Legit Reviews - FX-4100 Quad Core 3.6GHz Bulldozer Processor Review

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

If AMD can really put out a competitive product, Intel could just release higher clocks sacrificing some of their power efficiency for absolute performance. Or they'll just use IB-E to crush Piledriver. I just can't see AMD becoming competitive any time soon unless Intel decides to let them.

What worries me is Intel's strategy moving forward. While they'll definitely keep making extremely efficient CPUs, they don't seem to be pushing for much higher multi-threaded performance for their Performance platforms (equivalent of what now is P67, Z68) and CPUs (Core i5 and i7).

Haswell, which will replace Ivy Bridge, will apparently still be stuck with quad-core CPUs, which I think is unacceptable. The 'common' enthusiast has been stuck with quad-cores for $300 and under price points ever since the Core 2 Quad Q6600, released back in 2006. In 2013, seven years later, we'll still be stuck with quad-cores for non-enthusiast platforms and at the same price points. While it sucks for us, it does make financial sense for Intel to do this since they can upsell you to a six or eight-core plus a higher-end platform.

AMD isn't putting pressure on them when it comes to the high-end, so Intel is just laying back (much to our dismay).

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

No kidding the Phenom II X4 and the i3-2105 are evenly matched. Hyper-Threading plays more of a role than i originally thought.

Nice benchmarks. Great review site you have, very in-depth and makes objective comparisons. Great variety of gaming benchmarks, not 5-10 games like other sites. :thumbsup:

 

[IntelUser2000]

Haswell, which will replace Ivy Bridge, will apparently still be stuck with quad-core CPUs, which I think is unacceptable. The 'common' enthusiast has been stuck with quad-cores for $300 and under price points ever since the Core 2 Quad Q6600, released back in 2006.

Q6600 came in Jan 2007 at a price of $851. It's first price cut was at $500, making it comparable to Extreme Edition-minus-1 SKU nowdays, but only after the first price cut. The CPU at 2600K range was the E6600, which is a dual core. The hardware is cheaper than ever even before counting inflation but the complaints go up.

Blame the lack of multi-threaded applications on iPad and consoles. Most games are still in the 3-4 thread range.

 

[Edrick]

AMD isn't putting pressure on them when it comes to the high-end, so Intel is just laying back (much to our dismay).

LOL. If Intel was just laying back as you put it, AMD would not be so far behind. People are just spoiled with Intel's constant (10-20&#37 improvements over the past 4-5 years.

 

[jones377]

I for one am glad that Intel is more focused on improving performance per core than simply adding more cores outright. A 4c Haswell will absolutely crush the Q6600 in apps (like x264) that take advantage of the newest features and instruction extensions.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Nice benchmarks. Great review site you have, very in-depth and makes objective comparisons. Great variety of gaming benchmarks, not 5-10 games like other sites. :thumbsup:

Very nice chart. I did notice one thing though. Hyperthreading is very strange in that in maybe 3 or 4 games, it almost doubles performance, while in the rest it does almost nothing. My feeling is that most of the games are using only 2 cores effectively, so the i3 is very competitive. Cant explain why some games almost double with HT though. Even if they used 4 cores, I wouldnt expect HT to double the framerate. In most productivity aps it only increases performance about 20 or 30 percent I believe.

And I agree with you about the lack of hex core Intel processors coming up. I was very impressed with SB and the pricing. However, I would have thought that at least by Haswell they would have a mainstream hex core chip out. I gave Intel a lot of credit for not price gouging with SB, but it does seem they are trying to stick it to you if you want a six core processor. You would think that especially with the die shrink, they could make a six core chip in the 300 to 350 dollar range.

If they can get their act together and improve Bulldozer, or even die shrink Thuban and increase clocks and IPC some, I could see a possibility for a good niche product for AMD here. They might even take back the performance/$ lead in heavily threaded performance.

 

[frozentundra123456]

I for one am glad that Intel is more focused on improving performance per core than simply adding more cores outright. A 4c Haswell will absolutely crush the Q6600 in apps (like x264) that take advantage of the newest features and instruction extensions.

You are right, in that I dont like AMDs strategy of just moar cores without increasing the performance per core.

