Bulldoze that Sandy Bridge

[jeremyshaw]

Is there anything to be said for Bulldozer and power efficiency? I've noticed how bad my 1090T is compared against Sandy Bridge (at least according to Tom's Hardware charts).

That's what would give me the (barely) justified reason to upgrade.

Clearly 32nm will be more efficient. But are there any architecture changes that promise lower consumption on the platform or the CPU itself?

If the bobcat preview meant anything, is that AMD is working on more effective powergating. Whether this moves over the desktop/server platforms is yet to be seen.

I'd bet so...

8 cores, supposed to compete with the 32nm Westmere CPU's...probably 125w TDP...

JF-AMD stated they would deliver 8 cores on Bulldozer in less die space than 6 cores in Thuban/Istanbul. No word on power consumption or transistor count, though.