Hardocp Intel Core 2 Review up

[classy]

Intel Core 2 Duo

Very interesting to say the least


Ocworkbench
They test a 6800 against a 4000X2 oc to 280fsb for 2.8. Needless to say depending on the board it used it comes up short or slighty ahead. AM2 again is right with the 6800 extreme.


Techreport uses 1024x768 and does get some room, but not as much as we may have thought.
Techreport Core 2 duo

Overclocking ain't too bad, TR got it too 3.46, but it was at 70 degrees C with 9500 at full blast. Thats a little hot, too hot for my taste.

I am going to bed yall, I'll witness the bar brawls on the forums in the morning.

 

[Duvie]

I am not surprised and I dont even keep up on gaming...i knew the video cards are the limitation and until there is a mature SLI platform ready fro the core 2 duo its real world gaming is going to look ...uhhh...uninspiring....


I think with SLI the core 2 will pull a bigger lead but nothing like it shows in 640x480 or 800x600.....

I hope gamers enjoy that 2 extra FPS....

Also the E6700 does beat the FX62 in about all and I do believe it will be at a better price point....

 

[classy]

After reading it completely I don't know what to think. Clearly the Core2 is faster but only by a smidgen. Kinda makes me think AMD could still prevail with clockspeed. But this does confirm my suspicions all along, that when it comes to gaming it, most of the burden will be handled by the video card. I hate to admit it, but those AMD price cuts sound pretty damn good now.

 

[Duvie]

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTExMCwyLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

this is the real artivle....seems as if the Core 2 duo delivers there though...I can only imagine what myu E6600 can do if I can get it to 3.6-4ghz.....

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: classy
After reading it completely I don't know what to think. Clearly the Core2 is faster but only by a smidgen. Kinda makes me think AMD could still prevail with clockspeed. But this does confirm my suspicions all along, that when it comes to gaming it, most of the burden will be handled by the video card. I hate to admit it, but those AMD price cuts sound pretty damn good now.

for gamers perhaps...that and the AMD/AM2 platforms already have good support for SLI and tyhe GTX2 cards....

 

[wilki24]

I don't think anyone was expecting there to be a huge difference at higher resolutions in gaming.

Things I'd like to see:
- Performance under SLI (specifically the GX2)
- Multitasking performance
- Heat and power consumption
- Overclocking results, both a reasonable o/c as well as going balls to the wall
- Non-gaming tests
- How Conroe compares to some of the cheaper AMD chips (I have a 3700+ currently, and don't plan to spend anywhere near $1000 for a cpu... ever.)

I'm a hard-core gamer, but I do use my system for other tasks... and heat/power is a consideration (I like quiet machines).

Hopefully we'll see a more comprehensive review elsewhere soon.

Edit: I just noticed there was more info there, so ignore my previous comments

 

[IfReborn]

i am no expert but looks to me that the test was GPU limited. Now if we had a supper GPU that offed 4x the performance, i think the test would have turned out a lot different

 

[classy]

Originally posted by: wilki24
I don't think anyone was expecting there to be a huge difference at higher resolutions in gaming.

Things I'd like to see:
- Performance under SLI (specifically the GX2)
- Multitasking performance
- Heat and power consumption
- Overclocking results, both a reasonable o/c as well as going balls to the wall
- Non-gaming tests
- How Conroe compares to some of the cheaper AMD chips (I have a 3700+ currently, and don't plan to spend anywhere near $1000 for a cpu... ever.)

I'm a hard-core gamer, but I do use my system for other tasks... and heat/power is a consideration (I like quiet machines).

Hopefully we'll see a more comprehensive review elsewhere soon.

Kinda surprising on heat and power, Actually they are not as impressive as I thought they would be. Power Comsumption

 

[classy]

Originally posted by: Duvie
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTExMCwyLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

this is the real artivle....seems as if the Core 2 duo delivers there though...I can only imagine what myu E6600 can do if I can get it to 3.6-4ghz.....

I knew they would own there because even Pentium Ds most of the time won out over X2s. Good stuff. Good info by Kyle and the gang.

 

[dmens]

OMG, what a joke!!! Here's my reading of that "review":

"We *could* remove the GPU bottleneck but deliberately chose not to by running max graphic load tests on an inadequate card, hence turning this supposed CPU review into a meaningless frame-rate contest where the differing hardware were non-factors. Also, we're going to slap the "real world test" label onto our non-tests, then call all the other benchmarks on the web bogus because they actually tested CPU power as opposed to the GPU. Also, we will present the results of this non-test in an obnoxious and biased manner."

