Is the phenom 2 worth it?

dmxdex2020 · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:14

Im still not sure either intel or amd for a new gaming rig. The AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition is very cheap along with the MSI 790FX-GD70 motherboard. Its will work out cheaper than core i7 rig. How much different is the phenom 955 to the core i7 920 DO chip? The rig will mainly be for gaming and internet.

Alex h · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:20

was wondering the same

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:25

They're about equal. A lot of reviews say different things, but from what i've heard the 955BE is better at more things. You could probably overclock the i7 more, but the 955 is great at it's stock speed already, so i wouldn't overclock it straight away anyway. So yes, it is very worth it.

As for the board, i would go for the Crosshair III, brilliant little thing (and it comes with a free sound card

). Or if you needed more PCI-E slots (doubtful, not many games at all support more than dual GPUs) then go for the Asus with four of them.

DragonQ · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:32

Superewza said:
from what i've heard the 955BE is better at more things.

Rubbish. I spent about a month researching my new PC and none of the reviews I saw showed the 955BE being better than the i7 920 (which I was kind of annoyed about since I prefer AMD). It does not overclock as easily either. However, it's certainly close in a lot of situations and a lot cheaper when you factor in the motherboard and RAM so yes, the PII is a great choice, especially for a gamer.

Rroff · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:36

Depends... if your running only a single GPU and not overclocking CPU or GPU then the AMD works out better...

If your actually gonna use your PC and clock it up a bit (even a fairly conservative overclock) or plan on multiple GPUs then the i7 will crush the AMD.

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:50

DragonQ said:
Rubbish. I spent about a month researching my new PC and none of the reviews I saw showed the 955BE being better than the i7 920 (which I was kind of annoyed about since I prefer AMD). It does not overclock as easily either. However, it's certainly close in a lot of situations and a lot cheaper when you factor in the motherboard and RAM so yes, the PII is a great choice, especially for a gamer.

Poppelsquak. I've been researching the IT industry for years and most of the reviews and videos i've seen show the 955 BE to be faster. It doesn't overclock as much but it has a much higher stock speed, so you don't need to at first anyway. But yes, it is close, and to me it seems silly to spend so much more on what might be a few extra frames in a game that nobody's even heard of.

Rroff · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:51

yeah the same reviews that compare a 2.67gig i7 against a 3.2gig PII :rolleyes:

DragonQ · 26 Jul 2009 at 14:59

OK Superewza, prove it. I'll start with this i7 series review that shows the two chips competing in gaming scenarios (with the i7 winning 2 out of 3) and the i7 920 trouncing the 955BE everywhere else:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2008/11/03/intel-core-i7-920-945-965-review/1

Your move.

Final8y · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:02

Rroff said:
Depends... if your running only a single GPU and not overclocking CPU or GPU then the AMD works out better...

If your actually gonna use your PC and clock it up a bit (even a fairly conservative overclock) or plan on multiple GPUs then the i7 will crush the AMD.

This review is with an AMD 940 v i7 & is getting to be a bit out of date but i still see the problem in this review in the forums.
Also the NB was not Oced on the AMD in that review.

Originally Posted by anand
During testing, the Intel systems would generate minimum frame rates at this resolutions about 23~24fps on a couple of runs and then jump to their current results on the others. We noticed this in game play also; the Intel systems would hitch and pause at times. We would shutdown the game, clear the prefetch folder, and reboot. The game would operate fine in the next series of testing although we still had stuttering in intensive ground scenes at times. We tried new images, different CPUs, memory changes, and the Sapphire HD 4870 cards with the same results. The Phenom II 940 had extremely stable frame rates in each test and action was very fluid during game play.

Originally Posted by anand
After playing through the several levels on each platform, we thought the Phenom II 940 offered a better overall gaming experience in this title than the Intel Q9550 based on smoother game play. It is difficult to quantify without a video capture, but player movement and weapon control just seemed to be more precise. Of course, if you have the funds, we would recommend the i7 platform for best possible performance.

Originally Posted by anand
The Phenom II is slightly ahead of the Q9550 when overclocked although it is at a 7% clock speed disadvantage. We have noticed the CryEngine 2 will respond to improved memory bandwidth and latencies as we clock up the processors. The i7 holds a 14% advantage in average frame rates while the Phenom II once again impresses us with the best minimum frame rates when overclocked. However, not having a 20fps minimum frame rate is a disappointment with our multi-GPU setups. The NVIDIA 260/285 solutions scale better in SLI than the ATI HD 4870 products. We hope that ATI can improve their drivers for this game.

