After being here a couple of months, and of course seeing all levels and qualities of comments of all variety, I can reasonably conclude there is a pervasive pro-Intel bias in the forum, even among many of the most knowledgeable members.
That is, there are many who seem biased, along with many who do not, and that goes for both Intel and AMD, but more often for Intel.
By bias, I mean a preference for Intel even in certain situations where Intel chips do not have an advantage. For instance, a very careful review linked in the "[H]ardOCP Real-World Gaming CPU Comparison with 8800 GTX SLI" thread does careful comparisons both with all things being equal, and also with differences, in order to draw a very complete picture, but even some very knowledgable folks whom I find to generally make great posts here saw it as just biased, because they could not imagine otherwise?? (or perhaps just didn't read though it carefully).
[edit: I think they did catch that error later, but what is interesting is exactly that they made the initial error! That's bias.]
It's like it's hard to admit that for certain price points, there are AMD chips that are good bargains in terms of price/performance, using the Tom's Hardware metric in their price/performance reviews, for example.
Like, even if that was true (it often has been and is), we'd be careful to imply otherwise (misleadingly)!
Like we would not ever want to ever admit some AMD chip is a good choice for anyone right now. Instead, we must guide them to a C2duo setup.
We'd recommend a C2duo even to someone who already had a AM2 board and was looking to upgrade their game performance. I've actually seen that!
So what's the deal?
It's ok, in fact, it's great, if these are Intel system builders, or engineers, or whatever. That's great, and I love the detailed knowledge.
But this isn't the "Intel Forum", it's the "CPU forum".
For the record, I own both Intel and AMD stock, and have owned Intel longer, and am delighted with the great Intel improvements!
But of course Intel is losing a lot of profits right now (and the stock price shows that), since Intel has sacraficed profits with a price war, possibly due to poor planning, possibly to some other reason.
So I like Intel and AMD both, and I won't even bother to respond to any flames here.
Instead, I'm curious about whether I'm right about the pervasive bias.
The short time you have been here explains your perspective.
1 year ago, Intel got flamed, and AMD was the people's choice.
The reality is very simple, at most (but not all) pricepoints, The intel product, as of today, is a better buy.
A year ago, the AMD product were a better buy - it's just that simple. It's not bias, it's reality
Lets go head to head, product against product...
Top end - QX6700/EX6800 vs FX70/72/74...
=>Seriously, Quadfather is a joke, we all know it.=> Clear Intel Superiority
=>E6300 PI = (estimated) 1.55 price = $190=> Clear Intel Superiority =>4600+ PI = 1.57 Price = $268
Entry Level Dual Core
=>4200+ PI = 1.44, Price = $168
=> PentiumD 945 = PI = 1.45 Price = $156 => On a new build, buy the AMD, but if you have an Intel Motherboard, buy the netburst, if your mobo doesn't do C2D EDIT - Actually, I'd find another $22 and get the E6300. -~~also~~ The AMD's need good ram to run right, the c2ds work just fine on cheap ram - the extra $22 for the CPU can be made up easy with less expensive ram.
Cheapest Dual Core
=>3800+ PI = 1.35, Price = $144
=>D805 - PI = 1.12, Price = $101
=>E4300 PI = (estimated) 1.5, Price (Q2) $133 (clean win for Intel in Q2)
Out of the box, AMD wins over the D805, but a 3800+ won't get 4.0 ghz either if you OC, you could argue this one either way
If I am AMD the thought of a Q2 $133 E4300 that OCs to 3+ ghz just has to be f#%king scary -What does that make an x2 4200+ - a $109 part?
The bottom line is AMD has few, if any, categories where they are CLEARLY better, in the lower midrange it is close and decent arguments exist on both sides, but from "Mainstream" on up (as I have defined them above) Intel CLEARLY wins ever category.
I would note these comparisons are at stock speed. Given that just about every Core2duo chip will do well over 3 ghz with decent RAM and good cooling, once overclocking gets factored it, a huge Intel lead become an absolute utter blowout. Harsh, but true.