You can run the same crappy "test suite" on a nehalem or gesher in 200x/201x and come up with almost the exact same results due to the absurd bottleneck (feel free to QFT). I guess everyone should just buy a priced down AM2 and use it for the rest of their lives! LOL!

This review is worse than garbage.

 

[DrMrLordX]

This benchmark flies in the face of some other benchmarks (especially compgeek1's own benches) run with better video card configurations.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: dmens
OMG, what a joke!!! Here's my reading of that "review":

"We *could* remove the GPU bottleneck but deliberately chose not to by running max graphic load tests on an inadequate card, hence turning this supposed CPU review into a meaningless frame-rate contest where the differing hardware were non-factors. Also, we're going to slap the "real world test" label onto our non-tests, then call all the other benchmarks on the web bogus because they actually tested CPU power as opposed to the GPU. Also, we will present the results of this non-test in an obnoxious and biased manner."

You can run the same crappy "test suite" on a nehalem or gesher in 200x/201x and come up with almost the exact same results due to the absurd bottleneck (feel free to QFT). I guess everyone should just buy a priced down AM2 and use it for the rest of their lives! LOL!

This review is worse than garbage.

I think you are being overdramatic.....


Read the review??? If youy did you realize they tried to run the 7950 GTX2 cards but had an issue with the "immature" p[latform....

The gpu bottleneck was caused by the fact they chose to run resolution at what a person who owned that card would run at...

If you stopped being so over dramatic you realise a lot of gamer sin here are not buying (2) high priced cards...they will be limited and will likely play these res with those settings...


If anything it was a fair SYSTEM review.....A cpu review would run 640x480 and we know which cpu is the best...The plain fact is some may expect too much and better to let them see it know then bash it later....

 

[wilki24]

Does anyone else get the impression that the author(s) of these articles are using a lot of "Conroe comes out ahead, BUT the difference isn't that much..." type statements? i.e. a lot more than are necassary, since it's plainly obvious in most of the places they're used?

For example:

Now let?s take apply this data to what would happen if we were encoding an entire music CD of average length to your iPod or other MP3 player. You would likely only see a 20 to 25 second advantage to using Intel?s new Core 2.

Ok, put that way, it doesn't sound like much. But when you do the math, it's a 21% increase in performance.

I dunno, it just seems like a conscious effort to downplay the performance differences. I mean, hardware people get excited about a 5% performance increase from memory timings... yet a cpu that uses less power, generates less heat and is at an equal price point, all while giving a 21% boost in performace is downplayed?

What's with that?

 

[wilki24]

Kinda surprising on heat and power, Actually they are not as impressive as I thought they would be. Power Comsumption

Interesting.

One thing I noticed is that the x6800 goes from 193-209-228, while the FX62 goes from 157-217-248.

Increase from idle to 100%:
15.4% - x6800
36.7% - FX62

It seems like the Conroe's are using a lot more power at idle than they should be.... as if the FX62 went into some kind of low power mode while at idle (throttled clock speed?), while the conroe didn't.

Very odd.

 

[dmens]

Originally posted by: Duvie
I think you are being overdramatic.....

Read the review??? If youy did you realize they tried to run the 7950 GTX2 cards but had an issue with the "immature" p[latform....

The gpu bottleneck was caused by the fact they chose to run resolution at what a person who owned that card would run at...

If you stopped being so over dramatic you realise a lot of gamer sin here are not buying (2) high priced cards...they will be limited and will likely play these res with those settings...

If anything it was a fair SYSTEM review.....A cpu review would run 640x480 and we know which cpu is the best...The plain fact is some may expect too much and better to let them see it know then bash it later....

Oh I read it all right, while I'm watching the exact same conroe XE do a simulation job twice as fast as a 3.8ghz P4. What does that illustrate? If you're going to review a CPU, the absolute least you can do is try to make the component being tested influence the result. Sounds like basic scientific method.

I couldn't give a hoot about what resolution they *want* to run the game at. I personally don't run at anything except 1600x1200 either, but that's why I have SLI 7800's. If I wanted to benchmark my GPU, would I run a java applet with a little sphere bouncing about, or run BF2 at 1600x1200?

It is not even a fair system review. It is not even a fair gamer system review. If you're playing games at that resolution, would you have that kind of video setup?