Originally Posted by anand
Now that we have discussed the numbers, what about game play experience? As we alluded to earlier, the Intel platforms had problems with minimum frame rates throughout testing, not just in the benchmarks, but also during game play in various levels and on-line. We have not nailed it down yet, but we have noticed this problem consistently. In the meantime, the Phenom II X4 940 had rock solid frame rates and offered the smoothest game play experience.

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3506&p=1

More upto date reviews.
The i7 is OCed 200Mhz more & the Intel Q9550 is Oced 450Mhz more than the AMDs in the review.
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3533

Only an AMD 720 Tricore BE.
http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-phenom-ii-x4-810-and-x3-720be-review-am3/22

AMD 940 Its not multi GPU but if you get one of the 955 or 965 to at least 4 Ghz.
But you should look at the stock results really and remember that the AMD 955 has a higher 200Mhz core & 200Mhz NB stock speed than the AMD 940.
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/reviews/2009/02/phenom-ii-scaling.ars/6

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:15

DragonQ said:
OK Superewza, prove it. I'll start with this i7 series review that shows the two chips competing in gaming scenarios (with the i7 winning 2 out of 3) and the i7 920 trouncing the 955BE everywhere else:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2008/11/03/intel-core-i7-920-945-965-review/1

Your move.

Fine, i'll go on with this 4890 review (okay... bear with me here

) in which the 955 BE wins 3 out of 5 games.

http://www.modreactor.com/english/R...MD-Phenom-II-955-BE-vs-Intel-Core-i7-920.html

Also, did you know that in Windows 7, the GPU doesn't have to be limited to the graphics? They share tasks best suited to each of them all the time... nice.

DragonQ · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:28

I see you've chosen a pure gaming review there. That review once again proves my point - they compete in gaming and the i7 wins everywhere else (note the CPU scores in the 3DMark test). Thank you.

reflux · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:29

i7 is win, AMD Phenom is also fairly win, but cheap for a reason.

If you're gaming, there ain't much between them though.

Final8y · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:34

reflux said:
i7 is win, AMD Phenom is also fairly win, but cheap for a reason.

If you're gaming, there ain't much between them though.

Exactly.
And from the very first reviews the same was said that the i7 is not a real improvement in gaming but there are some here claiming otherwise.

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:35

At less intensive tasks the speeds should be about the same, since there's no way you're going to max out either of these processors by simply opening a window, or doing something in paint. Still, there's no way of even measuring that so that's why i choose a 'gaming' review.

dmxdex2020 · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:36

Ok so what is people on about multi gpu? the amd boards support multi gpu. I hate having to choose, i want a set up thats gonna last a few years, the core i7 is going out anyways, will they still be making 1366 boards?

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:38

Doubtful, Intel change their socket every other day. AM2/AM2+/AM3 are all interchangable and will be for the foreseeable future. AM3 is more future proof in my opinion.

reflux · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:42

Superewza said:
Doubtful, Intel change their socket every other day. AM2/AM2+/AM3 are all interchangable and will be for the foreseeable future. AM3 is more future proof in my opinion.

Socket 775 was Intel's main socket for nearly four years :rolleyes:

Socket 1366, as anyone who has done any research will know, is being kept for the high-end desktop segment for the forseeable future, which means another two years at least.

If and when AMD release a chip that can compete with i7, I expect they will need a new socket.

PermaBanned · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:44

Meh, it's what they did in the past. Old habits die hard

Still, the socket types aren't set to change on either platforms for the foreseeable future, and so that shouldn't really be a factor in your choice.

dmxdex2020 · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:45

reflux said:
Socket 775 was Intel's main socket for nearly four years

Socket 1366, as anyone who has done any research will know, is being kept for the high-end desktop segment for the forseeable future, which means another two years at least.

If and when AMD release a chip that can compete with i7, I expect they will need a new socket.

From the review i look above the phenom 2 competes very well so a saving of over 60 sounds good to me.

dmxdex2020 · 26 Jul 2009 at 15:46

Superewza said:
Meh, it's what they did in the past. Old habits die hard

Still, the socket types aren't set to change on either platforms for the foreseeable future, and so that shouldn't really be a factor in your choice.

The socket is not my factor i want long lasting and a top quad core processor for gaming and new games that will be quad core.

The crosshair asus board cannot reach higher ram speeds than the msi board.