Rumour: Bulldozer 50% Faster than Core i7 and Phenom II.

[taltamir]

points 1 & 2: fair enough

3. All amd needs is to make some small iterative improvements and they'll have a winner. say +10% clock/clock and +20% clocks, both of which seem to be conservative estimations. A stock 8 core BD @ 4.0 would run circles around a 2600k. Intel will certainly have a response, but as long as amd executes then we should at least have an interesting summer.

I was thinking "per clock per core"... but if they are talking about "overall virtualization performance" then they could just add 50% more cores at the same clock and performance levels and call it a day.

 

[GaiaHunter]

Will the OS be module-aware at all? I know you've said it a thousand times no, but I was under the impression (I could be wrong) Windows can distinguish between physical cores and HT 'cores'.

I don't know if windows can distinguish between physical and logic cores or not, but it is irrelevant since BD only has physical cores.

 

[taltamir]

windows can distinguish between physical cores and HT cores... I don't know what a "module" is.
The OS is not the only thing. I have several programs also capable of doing so. Such as CPUz, OCCCPT and CoreTemp.

 

[JFAMD]

Will the OS be module-aware at all? I know you've said it a thousand times no, but I was under the impression (I could be wrong) Windows can distinguish between physical cores and HT 'cores'.

Or should we really just drop this and stop caring, since anything using 4 threads will probably scale up to 8 anyway, and with Turbo CORE the true difference will be negligible anyway (or even preferable to pack threads into modules?)


Of course, this begs the question, if it really IS preferable to pack threads on the smallest number of modules possible, will the OS be able to do that?

The OS doesn't know about modules, it only sees cores. But all cores are physical cores, so it won't matter.

 

[out.of.order]

The OS doesn't know about modules, it only sees cores. But all cores are physical cores, so it won't matter.

who decide if a 4-threads task can run faster with 2 full-active modules or 4 half-active modules?

 

[Arkadrel]

who decide if a 4-threads task can run faster with 2 full-active modules or 4 half-active modules?

with 2 moduals active (and 2 turned off) for 4 threads, you save power.

with 4 moduals active (but only 1 core on each 4 active) for 4 threads, you get more performance (because these 4 cores, have double resources)


who decides? whoever programs the software I guess... and Im guessing there gonna go with the performance route for client, and maybe the energy saveing route for the server one.

 

[maddie]

who decide if a 4-threads task can run faster with 2 full-active modules or 4 half-active modules?

2 full-active modules:

Probably clocked faster and possibly faster overall in spite of slower per thread output.

 

[bryanW1995]

unless you have turbo turned on, in which case you get a higher turbo boost from only using 2 modules instead of 4 theoretically. It is going to be interesting to see how the software companies (and amd) handle this.

 

[JFAMD]

The answer is, as always, that depends. So much is workload dependent on so many different fronts.

People who make statements like "x will always give you better results" are typically wrong for a good portion of the time.

People would be better off checking actual performance on their applications first.

 

[Dice144]

If it is as fast or close to SB but uses less power sign me up!

 

[Sinanju]

true or not if AMD's bulldozer cpu is ALL AROUND 50% faster. There needs to be some well made fully loaded mobo's to go with these cpus.

I'm on the intel platform for two reasons: 1. performance is pretty much unmatched in my book and 2. the mobo's available for the i5-i7 platform are superior, IMHO, in every way compared to mobos made AMD cpus.

I have yet to find a mobo for AMD's that have everything and more than what is available for the intel cpus. Nor do they seem to work as fluidly together as intel's

but thats just me.

 

[Martimus]

true or not if AMD's bulldozer cpu is ALL AROUND 50% faster. There needs to be some well made fully loaded mobo's to go with these cpus.

I'm on the intel platform for two reasons: 1. performance is pretty much unmatched in my book and 2. the mobo's available for the i5-i7 platform are superior, IMHO, in every way compared to mobos made AMD cpus.