 

[Lord Banshee]

I see the these results as such.

HardOCP is a gamer site so this review is more for the people that game ALOT and already have a fast AMD64 CPU.

Which in the end if you game and you have a fast cpu, you will see little improvement in performance with conroe in "games" unless you run at resolutions at 1024x768 or below.

I can't agree more, why try to tell all these gamers that the conroe is faster at gaming so drop that 300-400 dollar amd cpu you bought 6-12 months ago and upgrade due to 20+% upgrade in performance. But in real life settings (ie High Quality and large res) they is little difference due to the lack of GPU performance. This isn't going to change and possiblity get worse. The performance ihit in new games are increasing with every new release.

If you are looking for a processor not just for gaming then look for benchmark from a non pure gaming site.

thats my $.02 anyway..

 

[dmens]

Originally posted by: wilki24

Kinda surprising on heat and power, Actually they are not as impressive as I thought they would be. Power Comsumption

Interesting.

One thing I noticed is that the x6800 goes from 193-209-228, while the FX62 goes from 157-217-248.

Increase from idle to 100%:
15.4% - x6800
36.7% - FX62

It seems like the Conroe's are using a lot more power at idle than they should be.... as if the FX62 went into some kind of low power mode while at idle (throttled clock speed?), while the conroe didn't.

Very odd.

Oh, I wouldn't pay any atetntion at that so-called "power review" either. Measuring system power while giving zero information on the entire setup? Please! Same crappy testing methods as the "CPU review". Their graphs are extremely misleading, being laballed as "CPU power consumption". Do you really think the conroe will draw 196W while idling? Hell no.

 

[coldpower27]

"No power saving features are being used in their idle state as many gamers turn this feature off in the BIOS due to negatively impacting full power usage with some systems. Your mileage may vary, and if your computer stays idle for long periods of time we do suggest you investigate these settings."

They also used a 35W x2 3800+ which is quite hard to obtain to my knowledge and is not slated for a price cut that I know of.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: dmens

Originally posted by: Duvie
I think you are being overdramatic.....

Read the review??? If youy did you realize they tried to run the 7950 GTX2 cards but had an issue with the "immature" p[latform....

The gpu bottleneck was caused by the fact they chose to run resolution at what a person who owned that card would run at...

If you stopped being so over dramatic you realise a lot of gamer sin here are not buying (2) high priced cards...they will be limited and will likely play these res with those settings...

If anything it was a fair SYSTEM review.....A cpu review would run 640x480 and we know which cpu is the best...The plain fact is some may expect too much and better to let them see it know then bash it later....

Oh I read it all right, while I'm watching the exact same conroe XE do a simulation job twice as fast as a 3.8ghz P4. What does that illustrate? If you're going to review a CPU, the absolute least you can do is try to make the component being tested influence the result. Sounds like basic scientific method.

I couldn't give a hoot about what resolution they *want* to run the game at. I personally don't run at anything except 1600x1200 either, but that's why I have SLI 7800's. If I wanted to benchmark my GPU, would I run a java applet with a little sphere bouncing about, or run BF2 at 1600x1200?

It is not even a fair system review. It is not even a fair gamer system review. If you're playing games at that resolution, would you have that kind of video setup?

Well in some of the test they had too...They said 1600x1200 in elder scrolls was unplayable...

Now you have SLI and run 1600x1200?? I bet you leads versus the AMD are not near the lead they were at 640x480...I think the article speaks the truth that at those resolutions you will not see big diiferences, especially in singkle card soultions...

So what is your problem with that??? i knwo a lot of gamers and I only now a very small few who have SLI systems....Are you going to tell them if they want to take advanatge of the big leads conroe offers they need SLI setuip??? i dont think so....

 

[wilki24]

Ok, I read all of the articles over there now, and besides the gaming one, they seemed pretty fair. Not "garbage" as one guy mentioned above. I do understand the thinking behind the gaming article, and it does provide some useful information: If you're using a single video card, and you have a fast A64 system now, you won't see much of an improvement, if any, by going to a C2D cpu.

However, I think the commentary could've been a bit more about the results, and less about how other reviews suck and using phrases that seem designed to minimalize the differences that do appear in the data.

One thing I am thinking, however, given the performance gains at lower resolutions, and with other applications, is that the C2d will be better able to drive future video cards when they come to market. That's not definite, but I think it would be a logical conclusion to make given the information that we do have so far.