A quad core Haswell will be a very good chip, no doubt. However, with the die shrink coming I would think it would be easy to just add two more cores, maybe even omit the IGP, and sell for less than 400.00. Think how awsome that chip would be. And I think with the die shrink and more efficient transistors, they could also keep the power usage in check as well. I dont see improving single core performance and adding more cores as mutually exclusive.

Maybe intel is just more concerned about reducing power and getting into the tablet/smartphone arena, and wants to maximize profits for the extreme high performance market.

 

[Edrick]

A quad core Haswell will be a very good chip, no doubt. However, with the die shrink coming I would think it would be easy to just add two more cores, maybe even omit the IGP, and sell for less than 400.00

They will do that, and it will be called Haswell-E.

 

[exar333]

That's the great thing about a high-IPC and power-efficient arch like Intel has now. They can keep core speed high, have enough cores (2-4 + HT) and have all your existing applications fly. If more cores are needed, they can dial-down the clocks a little and add more cores. Intel does this on the Xeon all the time, 6-8C @ 2.4Ghz (for example) with good thermals. You still get a high IPC product that can turbo to high clocks when <max cores are in use, and is very good in multi-threaded areas.

If 4 cores is not enough, Intel could pretty easily create SKUs that are 6C with less aggressive clocks.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Q6600 came in Jan 2007 at a price of $851. It's first price cut was at $500, making it comparable to Extreme Edition-minus-1 SKU nowdays, but only after the first price cut. The CPU at 2600K range was the E6600, which is a dual core. The hardware is cheaper than ever even before counting inflation but the complaints go up.

Blame the lack of multi-threaded applications on iPad and consoles. Most games are still in the 3-4 thread range.

The Q6600 had been available for $266 ever since mid-2007. So now instead of being seven years being stuck with quad-cores it'd be six years (when Haswell comes out). Big whoop.

The complains will obviously go up. Again, by 2013 we'll have been stuck with quad-core CPUs from Intel for non-Enthusiast platforms for six whole years. That's an eternity in the technology world.

LOL. If Intel was just laying back as you put it, AMD would not be so far behind. People are just spoiled with Intel's constant (10-20&#37 improvements over the past 4-5 years.

That's because AMD's CPU engineers have been dumb asses as of lately. The Phenom II X3, X4 and X6 were fine, but they came too late. The current FX line is just a piece of crap that shouldn't have been released until they knew it could compete. In the meantime, they could've released a Phenom II X8 with Llano's 3-4% IPC improvements for K10.5 on the 32nm process and it would've had lower power consumption, lower manufacturing costs (a smaller die based on a previous architecture), higher clock speeds (Phenom II X4 980 can reach 4.3GHz pretty comfortably), and would've been significantly faster than the crap they put out with the FX-8100 series.

Just doing some quick comparisons on performance alone, at the same clock speeds a Phenom II X8 would've been ~15% faster in single-threaded and ~25-30% faster in multi-threaded (no performance loss due to CMT) than the FX-8100. At least then it would've had a decent advantage over the i5-2500K in multi-threaded and AMD would be able to price it at $220 and actually had some people that weren't AMD fanboys buy it.

 

[frozentundra123456]

They will do that, and it will be called Haswell-E.

Probably, but the question will be the price and platform. SB-E if I am correct, is clocked high and somewhat pricy and requires an expensive motherboard and memory. Haswell-E I would assume would follow the same pattern.

I would prefer to see a more mainstream hex core chip, although as the last few posters metioned Intel could probably easily make one at lower clocks for a mainstream platform if there is sufficient demand. The problem I see is that it is a kind of chicken vs egg situation.

If intel, which has so much of the high end market doesnt push more cores, will software then not be written to utilize more cores, which will slow down six core chips, etc, etc.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Wait, wait. When people talk about how apps aren't that threaded and then Intel goes and focuses hardcore on single threaded performance, we complain that Intel's not doing moar cores? Hmm...

 

[nyker96]

somehow I'm not that excited about this one. ;[

one quote from the article sum it up:

he performance of the FX-4100 wasn't awful, but we didn't expect to see the AMD A6-3650 running at 2.6GHz to beat the AMD FX-4100 running at 3.6GHz in benchmarks like POV-Ray and Cinebench!

 

[skipsneeky2]

Wait, wait. When people talk about how apps aren't that threaded and then Intel goes and focuses hardcore on single threaded performance, we complain that Intel's not doing moar cores? Hmm...

