Power consumption Article (Paid Advert for INTEL)

[Reynod]

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/10/19/the_truth_about_pc_power_consumption/index.html

What a missmatched Intel paid pumper article this one is eh?

Pick a nice low end core2 cpu ... match it against a 5000+ G1 stepping 2.6ghz AMD cpu that we all know has thermal leakage issues because it is as fast as they can currently make on 65nm SOI.

How about comparing a low power cpu Toms? AMD have a heap of them ... surely you know that.

Once again the benchmarks fail to mention all of the finer detail.

I'd imagine the Intel chip was also careully selected.

Once again ... fizzle.

Reputation in the toilet once again.

 

[noblekitty]

Once again, the AMD zealots can't get out of the dark hole and admit the truth and the only truth. Lol @ those who still tout AMD for energy efficeint. I guess they can't compete on the performance front, they have to switch over and talk about power saving.
Even if the article's result favors AMD as a more power efficient, which I surely did not, I would stil buy Core 2 Duo for now. Why? Simple, because I don't care about a mere difference in power cost. At 15 cent per KWH, my current energy rate, I can surely pay 15 cent more per day to have a system that can out perform the competitions by 100%.

 

[killz86]

ok how can you stay that i bet my quad will run cooler that amd. no i am not a fan boy at all. intel has a better cpu all togather over amd. so please dont call my a fanboy or what ever you call it. i own a x2 4200 and a q6600 G0. and i own other athlon barton core. i am just saying. intel is on top right now. and its a fact. so take your amd fan loving stuff some where else

 

[apache_lives]

Both are 65nm, both perform about the same (well actually, the Intel out performs the AMD chip), so what are you saying? and the Intel CPU (e6400) - its the same as it originally was a year ago!

 

[Jakc]

Yeah it's a strange article.
We allready knew the difference between the core architecture and the much older amd 64 architecture when it comes to performance and power efficiency. I think AMD's claims are about their upcoming processors rather than the ancient one used in the article.
Also the AMD processor used is not exactly the most EE processor AMD offers in that performance segment, I just fail to see the point of the article.

A waste of everyones time if you ask me.
How about instead of wasting everyones time, some Tomshardware folks go and update the graphics charts, that are also (coincidence) leading potential customers away from amd and ati by providing misleading information.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

OK, I read it and am somewhat disappointed in that you can use EE chips and find a C2D equivalent. Also a die shrink from an arch as old as the k8 doesnt help here that much, even with EE being used. Maybe its a article to contrast the upcoming AMD chips, and at a bad time as well, being as AMD needs to make sales, and their new product will soon be out. Kinda like a doctor ripping the wound wider to see how bad it is, before he sews it up.

 

[cbxbiker61]

This article is utter rubbish! Not scientific in the least. Their quoted power usage includes the motherboard etc. Any monkey could choose a power hungry older generation Athlon board and a current generation Intel board to make Intel look good.

And the REAL truth is. Couple a AMD BE-2400 with a current 690G and a power efficient 80+ power supply and you have an amazingly power efficient combo. I've got that combo, it flatout works.

BTW, If your a speed junky, go ahead and buy all the high wattage components, just remember to turn your computer off when you're not using it My systems are up 24x7, and most of the time they're idling, waiting for something to do. That's a pretty normal operation mode for UNIXish systems. They like to do cron jobs and such at say 3:33 in the morning.

 

[Jakc]

Also, why the hell did they use the crosshair MB for the AMD system?
Like, really, just why?
AMD 690G has been out for ages.

What a mess this article is.

 

[10xBsod]

The power source chosen is too powerfull to run in high efficient mode.
A power source run at optimum efficiency between 20% and 100% of rated power. The intel system draw from the wall at idle 87W, and the source probable output 60-65W, that's aprox. 11% of nominal power of "Sky Hawk Power One GM570PC ATX 2.01, 570 W" . For mainstream use is enought 300W, and will run at optimum efficiency. http://www.80plus.org/manu/psu/manu_psu.htm (some efficiency graphics there)

I don't find the link now, but in some article was compared power consumption of different mainboards, and the Asus was the most hungry.The Intel and AMD platform should be tested with the same brand of mainboard, and in the same segment of price.(budget/mainstream/performance).

