AMD Phenom-Spider Linux Benchmarks (vs. Core 2 vs. X2)

However, once plopping in the AMD Phenom 9500 processor our pleasant experience soon went south. We immediately began with a kernel panic, and addressed that by a quick reinstall, but then were greeted by other issues -- mostly revolving around the system's stability.


Prior to installing the AMD Phenom 9500 processor, the MA790FX-DS5 test system was using an AMD Athlon 64 X2 processor and was freshly formatted with Ubuntu 7.10 "Gutsy Gibbon" and deploying the Linux 2.6.22 kernel. However, upon installing the AMD Phenom processor the results weren't as expected... The system had a kernel panic. This certainly wasn't what we were expecting, but upon reinstalling Ubuntu, the kernel had calmly started.



In addition to the kernel panic, we had also experienced a myriad of other issues when using Linux. These problems ranged from an occasional stability hiccup to Ubuntu's usplash hanging during the boot process and it's logo going psychedelic. We had experienced such issues while running at its default settings and the latest motherboard BIOS, and the issues had only intensified when overclocking. Interestingly, none of these problems were experienced when using the same motherboard with an AMD Athlon 64 X2 processor.



As we mentioned in our 790FX preview article, AMD's OverDrive software for easy tweaking/overclocking currently isn't available for Linux. Using the MA790FX-DS5 F3 BIOS from late December (with the TLB fix), we were able to easily overclock the Phenom 9500 to 2.53GHz. The remainder of the system hardware had consisted of a Corsair TX750W power supply, Seagate SATA 300GB hard drive, and 2GB of OCZ Reaper HPC PC2-8500 memory.

For comparing the Phenom Linux performance, we had re-benchmarked the AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+, which comes similarly clocked at 2.2GHz, and also when it was overclocked to 2.70GHz. The Athlon 64 X2 was tested on the same MA790FX-DS5 system. On the Intel side, we had used their X38 Chipset found on the ASUS P5E3 Deluxe motherboard and an Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 processor, while the rest of the hardware components remained the same. The Core 2 Duo E6400 was tested when running at 2.13GHz and overclocked to 2.52GHz. In this article we are just comparing these two dual-core processors to AMD's first quad-core processor, but once operations return to normal after CES we will be delivering more quad-core Linux benchmarks.



On the software side, we were running Ubuntu 7.10 "Gutsy Gibbon" with the Linux 2.6.22 kernel and X server 1.3. With the Radeon HD 3870 we were running the Catalyst 7.12 Linux driver.

On the next page is our dump of /proc/cpuinfo for the AMD Phenom 9500.

/proc/cpuinfo

processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 2
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) 9500 Quad-Core Processor
stepping : 2
cpu MHz : 2210.190
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 4
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc pni cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
bogomips : 4423.77
clflush size : 64

processor : 1
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 2
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) 9500 Quad-Core Processor
stepping : 2
cpu MHz : 2210.190
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 2
cpu cores : 4
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc pni cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
bogomips : 4420.27
clflush size : 64

processor : 2
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 2
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) 9500 Quad-Core Processor
stepping : 2
cpu MHz : 2210.190
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 4
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc pni cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
bogomips : 4420.24
clflush size : 64

processor : 3
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 2
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) 9500 Quad-Core Processor
stepping : 2
cpu MHz : 2210.190
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 3
cpu cores : 4
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc pni cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
bogomips : 4420.13
clflush size : 64

Without further ado, starting on the next page are our initial AMD Phenom 9500 Linux benchmarks.
 

surrealdeal

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Oct 3, 2007
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"However, upon installing the AMD Phenom processor the results weren't as expected..."

wow. it's painful that they actually had to say that.
 

sedaine

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Sep 10, 2007
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18,790



Yup - and it can't outright beat the Core 2 Duo (E6400)!!!!!
 
looks like it does decent in heavily multithreaded applications though.
08.png
 

Mathos

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Jun 17, 2007
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now if they could get it to do the same thing in Windows XP/Vista. Seemed to actually do fairly well on Linux performance wise at least compared to the X2, Looked to do ok against the OCed c2d e6400 in a few ways too. But wonder what it would of been like compared to a conroe or 1333fsb processor.
 

thunderman

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Nov 13, 2007
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I think there's a misunderstanding about the Phenom by some. They expected huge gains over AMD X2's in current software....that's just not going to happen.
Phenom was designed for heavy multi-tasking and tomorrow's Quad enabled games. If you look at the early evidence Phenom does really well in games that take advantage of all four cores. Why is the Phenom Better then The Intel quads? well the answer is simple and very logical, There's a good reason why AMD made a native Quad core rather than an Intel's method of a Double cheese burger. Native Quad design is far more efficient. Look at the Quake wars benchmark...The phenom makes the Intel Quad look like an Intel Celeron. As more games use four cores....Intel Quads just will not be able to keep pace.

AMD Phenom is the future! Old Pentium 3 Knock offs glued together have no place in modern computing!
 

rodney_ws

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Dec 29, 2005
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Now wait just a damned minute... AMD stock is... oooohhhhhhhh... sarcasm... I get it!
 



I should hope so: Since it's being compared to AMD and Intel Dual Core procs. If a quad can't beat a dual core in heavily multithreaded apps (Read: roughly twice as fast), then the maker should drop trou and bend over on the spot. I want to see the same tests run against another quad.



OTOH - Never mind. No sense in trying. It's clear at this point what the results would be. :pfff: