AMD Phenom II Review Thread

[demonkevy666]

Here is GTX 260 Core 216:

Preliminary Overclocking

I really was more displeased with myself than the actual processor in overclocking Phenom II. Even after spending hours playing with the processor, I found it very hard to break the 250HTT barrier. Afterward, I realized I was running the memory controller at 2.54GHz with "low" IMC volts which may have been a frequency bottleneck.

Sadly, I cannot comment on the temperatures I was hitting or what it takes to hit 4GHz, yet. Once this article is published, then I'll be a bit more liberal with voltages and really start bashing down clock barriers. I have plans on testing with air heatsinks, dry ice, a cascade, and liquid nitrogen, all the tools in an avid overclocker's arsenal.

seem people skip over this NB/IMC speed.

Wrap Up and Conclusion

For the enthusiast and amateur overclocker, Phenom II is almost a gift in a black box. With the Black Edition Phenom II X4 940 running ~$300 with shipping, you are getting a very flexible processor that just craves to be tweaked and overclocked. It may have trouble standing up against Core i7 in sheer CPU benchmarks like Cinebench and wPrime, but for 3D applications you just might see a few surprises from Phenom II.

phenom II doing good at 1920 x1200...?

[Nedjo]

Some people think that GTA IV is the most CPU intensive game out there right now.... let's see how Phenom II stakc up against Core 2 Quad in this game:

[Caveman787]

Actuallly in fair high resolution benches i7 and phenom II did well.

Some reviews show it as abysmal in some games and at high resolutions which doesnt make sense.

Also a big issue would be having a working board with new bios for the processor I think...I see no reason why phenom II would lag behind other alot in high resolution most I've seen it's doing better than core 2 probably because of the imc.

[Hornet331]

Some people think that GTA IV is the most CPU intensive game out there right now.... let's see how Phenom II stakc up against Core 2 Quad in this game:

more like the WCGE (worse coded game ever), imho GTA4 isn't representative for anything.

Even on a 3ghz quad it runs like .. barely in the playable fps range and looks like crap compared to other games...


Good games that show scaling in with quads -> Supreme Comander, UT3, Farcry 2.

[roofsniper]

more like the WCGE (worse coded game ever), imho GTA4 isn't representative for anything.


Good games that show scaling in with quads -> Supreme Comander, UT3, Farcry 2.

nice to see that you say something is coded well because amd does pretty well at it and then you say to pick games that always work best on intel.

the gta4 benchmarks prove my point. that at lower resolutions intel does better but at higher resolutions amd seems to do better. yesterday everyone was saying that 1204x768 is the best resolution to bench on because it shows cpu performance..........

[Hornet331]

nice to see that you say something is coded well because amd does pretty well at it and then you say to pick games that always work best on intel.

the gta4 benchmarks prove my point. that at lower resolutions intel does better but at higher resolutions amd seems to do better. yesterday everyone was saying that 1204x768 is the best resolution to bench on because it shows cpu performance..........

Well according to this graph.. a P2 920 is on par with a Q9550... and both arn't exactly in playable fps ranges.

I call it ty coded, cause if compared to crysis it looks like crap and runs even worse then crysis.

[Shintai]

nice to see that you say something is coded well because amd does pretty well at it and then you say to pick games that always work best on intel.

the gta4 benchmarks prove my point. that at lower resolutions intel does better but at higher resolutions amd seems to do better. yesterday everyone was saying that 1204x768 is the best resolution to bench on because it shows cpu performance..........

Look where the Phenom 1 is in GTA4...

pcgh.de looks to be abit odd graphs..
http://www.pcgameshardware.de/aid,67...ore_i7/?page=5

It honestly look bugged.

[roofsniper]

what about it? phenom I is the worst of the quads and it seems that gta4 favors quads over dual cores. i don't think memory bandwidth has anything to do with this. cause if so wouldn't the x2 be better than the c2d?

[Nedjo]

phenom II doing good at 1920 x1200...?

see 4 yourself:
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=802&p=0

[accord99]

the gta4 benchmarks prove my point. that at lower resolutions intel does better but at higher resolutions amd seems to do better. yesterday everyone was saying that 1204x768 is the best resolution to bench on because it shows cpu performance..........

