AMD Bulldozer Review: FX-8150 Gets Tested

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Perhaps the most hotly-anticipated launch in 2011, AMD’s FX processor line-up is finally ready for prime time. Does the company’s new Bulldozer architecture have what it takes to face Intel’s Sandy Bridge and usher in a new era of competition?

Benchmark Results: Media Encoding

Notoriously single-threaded iTunes does AMD’s flagship no favors, dumping it at the back of the pack after exposing its inability to keep up with the previous architecture running at 3.7 GHz (even when it’s hitting frequencies as high as 4.2 GHz thanks to Turbo Core).

MainConcept turns things around, taxing all of Zambezi’s resources and putting the FX-8150 in second place between both Sandy Bridge-based competitors. Thuban’s six cores land the Phenom II X6 in fourth place, followed by Bloomfield and Deneb.

The same goes for HandBrake, which puts FX-8150 right below Core i7-2600K. Phenom II X6 1100T passes Core i5, though, giving it the third-place finish.

Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini is an Editor Emeritus at Tom's Hardware US. He edits hardware reviews and covers high-profile CPU and GPU launches.
530 Comments Comment from the forums
  • btto
    yeah finaly, now i'll read it
    Reply
  • ghnader hsmithot
    nOT Bad AMd!
    Reply
  • jdwii
    Been so long and i'm kinda sad.
    Reply
  • compton
    Not many surprises but I've been waiting for a long, long time for this. I hope this is just the first step to a more competitive AMD.
    Reply
  • ghnader hsmithot
    At least its almost as good as Nehalem.
    Reply
  • gamerk316
    Dissapointing. Predicted it ages ago though. PII X6 is a better value.
    Reply
  • As I expected - failure.
    Reply
  • AbdullahG
    I see the guys from the BD Rumors are here. As many others are, I'm disappointed.
    Reply
  • iam2thecrowe
    for the gaming community this is a FLOP.
    Reply
  • phump
    FX-4100 looks like a good alternative to the 955BE. Same price, higher clock, and lower power profile.
    Reply