New Phenom II X3 AM3 at Frys $124 (1 Ghz+ Overclock!!!)

[fusion238]

Was reported that AMD AM3 (compatible with AM2+ DDR2 and AM3 DDR3 mbs) are
selling at Frys in California for $124. Some reviews are reported nice overclocks
from factory voltage settings.

Check out http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1392286

 

[soccerballtux]

Can't wait to see the benchies. I bet in games that take advantage of multi-core (Farcry2 etc) these provide some nice competition to even an OC'd e8400. Anybody have reviews?

 

[AstroManLuca]

Wow, sounds nice. Might have to get one of those when I do my system upgrade sometime this year.

 

[perdomot]

Nothing at the Frys website yet.

 

[fusion238]

Originally posted by: soccerballtux
Can't wait to see the benchies. I bet in games that take advantage of multi-core (Farcry2 etc) these provide some nice competition to even an OC'd e8400. Anybody have reviews?

Someone got a preview from a Chinese website at xtremesystems.org -

http://www.xtremesystems.org/f...howthread.php?t=216788

They indicate AM3 X3 at 3.6 Ghz gets 3DMark06 CPU score of 4219 (by
comparison $275 i7 920 gets around 4800) and for Cinebench R10 32bit
AM3 X3 at 3.6Ghz hits 8396.

With good overclock, Phenom II X3 would be very competitive with Intel
i7 costing over twice as much! (for system builders lowcost DDR2 and
AM2+ mbs would make it twice as nice in terms of performance value.)

 

[speedfreak]

Originally posted by: fusion238

Originally posted by: soccerballtux
Can't wait to see the benchies. I bet in games that take advantage of multi-core (Farcry2 etc) these provide some nice competition to even an OC'd e8400. Anybody have reviews?

Someone got a preview from a Chinese website at xtremesystems.org -

http://www.xtremesystems.org/f...howthread.php?t=216788

They indicate AM3 X3 at 3.6 Ghz gets 3DMark06 CPU score of 4219 (by
comparison $275 i7 920 gets around 4800) and for Cinebench R10 32bit
AM3 X3 at 3.6Ghz hits 8396.

With good overclock, Phenom II X3 would be very competitive with Intel
i7 costing over twice as much! (for system builders lowcost DDR2 and
AM2+ mbs would make it twice as nice in terms of performance value.)

this is good news to those who have tight budget and yet wants to gain performance.

 

[SunnyD]

Originally posted by: fusion238

Originally posted by: soccerballtux
Can't wait to see the benchies. I bet in games that take advantage of multi-core (Farcry2 etc) these provide some nice competition to even an OC'd e8400. Anybody have reviews?

Someone got a preview from a Chinese website at xtremesystems.org -

http://www.xtremesystems.org/f...howthread.php?t=216788

They indicate AM3 X3 at 3.6 Ghz gets 3DMark06 CPU score of 4219 (by
comparison $275 i7 920 gets around 4800) and for Cinebench R10 32bit
AM3 X3 at 3.6Ghz hits 8396.

With good overclock, Phenom II X3 would be very competitive with Intel
i7 costing over twice as much! (for system builders lowcost DDR2 and
AM2+ mbs would make it twice as nice in terms of performance value.)

The only problem here is that we're assuming all Phenom II's overclock easily to 3.6GHz. And then on top of that we're talking about a PII with 3 cores @ 3.6GHz versus an i7 920 with 4 cores + 4 threads @ 2.66GHz. Kindof apples->oranges comparison don't you think?

 

[Jessica69]

Originally posted by: SunnyD


The only problem here is that we're assuming all Phenom II's overclock easily to 3.6GHz. And then on top of that we're talking about a PII with 3 cores @ 3.6GHz versus an i7 920 with 4 cores + 4 threads @ 2.66GHz. Kindof apples->oranges comparison don't you think?

Why not compare the two? Top of AMD's cpu line and top of Intel's line. Cannot blame Intel for having a quad core and AMD can only, presently, put out a tri-core.

And in the "test" linked above, I see the "tester" went out of his/her way to "help" the AMD chip by using some quite fast DDR2 RAM and using low-end, slowest DDR3 RAM with the i7, and then only running the Intel board in dual channel mode........imagine the protests that the AMD crowd would generate if the AMD cpu was run with the slowest DDR2 RAM available and then only in single channel mode.

Testing is only fair if you test each to its maximum potential instead of arbitrarily crippling one setup to try to "equalize" the testing.....smacks of bias in the testing.....honestly, no one who is going to buy an i7 cpu is going to run just 2 x 1GB sticks of RAM, the cost for a 3 x 1GB tri-channel setup of RAM is so minor, esp. after considering the cost of the motherboard.