I know few games can rape a quad quad and none benefit from more then 4 cores but we need more god damn cores cause we need them like a hole in the head.

No need to go batsh*t crazy for more cores just yet

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Wait, wait. When people talk about how apps aren't that threaded and then Intel goes and focuses hardcore on single threaded performance, we complain that Intel's not doing moar cores? Hmm...

Many apps are very multi-threaded threaded, many aren't. That doesn't mean we always want to be stuck with quad-cores.

How about we move on and we get six-cores with higher IPC than SB/IB for under $400 when Haswell comes out? I guess Intel doesn't agree.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Speaking of this, X79/LGA 2011 will be a socket for SB-E and IB-E only, meaning HW-E would require a new socket, right? We may get eight-core CPUs with IB-E, so at least that looks promising.

 

[IntelUser2000]

How about we move on and we get six-cores with higher IPC than SB/IB for under $400 when Haswell comes out? I guess Intel doesn't agree.

Frequency scaling halted on the Intel side with Pentium 4 when they hit the acceptable ceiling for power usage. Sure, there are few that would want higher power for performance. But it doesn't work. If there were 200W SKUs just to cater for the enthusiasts, others would want it too. And it makes cooling a headache for the rest. 200W SKUs exist, which is called overclocking.

Move to a performance/W oriented architecture with stellar execution allowed TDP to come back down, for one generation. Core 2 Duo was at 65W, which is why they were able to double the cores. Assuming non core components take 10W, Core 2 Duo had 55W for cores while Core 2 Quad had 94W, which allows doubling cores at only 10% penalty to clocks. Which is actually what happened.

Besides, you are giving your heart out on a single presentation on a product that won't arrive in market for another 18 months. 22nm may yet afford 6 cores to arrive on LGA115x platform. But if you want your really parallel program to benefit, you might as well get Knights Corner also coming in 2013 and stick it in your PCI Express slot instead.

 

[Ajay]

Speaking of this, X79/LGA 2011 will be a socket for SB-E and IB-E only, meaning HW-E would require a new socket, right? We may get eight-core CPUs with IB-E, so at least that looks promising.

IIRC, Intel originally wanted 8 cores for SB-E, but the TDP was going to be too high and overclocking would have been more limited. If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on IB-E being 8 cores. Should be a folding beast :thumbsup:

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Frequency scaling halted on the Intel side with Pentium 4 when they hit the acceptable ceiling for power usage. Sure, there are few that would want higher power for performance. But it doesn't work. If there were 200W SKUs just to cater for the enthusiasts, others would want it too. And it makes cooling a headache for the rest. 200W SKUs exist, which is called overclocking.

Move to a performance/W oriented architecture with stellar execution allowed TDP to come back down, for one generation. Core 2 Duo was at 65W, which is why they were able to double the cores. Assuming non core components take 10W, Core 2 Duo had 55W for cores while Core 2 Quad had 94W, which allows doubling cores at only 10&#37; penalty to clocks. Which is actually what happened.

Besides, you are giving your heart out on a single presentation on a product that won't arrive in market for another 18 months. 22nm may yet afford 6 cores to arrive on LGA115x platform. But if you want your really parallel program to benefit, you might as well get Knights Corner also coming in 2013 and stick it in your PCI Express slot instead.

By now it's too late. These product design decisions are made more than two years in advance, so we won't get six-cores with Haswell.

X79 looks to have lost some SATA connectivity, and while it can support PCIe 3.0 SB-E CPUs themselves won't. You still get twice the lanes of PCIe 2.0, so it doesn't matter that much. If Ivy Bridge-E finally brings eight-core CPUs to the consumer market then that means we may see lower six-core prices.

As of now, future-proofing in Intel's non-Enthusiast platform looks VERY weak. For example, if you get an i5-2500K now, your upgrade options for Ivy Bridge are either a quad-core with no HT or a quad-core with HT. If you go for the QC/no HT you're only getting a ~10% increase (~5% from higher IPC, 5% from higher overclock-ability) in performance. If you go for the QC with HT, you'll be getting a ~10% boost in single-threaded, and a ~30% boost in multi-threaded. That CPU would cost similar to a 2600K, however. Above that, no options. That wouldn't change with Haswell, either: still quad-cores as max only.