 

[Reynod]

Exactly ...

And I have both Intel and AMD systems too.

What would have been fairer woud be to list all of the CPU's.

Do a comprehensive test.

Not another paid ad.

Happy to see the warts and all ... no problems there.

If I were building a system now there is no doubt I'd build a QX6600.

Informing "Joe public" properly is the responsible thing to do.

It's just so poor to do a 20 minute test and write it up as a definitive article ... just bottom of the barrel really.

 

[cbxbiker61]

The Intel and AMD platform should be tested with the same brand of mainboard, and in the same segment of price.(budget/mainstream/performance).

Not a terrible idea, but it still leaves too much wiggle room to selectively pick motherboards with good/bad power profiles. I think a more appropriate method would be to select motherboards that have the best power consumption characteristics for each platform.

BTW, when was the last time you saw a motherboard with specs that plainly state it's power consumption? I think it's about time we start getting the real facts.

http://www.silentpcreview.com/ is about the best place I've found for getting the low down on power supply efficiency numbers. There are some high-power supplies that have high efficiency even when they're running low loads.

Tasks: 66 total, 1 running, 65 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 0.0%us, 0.0%sy, 0.0%ni,100.0%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st

100% idle BE-2400 99% of the time. It's PDQ the other 1%.

 

[asdasd123123]

I don't believe that rig using 340w with just a 86GT and a AM2.
Mine maxes at 320w with an 88GTS and a 2,5ghz socket 939 opteron 90nm, 2gb 500mhz ddr1, two raptors and one 320gb drive.

 

[shabodah]

Seriously. I want some of Intel's cash, too.

Why would YOU EVER USE a current Nvidia chipset when trying to show the difference in AMD versus Intel Platforms?!??!?!?

I have a 7600GS, raptor, and 2350 running one the 6150/430 chipset that at MAX LOAD uses less power than BOTH of these systems. If just the onboard graphics were used, it would be UNDER 100 watts at max load.

If Tom's wanted the article to be fair, they could have either used the Nvidia chipset for the Intel system OR the AMD chipset for the AMD system. Either way, things would not look so out of balance.

Furthermore THE VAST MAJORITY of computers are EXTREMELY under-utilized, and thus, IDLE power consumption is what is occuring 85-90% of the time. The MINORITY of computer users are enthusiasts or gamers, even though we as enthusiasts seem to forget this at every opportunity.

 

[10xBsod]

...I think a more appropriate method would be to select motherboards that have the best power consumption characteristics for each platform....

Exactly, the chipset can influence significantly power consumtion:
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2007/10/11/amd-790fx-eats-8w
http://techreport.com/articles.x/12507/14

 

[Heyyou27]

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/10/19/the_truth_about_pc_power_consumption/index.html

What a missmatched Intel paid pumper article this one is eh?

Pick a nice low end core2 cpu ... match it against a 5000+ G1 stepping 2.6ghz AMD cpu that we all know has thermal leakage issues because it is as fast as they can currently make on 65nm SOI.

How about comparing a low power cpu Toms? AMD have a heap of them ... surely you know that.

Once again the benchmarks fail to mention all of the finer detail.

I'd imagine the Intel chip was also careully selected.

Once again ... fizzle.

Reputation in the toilet once again.

If you don't like the truth, go to AMDZone.

 

[Grimmy]

:lol: . o O (wow)

All I can say is... if you want power efficiency, don't use a high end video card with it.

I've already figured out that I pretty much loss all my power efficiency when I got my 8800 GTS installed.