Hope the AMD cpu ends up doing well, but in the end, I think it'll still be stuck competing with and being competitive with the C2Q processors from Intel and still lagging behind Intel's latest i7.

 

[richierich1212]

I have to see if the local Frys (Fremont, CA) has the new PII chips in stock

 

[Extelleron]

Originally posted by: Jessica69

Originally posted by: SunnyD


The only problem here is that we're assuming all Phenom II's overclock easily to 3.6GHz. And then on top of that we're talking about a PII with 3 cores @ 3.6GHz versus an i7 920 with 4 cores + 4 threads @ 2.66GHz. Kindof apples->oranges comparison don't you think?

Why not compare the two? Top of AMD's cpu line and top of Intel's line. Cannot blame Intel for having a quad core and AMD can only, presently, put out a tri-core.

And in the "test" linked above, I see the "tester" went out of his/her way to "help" the AMD chip by using some quite fast DDR2 RAM and using low-end, slowest DDR3 RAM with the i7, and then only running the Intel board in dual channel mode........imagine the protests that the AMD crowd would generate if the AMD cpu was run with the slowest DDR2 RAM available and then only in single channel mode.

Testing is only fair if you test each to its maximum potential instead of arbitrarily crippling one setup to try to "equalize" the testing.....smacks of bias in the testing.....honestly, no one who is going to buy an i7 cpu is going to run just 2 x 1GB sticks of RAM, the cost for a 3 x 1GB tri-channel setup of RAM is so minor, esp. after considering the cost of the motherboard.

Hope the AMD cpu ends up doing well, but in the end, I think it'll still be stuck competing with and being competitive with the C2Q processors from Intel and still lagging behind Intel's latest i7.

AMD has had quad core CPUs out since November 2007..... the Phenom II X4 940 & 920 have been out for a month now.

The Phenom II X3s should be very interesting for those looking for a cheap setup. The X3 710 / 720 are pretty much priced in line with the E7300 & E7400 processors, and should have no trouble competing with those CPUs at stock and even overclocked. If you run multithreaded software you aren't going to be able to beat a Phenom II X3 with an Intel CPU at the same price point.

All in all I think AMD's lineup is shaping up to be (almost) bullet-proof under $200, there's really nothing Intel has in that price category that can shape up to what AMD is going to be releasing. AMD is pricing Phenom II so that the high end quads are priced against the low end of Intel's quads (where they are competitive), the Phenom II X3 CPUs are priced against the E7xxx CPUs (where they will likely demolish the Intel competition), and we haven't even seen the pricing on Athlon X4 / X3 CPUs (with no L3).

Add in the 45nm Athlon X2 CPUs that should be coming out later this year and AMD owns <$200 market IMO at least. Above $200, it is complete Intel domination.... but below that, AMD has a very solid platform.

 

[nyker96]

amd keep this up might actually make decent profit this year.

 

[Accord99]

Originally posted by: Extelleron
All in all I think AMD's lineup is shaping up to be (almost) bullet-proof under $200, there's really nothing Intel has in that price category that can shape up to what AMD is going to be releasing. AMD is pricing Phenom II so that the high end quads are priced against the low end of Intel's quads (where they are competitive), the Phenom II X3 CPUs are priced against the E7xxx CPUs (where they will likely demolish the Intel competition), and we haven't even seen the pricing on Athlon X4 / X3 CPUs (with no L3).

At the moment, but it wouldn't be very difficult for Intel to respond; such as the rumored Q7500.

Add in the 45nm Athlon X2 CPUs that should be coming out later this year and AMD owns <$200 market IMO at least. Above $200, it is complete Intel domination.... but below that, AMD has a very solid platform.

History has shown that AMD has lost money when it can only compete in the sub $200 market.

 

[Extelleron]

Originally posted by: Accord99

Originally posted by: Extelleron
All in all I think AMD's lineup is shaping up to be (almost) bullet-proof under $200, there's really nothing Intel has in that price category that can shape up to what AMD is going to be releasing. AMD is pricing Phenom II so that the high end quads are priced against the low end of Intel's quads (where they are competitive), the Phenom II X3 CPUs are priced against the E7xxx CPUs (where they will likely demolish the Intel competition), and we haven't even seen the pricing on Athlon X4 / X3 CPUs (with no L3).

At the moment, but it wouldn't be very difficult for Intel to respond; such as the rumored Q7500.

Add in the 45nm Athlon X2 CPUs that should be coming out later this year and AMD owns <$200 market IMO at least. Above $200, it is complete Intel domination.... but below that, AMD has a very solid platform.

History has shown that AMD has lost money when it can only compete in the sub $200 market.