I have yet to find a mobo for AMD's that have everything and more than what is available for the intel cpus. Nor do they seem to work as fluidly together as intel's

but thats just me.

The funny thing is that I feel exactly the opposite. The biggest thing holding me back from buying a 2600K right now is that the MB's available for it are worse in just about every way to cheaper MB's for AMD processors. I mean you get so much more in a 890FX chipset than you do with a P67, and yet the MB is $50 cheaper to boot. That is the biggest craw in my side about making this purchase. I am hoping that Z68 helps this discrepency.

 

[Bearach]

true or not if AMD's bulldozer cpu is ALL AROUND 50% faster. There needs to be some well made fully loaded mobo's to go with these cpus.

I'm on the intel platform for two reasons: 1. performance is pretty much unmatched in my book and 2. the mobo's available for the i5-i7 platform are superior, IMHO, in every way compared to mobos made AMD cpus.

I have yet to find a mobo for AMD's that have everything and more than what is available for the intel cpus. Nor do they seem to work as fluidly together as intel's

but thats just me.

Point 1 I agree, but point 2? No, I don't. AMD's motherboards tend to be cheaper for the features. There isn't much difference of feature sets, if any at all. I believe that mostly it's Dual-GPU features that are different. For example, no SLi on AMD chipsets, but both on Intel.

If you were talking about the days of the VIA chipsets with AMD systems, I would agree, they were fiddly, but I've not had any troubles with nVIDIA or AMD chipset based boards for the AMD platform. None at all, so don't get the fluidly comment either.

But as you put it, that's just me. I wouldn't use point 2 to buy a Intel system. Point 1, and price is only reason to choose either.

 

[Ajay]

Hmm, no one adds an NF200 chip to AMD boards so they can run SLI? That's a drag. I can go either way WRT to using Intel or AMD processors (I'm building a 2 GPU folding box using an and old AMD San Diego Althon 64 right now), but I'm partial to nVidia GPUs.

 

[masteryoda34]

who decides? whoever programs the software I guess... and Im guessing there gonna go with the performance route for client, and maybe the energy saveing route for the server one.

This would need to be done at the Operating System level. Common programming languages don't give any control to the programmer on which physical cores a thread executes.

 

[Ajay]

This would need to be done at the Operating System level. Common programming languages don't give any control to the programmer on which physical cores a thread executes.

Well, this is old, but I'm sure there are ways to do this in the 64bit API as well:
Setting Affinities in Win32

 

[Stoneburner]

Point 1 I agree, but point 2? No, I don't. AMD's motherboards tend to be cheaper for the features. There isn't much difference of feature sets, if any at all. I believe that mostly it's Dual-GPU features that are different. For example, no SLi on AMD chipsets, but both on Intel.

If you were talking about the days of the VIA chipsets with AMD systems, I would agree, they were fiddly, but I've not had any troubles with nVIDIA or AMD chipset based boards for the AMD platform. None at all, so don't get the fluidly comment either.

But as you put it, that's just me. I wouldn't use point 2 to buy a Intel system. Point 1, and price is only reason to choose either.

This is truth. I was looking into upgrading my current pII x4 to a sandy bridge. Just the motherboard and processor are together $400 plus. With AMD i can typically get a very good board and processor for $300.

 

[bryanW1995]

The funny thing is that I feel exactly the opposite. The biggest thing holding me back from buying a 2600K right now is that the MB's available for it are worse in just about every way to cheaper MB's for AMD processors. I mean you get so much more in a 890FX chipset than you do with a P67, and yet the MB is $50 cheaper to boot. That is the biggest craw in my side about making this purchase. I am hoping that Z68 helps this discrepency.

I agree 100%. my 890fx mobo was only $150 new and actually has more features than my $200+ 1366 original mobo (that has been retired/replaced b/c it failed just outside the warranty period btw). I would expect that am3+ mobos will be closer to price parity with p67/x68, however.