I've mentioned it once, and mention it again. I use a P3 killowatt meter, that measures power consumption. So it shows the wattage being drained. I also recently ended up buying new batteries for my UPS, which I had to power up and drain a few times to get them... heh, fit.

So.. basically my old P4 system (6800GS AGP) used at idle around 110-115watts. My dad's E4300 (7300GT PCI-E) uses 107-109watts at idle. And finally my system, E4400, which typically used the same amount of power with the 7300GT, now sits at idle of 167watts with the 8800 GTS installed.

Now to mention the run times on my UPS.

I can run my linux P4 3ghz system 6800GS for about 20 mins and it starts beeping.

My new...

Will last about 11 mins and start beeping.

I wish I did have an AMD64 system to compare... but, it comes to show ya not only should the CPU be looked at, but other hardware as well. Especially... the GPU. :lol:

 

[Rabidpeanut]

Just cause AMD uses more power and is less efficient does not mean that this advert/article is NOT paid for by intel....

But then again, if you want to play games then you will have to pay the power bill either way, so shut up and stop whining.

 

[zenmaster]

While it was not a great article, I'm sorry to say it was not terribly slanted.

Yes, they could have used the AMD Athlon X2 BE-2400 rated at 45w.
However, The Intel 2xxx series also use very very little power since they have 1/4 of the L2 Cache of the chip shown.

The e6400 Chip is really not a great chip to showcase for power either.
It has 4mb of cache, but only 2 is used. The E6420 actually uses all 4mb of cache but is also more power efficient due to newer steppings.
So the e6420 would have given better results but used less power.
They also could have upgrade to a e6550 which also would have used less power and given much better resuls.

These chips simple represent moderate samplings of what is available.
They did not attempt to make the most power efficient solution possible.

(Note: If you want your GPU to be more efficient, just crank down the CLOCK speeds when not gaming and browsing the NET. The 8600GT selected for the test is a reasonable card for a home user. It is relatively light on power usage, but can be used by a light/moderate gamer.)

 

[cbxbiker61]

While it was not a great article, I'm sorry to say it was not terribly slanted.

They did not attempt to make the most power efficient solution possible.

I'd politely disagree. It was in fact slanted by choice of motherboards. If they want to make it an AMD -vs- Intel showdown then they should take the MB power consumption out of the picture. If they want to make it a platform -vs- platform showdown then the only logical solution is to choose the most power efficient MB/CPU available for the platform.

It doesn't matter much anyway...those that need to know, know what they need to know. Those that don't, read articles like this and think they know what they need to know.

 

[pete4r]

i think they choose E6400 and X2 5000 due to their close 3D Performance?

check this out

-------------------------------------------------
Here are the facts from our test results:

Power consumption must not only be looked from a minimum and maximum power consumption standpoint, but must be tracked using applications and benchmarks that truly simulate PC use over time. Performance and energy efficiency are closely related, and you cannot have ideal energy efficiency without a certain level of performance.
The Athlon 64 X2 system we used consumed more energy than the Core 2 Duo E6400 machine, whether it was idle, running our power consumption benchmarks, or under maximum load. I want to make clear that faster Athlon processors would look better, but they would also require more power. The same applies for faster Core 2 processors.

The Core 2 Duo E6400 system completed the SYSmark 2007 Preview run 14 minutes earlier than the Athlon 64 X2 5000+. As a consequence, the Intel system went back to an idle state earlier, which of course results in considerably less total power consumed. During the same time, the AMD system had to stay at a higher activity level for a longer period of time, which eventually meant that it required as much as 50% more power than the Intel system!

the bold area indicates that the AMD machine's meansurment was a whole 14 mins longer than intel's configuration?

Tomshardware should have gave a figure on how fast Intel's config has completed the test, using that we can get a %

 

[jabliese]

Everyone take a nice big, relaxing, breath. Unless it's a smog day out in California.

This article fails, but not because it compares AMD to Intel, or is biased in anyway. The conclusion does not carry through from the facts presented.