A Q7500 with 2MB L2 (1MB per core) L2 cache is not going to compete with Phenom II per clock. The Yorkfield CPUs with 6MB->12MB L2 cache are faster (sometimes significantly) than Phenom II, but knock that down to 2MB and the performance goes down substantially. I'd guess that a Phenom X4 910 (2.6GHz), which will probably sell for $150-160, will beat a Q7500 @ 2.6GHz.

As for making money.... yes that is going to be an issue. AMD is going to almost certainly see huge losses in 2009 with the way the economy is and the low ASPs of their products. AMD's margins are not going to be pretty, but at least they are going to be competitive (although more because of low pricing than performance competitiveness).

At least Deneb is cheaper to produce than Agena (or it it will be as yields mature). The real ace in AMD's lineup may be Propus; the die size is rumored to be ~140mm^2 in size and that's for a quad core CPU. The performance may not be great but the production cost will be on the level of the Brisbane CPUs....

 

[mrSHEiK124]

Come on AMD, give me a reason to look your direction for my typical ~$300 CPU purchases

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: mrSHEiK124
Come on AMD, give me a reason to look your direction for my typical ~$300 CPU purchases

Just curious, what price do you typically pay for motherboards?

 

[exar333]

Originally posted by: fusion238

Originally posted by: soccerballtux
Can't wait to see the benchies. I bet in games that take advantage of multi-core (Farcry2 etc) these provide some nice competition to even an OC'd e8400. Anybody have reviews?

Someone got a preview from a Chinese website at xtremesystems.org -

http://www.xtremesystems.org/f...howthread.php?t=216788

They indicate AM3 X3 at 3.6 Ghz gets 3DMark06 CPU score of 4219 (by
comparison $275 i7 920 gets around 4800) and for Cinebench R10 32bit
AM3 X3 at 3.6Ghz hits 8396.

With good overclock, Phenom II X3 would be very competitive with Intel
i7 costing over twice as much! (for system builders lowcost DDR2 and
AM2+ mbs would make it twice as nice in terms of performance value.)

You are comparing a PhII X3 @ 3.6 Ghz with a STOCK i7 at 2.66....it would be a better comparison to test this against a i7 also at 3.6....it would be no contest.

Heck of a value chop IMHO, though.

 

[Accord99]

Originally posted by: Extelleron
A Q7500 with 2MB L2 (1MB per core) L2 cache is not going to compete with Phenom II per clock. The Yorkfield CPUs with 6MB->12MB L2 cache are faster (sometimes significantly) than Phenom II, but knock that down to 2MB and the performance goes down substantially. I'd guess that a Phenom X4 910 (2.6GHz), which will probably sell for $150-160, will beat a Q7500 @ 2.6GHz.

Sorry, I should have been more clear. I was thinking that Intel would position the Q7500 as the counter to AMD's tri-cores.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Jessica69
Testing is only fair if you test each to its maximum potential instead of arbitrarily crippling one setup to try to "equalize" the testing.....smacks of bias in the testing.....honestly, no one who is going to buy an i7 cpu is going to run just 2 x 1GB sticks of RAM, the cost for a 3 x 1GB tri-channel setup of RAM is so minor, esp. after considering the cost of the motherboard.

Wouldn't it be interesting to test both ways?

Actually, I think a great test would be with the cost of the platforms (mobo/RAM/CPU) equalized. Really, so we're talking about two CPUs costing $XXX but they don't operate alone. Of course I don't think there would be much comparison with the Core i7 because... unless you go insane on RAM and motherboard, you can't even make a Phenom II platform as expensive as a Core i7 setup.

 

[konakona]

Originally posted by: Zap

Originally posted by: Jessica69
Testing is only fair if you test each to its maximum potential instead of arbitrarily crippling one setup to try to "equalize" the testing.....smacks of bias in the testing.....honestly, no one who is going to buy an i7 cpu is going to run just 2 x 1GB sticks of RAM, the cost for a 3 x 1GB tri-channel setup of RAM is so minor, esp. after considering the cost of the motherboard.

Wouldn't it be interesting to test both ways?

Actually, I think a great test would be with the cost of the platforms (mobo/RAM/CPU) equalized. Really, so we're talking about two CPUs costing $XXX but they don't operate alone. Of course I don't think there would be much comparison with the Core i7 because... unless you go insane on RAM and motherboard, you can't even make a Phenom II platform as expensive as a Core i7 setup.

well said. the point of the quoted review was not to show which is the fastest when money is no object; rather it was to show which is 'good enough' for the most realistic scenario. So far I don't see anything that would make me wanna get i7 over PII other than being better prepared for future games, the article most certainly got me convinced.