However, reading the discussion thread over on the forums there... man, it's like they all own AMD stock or something. "OMG, INTEL IS DA SUXXOR! C2D doesn't give you nothing more than AM2, and you can always overclock AM2 to beat C2D!!!"

It's like a fleet of Captain Obvious's over there all ready to be worked into an anti-Intel frenzy.

Sheesh. Glad the comments here seem to be a more balanced (usually).

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: dmens

Originally posted by: wilki24

Kinda surprising on heat and power, Actually they are not as impressive as I thought they would be. Power Comsumption

Interesting.

One thing I noticed is that the x6800 goes from 193-209-228, while the FX62 goes from 157-217-248.

Increase from idle to 100%:
15.4% - x6800
36.7% - FX62

It seems like the Conroe's are using a lot more power at idle than they should be.... as if the FX62 went into some kind of low power mode while at idle (throttled clock speed?), while the conroe didn't.

Very odd.

Oh, I wouldn't pay any atetntion at that so-called "power review" either. Measuring system power while giving zero information on the entire setup? Please! Same crappy testing methods as the "CPU review". Their graphs are extremely misleading, being laballed as "CPU power consumption". Do you really think the conroe will draw 196W while idling? Hell no.

Dude..settle down..You dont have to run spin control!!!!

read the other review I linked....It shows the ball lickin fest you only want to hear...

before you attack me I have a conroe preordered...I know it will be faster in encoding and rendering...that is why I bought it. Gaming is tougher to guage as the article explained well in the beginning...

 

[coldpower27]

Originally posted by: dmens
Oh, I wouldn't pay any atetntion at that so-called "power review" either. Measuring system power while giving zero information on the entire setup? Please! Same crappy testing methods as the "CPU review". Their graphs are extremely misleading, being laballed as "CPU power consumption". Do you really think the conroe will draw 196W while idling? Hell no.

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTExMSwxLCxobmV3cw==

They do they use a P965 Chipset with intel and a Nforce 570 for AMD.

 

[coldpower27]

I can completely understand dmens reaction,

Their review should have been labeled as Intel Core 2 Gaming Performance at High End Settings

I would be really interested if they threw a 3800+ X2 and a Pentium D 945 in there jsut to see how they would react too..

 

[dmens]

Originally posted by: Duvie
Now you have SLI and run 1600x1200?? I bet you leads versus the AMD are not near the lead they were at 640x480...I think the article speaks the truth that at those resolutions you will not see big diiferences, especially in singkle card soultions...

Of course with that setup, the CPU won't make a damn difference. That's why I said the review was arrogant, because it continuously stated the most obvious facts and calling other benchmarks "fake", while carrying on and pretending they were reviewing the processor.

Originally posted by: Duvie
So what is your problem with that??? i knwo a lot of gamers and I only now a very small few who have SLI systems....Are you going to tell them if they want to take advanatge of the big leads conroe offers they need SLI setuip??? i dont think so....

I'd tell them if all they cared about were frame rates, you'd be better off spending your money on a fancy video setup insetad of buying a conroe XE. Oh, and if the reviewer was actually honest about reviewing conroe, all he had to do was start dropping cheaper versions of conroe/FX into the test setup and see which one croaks first. You can guess which. LOL.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: dmens

Originally posted by: Duvie
Now you have SLI and run 1600x1200?? I bet you leads versus the AMD are not near the lead they were at 640x480...I think the article speaks the truth that at those resolutions you will not see big diiferences, especially in singkle card soultions...

Of course with that setup, the CPU won't make a damn difference. That's why I said the review was arrogant, because it continuously stated the most obvious facts and calling other benchmarks "fake", while carrying on and pretending they were reviewing the processor.

Originally posted by: Duvie
So what is your problem with that??? i knwo a lot of gamers and I only now a very small few who have SLI systems....Are you going to tell them if they want to take advanatge of the big leads conroe offers they need SLI setuip??? i dont think so....

I'd tell them if all they cared about were frame rates, you'd be better off spending your money on a fancy video setup insetad of buying a conroe XE. Oh, and if the reviewer was actually honest about reviewing conroe, all he had to do was start dropping cheaper versions of conroe/FX into the test setup and see which one croaks first. You can guess which. LOL.

I totally agree with you at the end....An E6600 and eve an E6400 would have still been right there...Doesn't say much for buying the higher speed chips but it does point out the lower end conroes will compete with AMD's flagship...