AMD's future

Arterion · 28 Apr 2007 at 15:53

Ok, so very few people would dispute that Intel is the current CPU king and that they've sort of left AMD in the proverbial dust.

But after reading up on current AM2 processors, i'm informed that performance wise, an AM2 5600+ (or maybe a 6000+, I can't really remember) does a pretty good job of keeping up with an e6700.

So, my question is this; despite the general superiority of the Core 2 Duo range, might it be worth with my forthcoming upgrade to go for an AM2 rig (which is likely to be a bit cheaper than the equivalent C2D rig) and settle for slightly lower potential performance for now (it's still gonna beat the hell outta my 939 3500+) in anticipation of AMD either further slashing the prices of their highest model CPU's and/or coming out with an entirely new range of AM2's targeted at bettering their C2D rivals- we all know that's how this market works...

easyrider · 28 Apr 2007 at 15:55

Not really

6300
DS3
6400 DDR2

stickroad · 28 Apr 2007 at 16:19

If your not overclocking AMD all the way.

str · 28 Apr 2007 at 16:58

About £45 for a X2 3600+ 65nm and possibly overclock it to 3GHz is good value although a low end C2D doesn't cost all that much more.

jaykay · 28 Apr 2007 at 17:01

If no overclocking then amd are the best
if you want to take the risk you can go am2 and get amds new cpu (k10) which are coming out in september

Margaret · 28 Apr 2007 at 17:16

str said:
About £45 for a X2 3600+ 65nm and possibly overclock it to 3GHz is good value although a low end C2D doesn't cost all that much more.

Should also be noted them low end C2D's can be pushed to 3Ghz+ with little effort.

Arterion · 28 Apr 2007 at 17:24

jaykay said:
If no overclocking then amd are the best
if you want to take the risk you can go am2 and get amds new cpu (k10) which are coming out in september

Would that not require another motherboard change when they come out? And possibly even new RAM.

Thanks for everyones responses thus far, proving to be very helpful so keep 'em coming!

Participant · 28 Apr 2007 at 17:31

6320>5600 and cheaper

jaykay · 28 Apr 2007 at 17:42

Arterion said:
Would that not require another motherboard change when they come out? And possibly even new RAM.
Thanks for everyones responses thus far, proving to be very helpful so keep 'em coming!

AMDs new cpu should techniqually need just a bios update as the k10 use ddr2 memory and a faster hypertransport but the one amd uses currently is fast enough so it should be ok

Arterion · 28 Apr 2007 at 19:34

I suppose it's early days yet to ask such a question, but how good do we think these K10's are going to be? Are we really likely to see AMD take the crown back or is it going to be another half-assed release like AM2 was to begin with?

drunkenmaster · 28 Apr 2007 at 19:48

am2 wasn't a half asses release at all, it was NEVER supposed to be a brand new cpu, it was always same cpu different socket, slightly diff mem controller and ddr2. the new chips are backwards compatible, which they obviously aren't with 939, so they bring out AM2, if they hadn't then everyone that bought a cpu in the last, what, a year or so(? i have no recollection of when am2 came out tbh) wouldn't be compatible with future products.

to be fair, with intel and amd a huge portion of products aren't end user builds and they aren't ever upgraded, just ditched and buy new so 99% of people what socket their computer has makes no real difference in their lives.

but yes K10, its sounding like, well, noticeably to hugely faster than a core 2 duo. the only issue i see is how high they can clock them up as they seem to have had clock speed problems in the last couple years. however their quad core platform is looking to be far less bandwidth starved than the competing intel chips so even with less speed, if intel can't actually get an info to the faster cores to process that won't matter.

most info suggests that AMD will be comftably infront, and there are some official benchmarks that show Intels new cpu's to come out around the same time, well, their improvements are tiny, very limited to SSE4 using apps. the benchies basically said the chips were around 20% faster but they were also 15% higher clock speeds and they had the 1333mhz bus so clock for clock theres been almost zero improvement. so looks like intel have nothing to compete with till ondie mem controller next year, and even then that looks set to be Xeons only and i'm guessing as before that the Extreme Editions will be rebadged xeons , in and of itself that won't instantly mean it will beat AMD at all though, as amd can add a lot of stuff the conroe has to improve latency, at the moment AMD just have the ondie mem instead of other latency reduction techniques, intel will add ondie mem control and amd will add further latency reduction to fight back.