AMD claims that Barcelona rocks, and I hope it does. If AMD hits back hard, Intel will stop capping the C2Ds at 2.93 ghz and sort out some bins and let the 3.73 ghz parts out, and maybe pull the 45 nano Core2 in a quarter or so (we can only hope) - but at this point it time, Intel clearly leads.
Go back a year, read the forum in January 2006, and Netburst was getting a (well deserved) sh*tkicking...
To paraphrase Harry Truman, "I'm not giving them hell, I''m just telling the truth and they think it's hell"
Dam THG for not sticking the 6300 in there!! Its been 6 months for goodness sakes.
You know what's funny? I've heard people flaming THG for being AMD-biased because they don't include 6300 (which would clearly tip scales even more in Intel's favor on their charts).
Dam THG for not sticking the 6300 in there!! Its been 6 months for goodness sakes.
You know what's funny? I've heard people flaming THG for being AMD-biased because they don't include 6300 (which would clearly tip scales even more in Intel's favor on their charts).
Anandtech did a review of the E4300 (800 mhz FSB, 1.8 ghz) and it benchmarked almost exactly halfway between a 4200+ and a 4600+
The E4400 (2.0 ghz) will be a 189 part and shoud benchmark very close to a 5000+
Once availability gets better, the E4300 will be a $166 part, dropping to $133 in Q2 - and it STILL overclocks well above 3 ghz... now that is a truly SCARY bargain
Dam THG for not sticking the 6300 in there!! Its been 6 months for goodness sakes.
You know what's funny? I've heard people flaming THG for being AMD-biased because they don't include 6300 (which would clearly tip scales even more in Intel's favor on their charts).
Anandtech did a review of the E4300 (800 mhz FSB, 1.8 ghz) and it benchmarked almost exactly halfway between a 4200+ and a 4600+
The E4400 (2.0 ghz) will be a 189 part and shoud benchmark very close to a 5000+
Once availability gets better, the E4300 will be a $166 part, dropping to $133 in Q2 - and it STILL overclocks well above 3 ghz... now that is a truly SCARY bargain
Well, hopefully the little burp weve seen in AMDs prices the past 2 weeks was retailer induced, and AMDs prices will continue to fall giving them a more favorable comparison. If not, as you say, the 4300 will be a "scary bargain"
Heres the chart its less than 1 week old. Discounting OCing, which CPU is the best value?
The Pentium D 805? 8O
Intel Celeron D 331??? ($45)
But this does outline that you can't compare just teh CPUs, you need to factor them into the cost of an entire system. As part of the savings on an entire system it really might not be worth it to save $100 to go from a e6400 to a D 805. YOu could very well be talking about a $1000 C2D system @ 3.34ghz vs. a $900 Pentium D system @ 4.1ghz if CPU (and thusly CPU cost) is the only thing you are changing. 10% less cost, 40% less performance??? That's not a good value! o.0
Also, that price/performance chart could really use a few more CPUs, and a few more OCed CPUs on it. It's just a rough outline that's supposed to get you to consider price points before you buy.
I was wondering what you think of the 1066mhz FSB and the 4mb cache available in such a cheap processor?
First, the e4300 only has 2m L2 cache, same as the e6300.
Right now the e4300 has basically the same price as the e6300. At only 1066mhz FSB the e4300 doesn't really outshine an OCed e6300, it just saves you a little money on RAM. It's bumping the e4300 up to 1333mhz FSB (2997mhz, which is reportedly easy to do) where the e4300 starts to really pull ahead of the e6300 as both chips are now nearing their upper limits but the e4300 has a higher multiplier. However, then you aren't saving any money on RAM. So at 266mhz or 333mhz the e4300 is offereing 28% more core frequency than an e6300 for the same price, but bandwidth and latencies are equal so it's not quite +28% performance all around. Both chips will clock beyond that, but not by a whole lot and it requires faster RAM. Still waiting for more data on the e4300.
Dam THG for not sticking the 6300 in there!! 
Its been 6 months for goodness sakes. 