Comparing a slower, less efficient PC to a faster, more efficient PC cannot lead the conclusion:
"The results speak clearly, showing that performance is still a major issue, even when the primary goal is to save power in average desktop environments."
Had the slower PC been more efficient, you could get to this conclusion. As it stands, about the best you can conclude is that 2 year old PC's are generally less efficient than new PC's, or something like that.

If Tom's wants to make a conclusion about run speed and efficiency, they should either compare a range of core duo PC's, preferably across max power consumption lines, or compare a core duo to Via's 1.5 Ghz ridiculously low power system, or AMD's 2 Ghz low power system. At the least, find a slower system with less power consumption than the core duo.

 

[Grimmy]

(Note: If you want your GPU to be more efficient, just crank down the CLOCK speeds when not gaming and browsing the NET. The 8600GT selected for the test is a reasonable card for a home user. It is relatively light on power usage, but can be used by a light/moderate gamer.)

Heh... well for a 8800, using rivatuner and pushing everything down as far as it can go:

Default speeds - GPU@588 Memory@920

Reduced all the way - GPU@295 Memory@460

Power consumption only reflected 12watt difference changing the 2d clocks.

And is still 35watt more then my old P4. :lol:

 

[sojrner]

Everyone take a nice big, relaxing, breath. Unless it's a smog day out in California.

This article fails, but not because it compares AMD to Intel, or is biased in anyway. The conclusion does not carry through from the facts presented.

Comparing a slower, less efficient PC to a faster, more efficient PC cannot lead the conclusion:
"The results speak clearly, showing that performance is still a major issue, even when the primary goal is to save power in average desktop environments."
Had the slower PC been more efficient, you could get to this conclusion. As it stands, about the best you can conclude is that 2 year old PC's are generally less efficient than new PC's, or something like that.

If Tom's wants to make a conclusion about run speed and efficiency, they should either compare a range of core duo PC's, preferably across max power consumption lines, or compare a core duo to Via's 1.5 Ghz ridiculously low power system, or AMD's 2 Ghz low power system. At the least, find a slower system with less power consumption than the core duo.

apparently it takes a new member to come in here and bring light to the fault in the logic of the article... and NOT just whine from fanboi-itis. well done man.

While the conclusion is not supported by the test, the idea that efficiency is more than simply raw power consumption is solid. From dictionary.com:

ef·fi·cien·cy
1. the state or quality of being efficient; competency in performance.
2. accomplishment of or ability to accomplish a job with a minimum expenditure of time and effort: The assembly line increased industry's efficiency.
3. the ratio of the work done or energy developed by a machine, engine, etc., to the energy supplied to it, usually expressed as a percentage.

with that in mind, performance MUST be included in any efficiency measure as it is a RATIO of time vs energy supplied. The article is intriguing in the assumption that a fast proc has the potential of beating a power frugal proc, regardless of max power usage. I say "assumption" only b/c they really did not bring that point home in the testing. (as jabliese pointed out) My gut/intuitive reaction is that a test for that would prove it correct. Not that it would stop the fanboi whining.

as for the idea of it being anti-amd... meh, I just don't see it. Sure, all the fanbois for either camp will ALWAYS have issue with components selected in this type of comparison. Reality is that those fans will NEVER be pleased. ever.

Honestly, I enjoy articles like this on Tom's. Even when they just miss the mark of supporting the conclusion like this one, they still bring up some solid thoughts to make you go "hmmm..."

Rock on.

 

[uwdaveh]

The reason I found this article a bit pointless is this: the E6400 is 80+ (Canadian) dollars more expensive than the X2 5000+ in my city...so it's gotta be better, right? Either speed or efficiency. So what's the point of this article? lol

 

[cbxbiker61]

As a point of reference here's a thread where people are actually measuring total system power with AM2's combined with Asus M2A-VM's. I don't have a watt meter so I can't check mine (yet). Even with standard 65nm AM2's the low-power measurements are astounding.

http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=37340