHY DO THESE ALWAYS GO IN MEMORY, NOT CPU!?!?

 

[Mike995]

Would depend completly on the application you are running. Your single core would get destroyed in media encoding versus the FX 64. How ever gaming it would fare pretty close I would imagine.

 

[monkeymanuk]

Great, yet another high end review without real high end graphics tests. What a pile!

If I spend $1000 dollars on a CPU I'm not gonna scrimp on my monitor.

What is the video performance like at 1600 x 1200???

What is SuperPI score running 2 threads of 32M iterations???

We know Conroe is fast, it can perform most tasks without going outside of its own built in cache. That's just dandy.

<b>Here's my real-world test set up!!!</b>

I normally run several applications at once: Dreamweaver, MYSQL, Apache, PHP, Paint Shop Pro 8, Firefox, IE & Windows Media Player. Firefox will generally have 6-8 tabs open as I browse whilst I work. I also play HL2 whilst these applications are active in the background to take a break from my work. That would be a real-word test!!! That is what I do in my day to day work.

My System nevers blinks, I never notice any slow-down (with the exception of Hard Drive). Spec is 3800+ X2 @ 2.5Ghz, 2GB DDR400, 7600GT @ 25% overclock.

I'm quite happy to encode a dvd in the background <b>because it takes a long time</b> regardless of which CPU you are using. I dont really care if Conroe can do it faster, I never sit there waiting whilst it is processing, what idiot does?

 

[chunkymonster]

Wow! An incredible showing of what each system can do when tweaked to the Nth degree...CD2 is impressive, very impressive indeed...shame these chips cost so much, I can't afford either of them...this article makes me curious as to what gains the AMD 65nm chips are going to realize...

 

[NeonDeon]

This aint even new news! We know the core2 extreme would come out on top! Uhhh... Duhh... It's a brand new processor those was designed to beat the Athlon 64fx-62.

I would hope that Intel would not be so stupid and come out with a new product that would be sub-par with AMD. That would be the end of Intel, (almost) can you say 30% market share for AMD boys and girls?

Now next year we will be doing this all over again when AMD takes the covers off their new or improved processor. I for one am happy to see Intel do well, That just mean AMD will have to step up to the plate next and out do Intel. In the end we (gamers, moders, modelers, animators, and on and on) get to keep playing with better and faster $h@t. And that makes us all happy

 

[monkeymanuk]

So this is in effect a completely useless review. Just Tom Pumping the Conroe machine again.

What does it show that we didn't already know?

Is it really a CPU only test, I cannot see any benchmark that truely stresses the CPU.

Real world power users don't just use one or two applications at the same time, they tend to use five or six.

I want to see real-life results!

Interesting to note that Athlon energy efficiency outperforms Conroe when Idling, lets face it most of the time your CPU does not get used anywhere near 100%.

 

[cxl]

It shows one interesting aspect of supposed Intel vs. AMD price war - it is price war for AMD, not Intel.

Through at least next year, Intel will always have high-priced high-end parts, because it will be able to increase clock speed just as it needs to.

 

[Viperabyss]

Core 2 Duo simply overclocks much better than any of AMD's offerings.


PS - WHY DO THESE ALWAYS GO IN MEMORY, NOT CPU!?!?

because if you put this in CPU thread, some ppl are going to trash it.

i've gotta admit though, this is getting really numb. when conroe benches just came out, the world was in shock and joy...

...and now its just, "another benches? nah i don't even need to look. conroe pwns all".

 

[SuperFly03]

So this is in effect a completely useless review. Just Tom Pumping the Conroe machine again.

What does it show that we didn't already know?

Is it really a CPU only test, I cannot see any benchmark that truely stresses the CPU.

Real world power users don't just use one or two applications at the same time, they tend to use five or six.

I want to see real-life results!

Interesting to note that Athlon energy efficiency outperforms Conroe when Idling, lets face it most of the time your CPU does not get used anywhere near 100%.

Ever heard of Folding at Home or SETI? Yup, you can definately use your processor capacity 24/7.

I've been toying with the idea of converting my 200 disc DVD library to digital form and Conroe would sure go a long way towards reducing that time.

As for gaming at 16x12, few people do it. I am one of those people, but from surverys I *think*upwards of 50% or more game at 1024x768, and maybe another 15-20% at 1280x1024. Calm down, its all going to be ok.

Neon: Yes its a new generation proc, but so is the fx-62 (lets not get into semantics about refresh v. new core) and previously the performance gap hasn't been this large, at least I don't ever remember it being this one-sided. Conroe doesn't lose a single gaming or multimedia benchmark... not one, previously its usually being a split on the order of 45/55. This lop sided victory is big for intel, especially if it takes AMD 4-5 months just to match it, if they can do it that fast.

Monkey: Who the hell cares about super pi? Honestly, think about it. What purpose does being able to compute Pi out to 32 million digits really get you? a pat on the back? Nope, not even that. All it gives you is a number to compare against other people, who cares! Compare FPSs, Multimedia compression times, but not SuperPi, quit being a baby.

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

Great, yet another high end review without real high end graphics tests. What a pile!

What is the video performance like at 1600 x 1200???

