First, I would very much like it if the AT staff could do some unbiased testing on this.
I've found an excellent article, but the author appears to have an AMD bias. I have come to know and trust the articles at AT...
For those who don't know, TDP (Thermal Design Power) is becoming more and more controversial. It is a critical value for determining both heat (very important for you Prescott O/C people) and power use (critical for laptops).
Unfortunately, the values published by Intel and AMD are absolutely meaningless, even as a comparison!
The reason for this is that TDP measurement is NOT a defined rule but is an arbitrary measurement based on whatever the company WANTS to base it on! For example, Intel's definition of TDP is:
From the Intel Datasheet for Northwood CPUs:
"The numbers in this column reflect Intel?s recommended design point and are not indicative of the maximum power the processor can dissipate under worst case conditions."
And from Intel?s datasheet for Prescott CPUs:
"Thermal Design Power (TDP) should be used for processor thermal solution design targets. The TDP is not the maximum power that the processor can dissipate."
While AMD's definition of TDP is:
"Thermal Design Power (TDP) is measured under the conditions of TCASE Max, IDD Max, and VDD=VID_VDD, and include all power dissipated on-die from VDD, VDDIO, VLDT, VTT, and VDDA."
This means that TDP, as defined by AMD, is measured at the maximum current the CPU can draw, at the default voltage, under the worst-case temperature conditions. This is the maximum power that the CPU can possibly dissipate.
The discrepencies between these 2 measurements is VAST!
As clockspeeds increase, and the battle for laptops heats up, this (IMHO) is going to be the next major benchmark controversy...
I've found an excellent article, but the author appears to have an AMD bias. I have come to know and trust the articles at AT...
For those who don't know, TDP (Thermal Design Power) is becoming more and more controversial. It is a critical value for determining both heat (very important for you Prescott O/C people) and power use (critical for laptops).
Unfortunately, the values published by Intel and AMD are absolutely meaningless, even as a comparison!
The reason for this is that TDP measurement is NOT a defined rule but is an arbitrary measurement based on whatever the company WANTS to base it on! For example, Intel's definition of TDP is:
From the Intel Datasheet for Northwood CPUs:
"The numbers in this column reflect Intel?s recommended design point and are not indicative of the maximum power the processor can dissipate under worst case conditions."
And from Intel?s datasheet for Prescott CPUs:
"Thermal Design Power (TDP) should be used for processor thermal solution design targets. The TDP is not the maximum power that the processor can dissipate."
While AMD's definition of TDP is:
"Thermal Design Power (TDP) is measured under the conditions of TCASE Max, IDD Max, and VDD=VID_VDD, and include all power dissipated on-die from VDD, VDDIO, VLDT, VTT, and VDDA."
This means that TDP, as defined by AMD, is measured at the maximum current the CPU can draw, at the default voltage, under the worst-case temperature conditions. This is the maximum power that the CPU can possibly dissipate.
The discrepencies between these 2 measurements is VAST!
As clockspeeds increase, and the battle for laptops heats up, this (IMHO) is going to be the next major benchmark controversy...
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