I think this article deserves a different title. I'd suggest calling it "The official 'We're not Intel Fanboys' article"
My reasoning: Every other overclocking article since the Core 2's release favors the boys in blue, yet here is a review showing that AMD does have some decent overclocking potential on a 65nm chip. But (IMHO) it makes one ABSOLUTELY UNFORGIVEABLE ERROR, specifically I HATE this paragraph from the first page:
"Of course there's nothing to keep you from overclocking the Intel processors included for comparison here as well. However, within this article we are considering the 5000+ Black Edition primarily as a CPU upgrade for people with existing AM2 systems, meaning that Intel processors are not an option."
Toms: Please tell me which group you think is bigger:
A) The current owners of AM2 boards, who are considering buying the 5000+ Black Edition and "intend to overclock it - and we mean really overclock it." When a few short months ago AMD's main selling point was lower cost vs Intel's performance, so how many of those buyers do you think are in the "really overclock it" crowd?
B) Everyone else who is interested in overclocking CPUs and wants to see how the new 65nm Black Edition compare to the 65nm Core 2's (or better yet the 45 nm). This includes the people that have no intention to buy anything, but just want to keep track of what's available.
If you think group A is significantly bigger then you wrote the article from the correct viewpoint. But from where I'm sitting I think the article was writen to make Tom's seem a lot friendlier towards AMD. As within a couple of months both companies will release their new CPU's, from the early numbers/reviews I've seen it looks like both will get a similar increase in clock-for-clock performance and overclocking headroom due to the die shrink. If this is the case - all the upcomming reviews will still have Intel in the lead (in both stock and overclocked performace categories). But because I've seen so many accusations on these forums that Tom's in in Intel's pocket, while this review calls this AMD CPU an "ideal choice", I think it was probably written to be cited as an example that Tom's is being fair in their reviews and not only touting Intel's products.
Yes, the pricing of this CPU is below Intel's e6xxx line, but what about the e4400/4500? They are similarly priced and have great overclocking headroom. Did all mention of the 4xxx line get forgotten because it would have moved the results in Intel's favor? What about any previous e6550 overclocking benchmarks - the stock numbers were included and I know you have overclocked benchmarks for both the e4xxx and the e6xxx lines, so why not include them?
As I've said in some other critisims on these forums,
no computer hardware exists in a vacuum. So Tom's, the depth of this article is a good start in trying to recapture some of your former glory, but stop putting disclamers and doing uneven comparisons (if your going to use overclocked AMD CPU's, compare them to OC'd Core 2's). When you stack the deck like this, it only makes me question the results and why you did it like this in the first place.
good game 
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