low TDP CPU wanted for specific application

[justchill]

Hello,

my application is a low profile PC (few cooling possibilities) and I'm looking for a CPU for that PC. The requirements are (most important first):


■Cheap
■Powerful enough to run XP, OCR software and mediaplayer.
■Low TDP
■Modern socket
■Desktop CPU
■DDR2 memory must be supported
■2 years availability at least
■extra but not necessary: possibility to undervolt and underclock
■extra: energy saving functions (cool 'n quiet, EIST..)

Your advice please

grtz

 

[Andrius]

Pretty much every CPU you can buy today is enough (even a Celeron or Sempron but you should avoid them anyway).
AMD has better (they reduce frequency more) energy saving features.
An Intel E2140 (socket 775) is basicly overkill already (cheapest).

What do you mean with 2 years availabilty ?
Both AM2 and Core2 are around 1.5 years old. In another 1.5 years you probably won't be able to buy either one.

 

[sonoran]

Silverthorne is what you want. Unfortunately it doesn't ship until 2008.

 

[zenmaster]

This chart gives you a good idea of power usage and performance for low-watt Desktop CPUs.

http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/cpu/intel-pentium-e2140-2160-page3.html

 

[justchill]

Thanks for the replies. The graphs say that the the Pentium E2140 consumes less power then the AMD X2 BE-2350. However the Pentium E2140 has a TDP of 65W and the AMD X2 BE-2350 of 45W. What am I not seeing here?

The silverthorne is for notebooks and probably too expensive.

Well, if I choose a CPU now, I will have to be able to buy it in january 2009.

 

[KyleSTL]

What is the use? (just curious)
I would say go for Intel, they have made great strides with there architecture (with the new steppings M0 and GO) to surpass AMD for energy savings. I have seen many overclocks of E21x0 processors with the voltage below default. I would imagine that almost any processor should be able to undervolt at stock frequency (which reduces the heat output greatly).

 

[runswindows95]

E21XX will do nicely.

 

[skittle]

AMD and Intel TDP are not directly comparable...

Intels TDP quotes the maximum TDP of the chip
AMDs TDP quotes the average or something silly like that

 

[justchill]

What is the use? (just curious)
I would say go for Intel, they have made great strides with there architecture (with the new steppings M0 and GO) to surpass AMD for energy savings. I have seen many overclocks of E21x0 processors with the voltage below default. I would imagine that almost any processor should be able to undervolt at stock frequency (which reduces the heat output greatly).

Well, the application would be a reading device for visual impaired people. It just scans paper text and then reads it using OCR software and reading software. That's basically it.

What CPU is cooler? the intel E21xx or the AMD BE23xx ?

 

[accord99]

Well, the application would be a reading device for visual impaired people. It just scans paper text and then reads it using OCR software and reading software. That's basically it.

What CPU is cooler? the intel E21xx or the AMD BE23xx ?

The E21xx is less power, but the overall system power consumption also depends on the choice of MBs.

 

[epsilon84]

AMD and Intel TDP are not directly comparable...

Intels TDP quotes the maximum TDP of the chip
AMDs TDP quotes the average or something silly like that

Yeah, it used to be the opposite in the days of Heatburst, with Intel quoting 'average' TDP while AMD quoted max. Now it's AMD with its 'average power ACP' stuff.

To be fair, you can't just compare CPU wattages because AMD has their memory controller on die, so that saves about 10 - 20W off total power consumption.

I believe a BE X2 (Energy Efficient, not Black Edition ) coupled with a 690G mobo is still the most efficient combination around, although the latest M0 stepping E21x0 chips should come pretty close, they apparently only consume 8W when idle, that's pretty darn efficient.

 

[justchill]

Note that I will be using a 1U or 1.5U cooler only cause of space restrictions. So the CPU may not heat much.

 

[KyleSTL]

Your best bet is a E21x0 with a G965 or G31/33 motherboard. MicroATX and Mini ITX use a little less power than their ATX counterparts.

 

[zenmaster]

The TDP is not a good guideline for power usage,

Example - The E6750 also has the same TDP of 65w and has 4x the Cache and runs 50% faster and uses much more power, though still a modest amount all things considered.

 

[justchill]

The status of my research is :

* AMD sempron-LE 1xxx or AMD BE-23xx
* INTEL E21xx

What would be the intel opponent of the sempron + socket?

 

[KyleSTL]

Celeron 420-430-440. Single core, 512kb L2 cache, LGA 775 socket. Made on 65nm Core microarchitecture with a TDP of 45W.

 

[zenmaster]

The 965g would seem to be the Intel Chip.
See - http://techreport.com/articles.x/12872

The E2160 will likely use slightly less power than the E4300.
The E4300 is built using the L2 Stepping,
but the E4400 and the E2xxx series are on the M0 stepping.

Most likely only 1-2 watts less when idle but the saving could be as much as 4-5watts underload than what is shown by the E4300 in the chart.