SkeeterUK · 28 Apr 2007 at 20:28

Well since majority of ppl in the world wont be overclocking then amd are not that much behind intel since there cpus are just as good as intels conroes at stock liek the amd 6000 is same as 6600 from conroe. Only a small oc market then the intel wins. But for the average user then amd wins with cheap good cpus.

~>Dg<~ · 28 Apr 2007 at 20:37

well the 6000 have gone up because there selling so well.

Gashman · 28 Apr 2007 at 21:36

Robbie G said:
6320>5600 and cheaper

not at stock speeds its not, looked at recent benchmark the 5600+ beat the E6300 (E6320 with less cache, not much difference perfomance wise) in almost every game when both at stock speeds, so if your not overclocking 5600>E6320

and with the recent price cuts the 5600+ is some 10 pound more, money you'd likely make back with AM2s generally cheaper motherboards

mrthingyx · 28 Apr 2007 at 22:18

If you have more money than sense, go for AMD's Quad FX platform. Despite getting its proverbial whooped by the Core 2 Quad, its implementation and potential make it a much more attractive option... assuming Barcelona is as fast as AMD claim it will be.

Of course, it is essentially two Athlon 6000s working in parallel, but the fact that the Quad FX could never be described as bandwidth-limited (gotta love NUMA, even if it only helps in one or two applications) and that it's a much more interesting approach to quad core than Intel's (and would be better if the Core 2 Duos weren't so good).

TBH, if buying a CPU today, you won't go wrong with either AMD or Intel - both will be ridiculously fast, eminently capable and - bar the sticker on the front - you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between the two..

However, I'd just sit it out at wait a couple of months for the really interesting things (i.e. Penryn and Barcelona) to turn up.

Arterion · 28 Apr 2007 at 22:34

Ok, ill do that, thanks Mrthingyx....now I just gotta hope I can make my student loan last that long

Rich43 · 28 Apr 2007 at 23:27

AMD needs to move to 65nm from 90nm to keep up.

drunkenmaster · 28 Apr 2007 at 23:39

Rich43 said:
AMD needs to move to 65nm from 90nm to keep up.

well, they have 65nm cores available, their next cores are all 65nm, but amd doesn't have the fab capacity to just turn a fab around stick 65nm producing kit in and get going. it takes time, loses output and time and money to switch over. intel with there 72 fabs can much more easily take one offline for a bit, switch over and spend time getting yeilds going and have the money to more quickly switch other fabs around once they have it sorted. amd is a much slower process as they are smaller. but even now, to be fair, they are competing pretty well, for the same price theres not a huge amount in it performance wise. 99% of people buying cpu's couldn't care less, know the difference or feel the difference when gaming is the only intensive thing they use, which is gpu limited.

i think amd are finally back in the budget market at the moment offering the cheapest/best chips and best value.

fact is 95% of the people on this forum, me included wouldn't see the difference in framerate in most of our games from stock/overclocked c2d's to a £50-60 x2. but thats life, i like my E6600 at 3.5Ghz, but i'm fully aware i don't need it.

pumpman · 29 Apr 2007 at 00:31

according to an article I was reading today last years cpu sales were 80-20 in favour of amd at a certain online etailer, since the release on conroe they are 60-40 in favour of intel.

Participant · 29 Apr 2007 at 08:17

drunkenmaster said:
fact is 95% of the people on this forum, me included wouldn't see the difference in framerate in most of our games from stock/overclocked c2d's to a £50-60 x2

Maybe true but it's more future proof and you would certainly see a difference when future core-dependent games require more beef. Plus Windows operates faster.