How about Left 4 Dead then?

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/aid,67...ore_i7/?page=4

[roofsniper]

How about Left 4 Dead then?

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/aid,67...ore_i7/?page=4

what about left for dead? obviously it doesn't work well with the phenom II. consdering that overclocking it reduces performance by a pretty big amount.

edit: http://www.overclockersclub.com/revi...omii940/15.htm looking at other reviews for left 4 dead its the same story again. phenom II's performance compared to intel increases at higher resolutions.

advantage of phenom II over phenom I in 1024x768: 6.67%, in 1280x1024: 8% in 1680x1050: 3.28%, in 1920x1200: 5.88%. if the lowest resolutions showed absolute cpu performance you would think that as the resolution went up the performance of phenom II over phenom I would decrease over time which it does not.

[accord99]

what about left for dead? obviously it doesn't work well with the phenom II. consdering that overclocking it reduces performance by a pretty big amount.

It means that trying to say anything about CPU performance when something is clearly GPU limited doesn't prove much of anything.

[PetNorth]

Some people are too emotional to accept the facts.
More precisely:
Q9300~=P2 920~=Q6700
Q9450~=P2 940~=QX6800

I tend to disagree. As rk7p5 said, this Christmas I tested my systems, Kentsfield and Agena, clock for clock (all real world apps), and based on them, I would say that PhII 940 is between 9550 and 9650, and PhII 920 between 9450 and 9550. I´ll include Deneb and Yorkfield as soon as possible, aren't in house yet ;-) http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=213642

[AbelJemka]

I read like every review on the net and i was pretty astonished by the big discuptancy in results
You can find review PhII 2 above Q9550 in a place and far behind in another same bench same settings
That's pretty incredible and for either some receive big bucks to praise PhII or some don't knoww how to correctly setup an AMD system after 3 years of Intel Core domination

[Hornet331]

That's pretty incredible and for either some receive big bucks to praise PhII or some don't knoww how to correctly setup an AMD system after 3 years of Intel Core domination

I just love this tinfoil hat conspiracy theories.

As if its so hard to put a cpu/ram/gfx card into a mobo and install a os.

Oc benching is another story but you can't do much wrong with out of the box (aka stock) stuff...

edit:

omfg i just read the HardOCP review...

WTF !!!111

The Phenom II performance speaks for itself. It loses to its old nemesis, the Core 2, which I think some folks will be surprised by. The Phenom II loses to the Core i7, which I think was to be expected. The Phenom II is a loser.


Does that mean it is without value? Absolutely not. But I think those that will find value in it will be few and far between and even fewer of those folks will be computer hardware enthusiasts.


If you are a gamer or a content creation professional, my suggestion to you is to save your pennies and get the Intel Core i7. Even if you have to wait an extra few months to save up for good DDR3. The Phenom II just does not have long legs, and I don’t think I will want to pay for DDR3 to dress one up next month either.

Did Hell just froze over and im seeing this correct that Kyle Bennett calls P2 a looser.

[Spectrobozo]

yes this is very strange, a lot of different results... far cry 2 is one good example.

[v_rr]

You're talking about hand picking but you're doing the same thing with FEAR. Not to mention FEAR is like 5 years old, it's a bad benchmark.

Easy, when i point the review I was talking about all games in that review, not only fear. Check-out the other games

The AMD roadmap is allways changing. 15 days ago and AMD made changes. And as far as I know not to be on roadmap don´t say nothing.
As far as i know AMD still have de Phenom "Stars"/FX to come and will have 6-core opteron also in midle of this year (H2), not final 2009 like shintay said. It´s H2 for the 6-core:

We've seen an updated server roadmap where AMD places its six-core Istanbul processor for the second half of 2009. At first, AMD internally said that there will be some samples in late 2008, but 2H 2009 is the time of volume production.

The new six-core CPU will have 6MB L3 cache and DDR2 support, powered by HT-3 and AMD Virtualization support. Of course, this CPU will be developed in 45nm and it looks just like Shanghai 45nm CPU but with two additional cores.

http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?op...=7224&Itemid=1

So AMD can do somethings to counter i5 by Q3. One 3.2-3.4Ghz CPU? Possible...
A 6-core CPU? Also possible...
Everything is open.