1600x1200 = GPU Test

The main focus of the article is CPU.

because if you put this in CPU thread, some ppl are going to trash it.

Check and mate, very good point!

 

[SuperFly03]

Great, yet another high end review without real high end graphics tests. What a pile!

What is the video performance like at 1600 x 1200???

1600x1200 = GPU Test

The main focus of the article is CPU.

Thank you, I am glad some one else understands the point of the article.

 

[Viperabyss]

Interesting to note that Athlon energy efficiency outperforms Conroe when Idling, lets face it most of the time your CPU does not get used anywhere near 100%.

wow... you know what? my pentium M also outperforms Conroe when idling. wow.. so actually my pentium M is better than Conroe!! since my computer spend most of the time idling.

nice logic you got there..

 

[Doughbuy]

Nice article, AMD got their a$$ handed to them with all the trimmings. That takes care of the which processor is better if I OC it questions.

BUT!!!!

What I really want to know is how an OC'ed E6600 will fare, since that seems to be the processor that nearly everyone is thinking about. I know Anandtech said they were able to get up to a 4GHZ stable OC... and I want to see how much that would dominated everything else out there. 4GHZ E6600 vs. 3.6GHZ X6800?? vs. FX-62?? vs. Pentium I??!?!?!?!?

 

[SuperFly03]

Nice article, AMD got their a$$ handed to them with all the trimmings. That takes care of the which processor is better if I OC it questions.

BUT!!!!

What I really want to know is how an OC'ed E6600 will fare, since that seems to be the processor that nearly everyone is thinking about. I know Anandtech said they were able to get up to a 4GHZ stable OC... and I want to see how much that would dominated everything else out there. 4GHZ E6600 vs. 3.6GHZ X6800?? vs. FX-62?? vs. Pentium I??!?!?!?!?

E6600 = X6800 except that the X6800 has an unlocked multiplier adjustable upwards and downward and the E6600 only has a downwards multiplier. So if they were at equal clocks they would have nearly equal performance (assuming FSBs were equal). A 4Ghz would whip up on a X6800 at 3.63Ghz.

Yes I am looking at taking a E6600 to 4Ghz... god think of the performance lol.

 

[CannedTurkey]

I think about the most interesting part was this here:

Raising the FSB and memory clocks on the Intel system increased memory throughput from 5.7 to 7.3 GB/s. AMD's integrated memory controller enabled memory throughput for the Athlon 64 FX-62 to increase from 9.3 GB/s to a record-breaking value of 10.7 GB/s.

Is the lower memory throughput going to be a limiting factor for the Intel once the quad cores are released?

 

[monkeymanuk]

Interesting to note that Athlon energy efficiency outperforms Conroe when Idling, lets face it most of the time your CPU does not get used anywhere near 100%.

wow... you know what? my pentium M also outperforms Conroe when idling. wow.. so actually my pentium M is better than Conroe!! since my computer spend most of the time idling.

nice logic you got there..

Get a grip! I was merely highlighting the fact that Intels latest greatest processor @ 65nm should probably perform better in this regard.

Monkey: Who the hell cares about super pi? Honestly, think about it. What purpose does being able to compute Pi out to 32 million digits really get you? a pat on the back? Nope, not even that. All it gives you is a number to compare against other people, who cares! Compare FPSs, Multimedia compression times, but not SuperPi, quit being a baby.

I know superpi is bollox you numpty. My point is that these tests do not actually stress the CPU. Like I said run 5 or 6 heavy duty apps and provide the results.

As far as I can see this article does not provide any new information so what is the point of it other than pumping the Conroe brand????????

If it aint news dont print it!

 

[gomerpile]

AMD has had a year to develop the 4X4 which will have ddr3, I strongly beleive conroe won't even come close to it but time will tell I will wait for the 4X4 it will cost but so does the conroe.Price where I live with tax for the extreme is over 1400
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=2638

 

[Viperabyss]

Interesting to note that Athlon energy efficiency outperforms Conroe when Idling, lets face it most of the time your CPU does not get used anywhere near 100%.

wow... you know what? my pentium M also outperforms Conroe when idling. wow.. so actually my pentium M is better than Conroe!! since my computer spend most of the time idling.

nice logic you got there..

Get a grip! I was merely highlighting the fact that Intels latest greatest processor @ 65nm should probably perform better in this regard.

Monkey: Who the hell cares about super pi? Honestly, think about it. What purpose does being able to compute Pi out to 32 million digits really get you? a pat on the back? Nope, not even that. All it gives you is a number to compare against other people, who cares! Compare FPSs, Multimedia compression times, but not SuperPi, quit being a baby.

I know superpi is bollox you numpty. My point is that these tests do not actually stress the CPU. Like I said run 5 or 6 heavy duty apps and provide the results.

As far as I can see this article does not provide any new information so what is the point of it other than pumping the Conroe brand????????

If it aint news dont print it!

1. just because Conroe is 65nm, so it must performs better than an underclocked, undervolted, and a lot slower 90nm parts?

2. normal users don't run 5~6 heavy duty applications. they would run 3 applications maximum.
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/08/02/thg_tuning_test/page13.html

but i gotta admit though, in my opinion this test doesn't provide any new information to the consumers, other than, it can overclock easily on stock cooling.