Phenom launch: Reviews :D

[killadoob]

its actually really sad that amd's old cpu's beat its new ones

intel's new core 2 and quadcore smashed their old p4's badly

intel is whipping amd in every single cpu, intel offer a better cpu in every price range that performs better at stock and whips amd when overclocked

i agree with you about amd, but im looking at amd and thinking wtf are you ppl smoking in those labs

 

[ShockG]

Abe that's what many had thought, about Intel bankrolling two development teams but its untrue. At no point other than when the first Pentium4 came out at about 1.6Ghz was this happening. When Netburst development took full swing the team that was working on giving the Pentium3 a longer life was re-deployed to work on the P4.
The team that ultimately made the horribly expensive but very fast Pentium3-S was from the East (India/Israel) and that same team then produced the Dothan which was the Centrino/Core technology.
When Intel decided to go with that, R&D funds were put into that and it was brought back to the US. All of this resulted in the Core2. There was no parallel development...

anyway, Phenom is obviously disappointed many people (me included) but I must say its kind of tricky comparing the core2 to the Pentium4 in the same way we want to compare the A64 to the Phenom.

The Intel CPUs were very polarized, the Pentium4 was exceptionally bad, the Core2 was very good, so it was easy for the P4 3.6GHz Dual core to be out gunned by a 2.4GHz E6600. This isn't the case with the AMD products.
clock for clock the Phenom is faster, but it doesn't give 2X the IPC so given enough of a frequency difference the 3.2GHz A64 will come out ahead. Compared at the same clock speeds the Phenom would be quiet a bit faster.

 

[killadoob]

all im saying is that when intel finally released something other than a p4 it kicked the p4's ass in a massive

so their new cpu was awesome compared to their last p4

yes in a way compare them, i dont know sh%t about the technology, i do know about encoding gaming blah blah and core 2 is so much better than p4

phenom is not better than a64 and if it is, not by a whole lot

shocking amd, how u have let all your followers down in a massive way

 

[Gnome]

This isn't the case with the AMD products.
clock for clock the Phenom is faster

Actually Clock for Clock the Core 2 is still faster, but when I read the review I saw a few key points which I personally think is the reason why:

Firstly the L3 Cache running at a much slower speed than it is supposed to.
Secondly Smaller cache sizes when compared to intel
And thirdly the Core 2 is completely mature in respect to chipset and platform while the Phenom is just being released and the Chipsets are crippled at this point.

Perhaps the Phenom will pick up next year with higher frequencies and better compatibility all round.

 

[Abe]

its actually really sad that amd's old cpu's beat its new ones

But not clock for clock. Thats a 2.3Ghz compared with a 3.2Ghz CPU.

i agree with you about amd, but im looking at amd and thinking wtf are you ppl smoking in those labs

From what I read, they went back to the drawing board a couple of times over the 5 years they were leading. That's a really big stuff up.

Perhaps the Phenom will pick up next year with higher frequencies and better compatibility all round.

I read that the Phenom architecture will scale much better as they add Cores. AMD have plans to release their 8 core CPU towards the end of next year so that will make things interesting if they can stick to their plans.

I think Phenom is a good architecture, they are just having teething problems. It's also probably hurting that they are not on 45nm.

 

[Ekhaatvensters]

phenom is not better than a64 and if it is, not by a whole lot.

Lol..

But ja, I wouldn't buy a phenom now, possibly when the faster parts come out later this year or next year and prices drop, it could be worth it. New boards and 790X chipsets becoming cheaper would help too.

Unfortunately AMD let themselves fall too far behind, Intel is now on 45nm and going forward.

 

[ShockG]

Actually Clock for Clock the Core 2 is still faster,

No one ever disputed that, its obvious. Re-read what I wrote. Phenom is faster than A68 clock for clock, I made no mention of the Core2 against the Phenom in IPC.

Chipset may be immature but it has nothing to do with it. What makes up most of the Northbridge is the memory controller, since its in the CPUs with the AMD parts, chipset differences will be there but not enough to turn any of their CPUs into a winning product over the competition.

The reason AMD went back to the drawing board many times is because they never had CPU to succeed the Athlon64 to begin with. The K10 lived in theory it seems, nice and elegant in what its supposed to be, but no funds actually put into making it a significant step above the K8 which they had for so long.

It seems AMD has been making the Athlon64 for so long they pretty much forgot or are incapable of making anything else. Right now they're a good 1~1.5yrs behind in performance and come Q3 2008, they'll be even further behind. To win this or stand a chance against Intel's Nehalem the upcoming Phenoms need to beat the Penryn CPUs in almost everything and at lower clock speeds. Something that can't happen without an entirely new core. The K10 won't scale like that, not even with 2 years of R&D behind it.