[Chad Boga]

So AMD can do somethings to counter i5 by Q3. One 3.2-3.4Ghz CPU? Possible...
A 6-core CPU? Also possible...
Everything is open.

And in Q4 32nm Westmere is due.

[rk7p5]

Ben Brown also did an awesome comparison between agena and deneb. Ipc wise deneb is 10% to 15% faster then agena, putting it between yorkfield and i7. Bang for the buck, you can't beat amd atm.

http://www.overclock.net/amd-cpus/43...omparison.html

[Hornet331]

Ben Brown also did an awesome comparison between agena and deneb. Ipc wise deneb is 10% to 15% faster then agena, putting it between yorkfield and i7. Bang for the buck, you can't beat amd atm.

http://www.overclock.net/amd-cpus/43...omparison.html

that strongly depends on the apps, in rendering deneb is ~5% faster but is some games its sometimes up to 20% faster, sometimes its not faster at all.

But calling it 10-15% faster on avarage ipc wise is a bit off an overstatement.

[AbelJemka]

I just love this tinfoil hat conspiracy theories.

I don't understand why you try to bash me on this
I speak sincerely.
Just compare results all over the net and you'll see the mess.

[Hornet331]

Cause all this company A pays site B to rate product C better is BS, it may happen in one or two cases, but saying that half sites get payed and the other half is to stupid to set up a computer right is ridiculous.

[AbelJemka]

You know sarcasm?
I use smilie like this
You can find yourselve a reason for mess up in result because it's abvious there is mess up.
With ATI and Nvidia even it's numbers are a little ainaccurate you know one win this benchmark etc...
Here with see a clear win, a clear tie or a clear lose for the same benchmark with same settings and with the same system spec. Thats nearly impossible!
That's why those threads are like this, flamewars threads coz by picking the "right" you can show the truth to everyone.

[roofsniper]

And in Q4 32nm Westmere is due.

if you are buying a laptop then yes it might be. westmere for laptops is set for late 2009 to january 2010 while the desktop versions are set for first half of 2010 for the high end and last half for the mainstream and low end. the high ends won't be competing with deneb and will actually just be competing with nehalem. plus bulldozer is set for 2011 which will include 12 cores and will be the core used for fusion so we could be seeing graphics in the cpus by then. so even though you are saying how westmere is going to destroy amd look at the big picture, bulldozer might come right after westmere and with bulldozer supporting 50% more cores than westmere and possibilities of integrated graphics.

[Chad Boga]

if you are buying a laptop then yes it might be. westmere for laptops is set for late 2009 to january 2010 while the desktop versions are set for first half of 2010 for the high end and last half for the mainstream and low end.

I suspect that the first 6 core Westmere will be server oriented, as will the first iteration of any 6 core from AMD.

plus bulldozer is set for 2011 which will include 12 cores and will be the core used for fusion so we could be seeing graphics in the cpus by then

I very much doubt the first offerings of Bulldozer will be 12 core, certainly not on the desktop and why should it be?

For the desktop user for the next 2 to 3 years at least, 4 cores with higher IPC and clockspeed will be much more compelling than 6 or more cores that are clockspeed limited by power draw.

so even though you are saying how westmere is going to destroy amd look at the big picture, bulldozer might come right after westmere and with bulldozer supporting 50% more cores than westmere and possibilities of integrated graphics.

Sandy Bridge will probably arrive much closer to Bulldozer's introduction than Bulldozer will arrive to Westmere's introduction.

AMD's biggest problem is clearly the 12 months of 2010.

I suspect we will see Westmere/Nehalem Quads in Q1 10 on 32nm for the desktop and it will take AMD at least 12 months to respond adequately to this, and that will mean they will be at a greater competitive disadvantage to Intel than the first 12 months of Conroe's introduction.

Do you think AMD will be able to survive going through that again?

I do not.

So AMD needs for Intel to stumble somewhere along the way, either they are 6 months late with 32nm or Westmere, because we know that Bulldozer is surely their last hope to get back on a truly competitive keel with Intel and if Bulldozer has any stumbles, well . . . . . . .