 

[bryanW1995]

Hmm, no one adds an NF200 chip to AMD boards so they can run SLI? That's a drag. I can go either way WRT to using Intel or AMD processors (I'm building a 2 GPU folding box using an and old AMD San Diego Althon 64 right now), but I'm partial to nVidia GPUs.

you don't need to run the gpus in sli to run DC programs with them. I'm running seti on a gtx 260 and a 9600 gso on an ip35 pro right now in fact, check the DC forums or pm me for details.

edit: besides, you can hack an amd mobo to run sli without the nf200 chipset right now anyway.

 

[Ajay]

you don't need to run the gpus in sli to run DC programs with them. I'm running seti on a gtx 260 and a 9600 gso on an ip35 pro right now in fact, check the DC forums or pm me for details.

Thank you, but I do know this. I meant for games.

edit: besides, you can hack an amd mobo to run sli without the nf200 chipset right now anyway.

Thank you again, I didn't know this! Maybe my next cpu upgrade will be a BD based cpu - as I've heard they out fold Intel - though since I have a good X58 mobo right now, I'm may go for a Gulftown, if they drop in price. Then again, if the a BD cpu & mobo cost less then Gulftown - I may switch anyway (so long as I can run SLI, as I hope to add another GTX 460 this summer).

 

[AtenRa]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...20IV%20Formula

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...P8P67%20DELUXE

Except the PCI-e lanes i dont see any difference in features between the two M/Bs.

Granted the cheaper AM3 models do have more or better features than P55 boards but the P67 boards dont lack anything except the PCI-e lanes

 

[996GT2]

This is truth. I was looking into upgrading my current pII x4 to a sandy bridge. Just the motherboard and processor are together $400 plus. With AMD i can typically get a very good board and processor for $300.

I believe Microcenter is still running their Sandy Bridge combo deals. I know that my 2500K and Gigabyte P67A-UD3 only cost about $290 combined on launch day.

At $290, it's really a no-brainer in favor of Sandy Bridge.

 

[bryanW1995]

Thank you, but I do know this. I meant for games.



Thank you again, I didn't know this! Maybe my next cpu upgrade will be a BD based cpu - as I've heard they out fold Intel - though since I have a good X58 mobo right now, I'm may go for a Gulftown, if they drop in price. Then again, if the a BD cpu & mobo cost less then Gulftown - I may switch anyway (so long as I can run SLI, as I hope to add another GTX 460 this summer).

markfw900 would be the guy to ask about folding ppd comparisons of nehalem, SB, and x6. I can say that in seti my 1055t @ 3.35 gets more ppd than my i7 @ 4.0, however. Extrapolating that out, I'd imagine that BD will be about 50% greater than x6 in ppd, so it should comfortably beat westmere at least.


edit: @996gt2, MC usually has great deals on both intel and amd cpus/mobos/systems, so you need to compare their best deals on both rather than, say, newegg's price for amd and MC's price for intel.

 

[bryanW1995]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...20IV%20Formula

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...P8P67%20DELUXE

Except the PCI-e lanes i dont see any difference in features between the two M/Bs.

Granted the cheaper AM3 models do have more or better features than P55 boards but the P67 boards dont lack anything except the PCI-e lanes

WTF?? you can't compare a ROG mobo to a p8p67 deluxe. crosshair formula mobo for p67 will probably be more like $100 extra over the amd equivalent, if anything a mere $50 premium is on the low end of the likely price delta.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131666 this one is probably a better comparison, and it's on a 2 year old platform that is currently on life support.

 

[Stoneburner]

I believe Microcenter is still running their Sandy Bridge combo deals. I know that my 2500K and Gigabyte P67A-UD3 only cost about $290 combined on launch day.

At $290, it's really a no-brainer in favor of Sandy Bridge.

Yeah but like most people I don't live near an MC. Probably a good thing as I would waste money on unnecessary stuff.

YOu also have to consider, MC has deals on AMD boards and chips as well though. If I'm near an MC in the next few weeks and they're running a deal, I am very intrigued by it. However, as somebody else pointed out, getting ALL features on an intel board is not easy.