As far as PCIe 3.0 goes, if you use 2.0 x16 for the new Enthusiast GPUs (from AMD that means HD 7900 series) then it won't matter. It matters more for P67 and Z68 because the bandwidth available would be close or equal to that of X79, even if you still get half the lanes.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

IIRC, Intel originally wanted 8 cores for SB-E, but the TDP was going to be too high and overclocking would have been more limited. If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on IB-E being 8 cores. Should be a folding beast :thumbsup:

Yeah, the more I think about it the more it makes sense that IB-E will finally bring an eight-core. After all, it'd be on a much smaller 22nm process plus it'd have the new 3D transistors. I guess that would enable Intel to do what it did with the i7-980X and i7-970: more cores, but no going over 130W TDP and not losing clock speeds in comparison. Ivy Bridge is a big deal when it comes to lowering power consumption.

Obviously, this would mean an EE model that would replace the six-core at $1000. What remains to be seen if they'll do like the 970 and release a model clocked ~100MHz lower and with a $100 lower price and then around six months to one year later reduce it to $~600. They could also release two eight-core models, one $100 lower initially like I mentioned earlier. In any case, it means the model would supplant the current six-core EE and could mean as a result lower priced six-cores.

 

[lol123]

Besides, you are giving your heart out on a single presentation on a product that won't arrive in market for another 18 months. 22nm may yet afford 6 cores to arrive on LGA115x platform. But if you want your really parallel program to benefit, you might as well get Knights Corner also coming in 2013 and stick it in your PCI Express slot instead.

Knights Corner is coming in 2012.

 

[Gikaseixas]

Biased and wrong. The 2105 is just a 2100 with HD 3000 graphics. The FX-4100 does not even come with an IGP, so right off the bat your comparison is biased. You can also get the i3-2120 for $123, making this a CPU both faster AND cheaper than the i3-2105. Price difference would be under $15 between the FX-4100 and the i3-2120.

Also, pretty much everything they used was multi-threaded, which makes it look better than what it is. Even then, it was barely faster while consuming lots more power and actually being slower than a Phenom II X4 and comparable only to an Athlon II X4. What's the incentive to buy this when the Phenom II X4 955 has comparable performance/watt, is faster, and only costs $10 more? For that matter, why not the i3-2120 instead? If we look at the overall picture the Phenom II X4 and Core i3s are pretty evenly matched, with the i3 having a big advantage in power consumption and heat produced.

I don't see any bias on my post, everything i said is backed up by the review so don't come here with that nonsense.

So we can't compare an i3 to FX4100 because one of them comes with a IGP eh? So why do people compare i5 2500K and FX8150? As far as i know, one of them also comes with IGP. As for the price, i got it from Newegg, didn't have to search the entire net to prove anything, Newegg is a very good source for prices.

Regardless if the review was entirely based on multi-threaded scenarios it was just one site's POV and one that we're addressing, i didn't choose the tests, they did.

Last, show where in my post i said anything remotely close to FX4100 BETTER THAN i3 2120 in power consumption????? I said it was worse so why the lecture on power consumption??? If there's any bias it's clearly on your post, not mine. All the things i mentined still stand.

 

[Gikaseixas]

Funny thing for AMD is this.....Bulldozer is making Phenom II Quads and Hex-Cores much more attractive and in higher demand than ever before.

I myself am now eyeing a new 1090T to replace my Athlon II cpu.

Funny how Bulldozer is increasing sales of older chips which i'm quite sure is the opposite of what AMD actually wanted. LOL!

spot on, i'm about to get a X6 to replace my 940BE

 

[IntelUser2000]

Knights Corner is coming in 2012.

Knights Corner is early 2013. They are gonna get it in late 2012 to select HPC customers but that's about it.

By now it's too late. These product design decisions are made more than two years in advance, so we won't get six-cores with Haswell.

No it isn't. It's a SINGLE slide. There were even plans for 6 core on Sandy Bridge Socket 1155. The 6 core part might exist in labs, whether it reaches us is a totally different story. That's one part slides won't show.

 

[ed29a]

Last, show where in my post i said anything remotely close to FX4100 BETTER THAN i3 2120 in power consumption????? I said it was worse so why the lecture on power consumption??? If there's any bias it's clearly on your post, not mine. All the things i mentined still stand.

Don't bother. LOL_Wut_Axel is always putting words into people's mouths.