X2 3800+@2.55 vs 820D@3.5 Impressions and benchmarks ! ** Update, encoding bench results in **

[DarkKnight69]

Originally posted by: Hacp
Of course an x2 3800+ @ 2.55 is going to beat the 3.5 PD. Do you expect a 3.4 Pentium TO beat an FX-55????

hahahaha, very good point!!

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: DarkKnight69

Originally posted by: Hacp
Of course an x2 3800+ @ 2.55 is going to beat the 3.5 PD. Do you expect a 3.4 Pentium TO beat an FX-55????

hahahaha, very good point!!

It would have beat it with half that OC...I know Mark and his intentions were not so much benches but were about...

1) Feel of the cpu (in terms of use)
2) Heat
3) Ease of Ocing with a heck of a lot more cooling then he is running on his 3800+ in terms of cpu and case cooling
4) Overall stability

 

[Markfw]

Exactly Duvie ! One point to add to that list. After giving the benefit of better cooling, dual channel memory and everything, and max OC (to eliminate that arguement) what is the final "bang/buck" and how much can you save by getting an 820D. I haven;t finished yet, but early results say bang/buck is horrible, and you don't really save much with what you have to go thru to get a "cheap" processor. Total system cost is almost the same.

But this is not the final yet.

 

[Technonut]

Legion Hardware just put up a Dual-Core OC'ing Performance Article. They got their 820 D up to 4.2GHz....

At their stock frequencies the AMD Athlon64 X2 4400+ is naturally going to be much faster than the Intel Pentium D 820. Despite the Pentium D 820 being clocked 600MHz faster the Athlon64 X2 4400+ utilizes a more efficient design. On the other hand overclocking these two processors may give the Pentium D 820 processor a natural advantage. The Pentium D 820 is easily capable of achieving a clock frequency in excess of 4GHz, once again for this article the processor was tested at 4.2GHz! The AMD Athlon64 X2 4400+ managed to reach 2.7GHz, this mere 500MHz overclock went a long way in aiding the X2 4400+?s performance.

 

[Markfw]

That review was crap. And they didn;t even say what cooling was used, what voltage, what stability testing, was the case open or closed, etc.... I am trying to be a little more objective. 4.2 on good air ? I have the best air. Once I get farther into this, maybe I will crank the voltage more. I was trying to keep it the same. They also don't mention temps.

 

[Technonut]

Originally posted by: Markfw900
That review was crap. And they didn;t even say what cooling was used, what voltage, what stability testing, was the case open or closed, etc.... I am trying to be a little more objective. 4.2 on good air ? I have the best air. Once I get farther into this, maybe I will crank the voltage more. I was trying to keep it the same. They also don't mention temps.

Yes, that info would be helpful to know.... It still shows some results with the 820 D @ 4.2GHz though.....

Rather this is an interesting article for those looking at using either an AMD or Intel dual-core processor in a gaming machine that will be overclocked. The overclocking results are what I would expect any D 820 or X2 4400+ processor to achieve with a good quality air-cooling or decent water-cooling solution.

I would assume they used water-cooling....

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: Technonut

Originally posted by: Markfw900
That review was crap. And they didn;t even say what cooling was used, what voltage, what stability testing, was the case open or closed, etc.... I am trying to be a little more objective. 4.2 on good air ? I have the best air. Once I get farther into this, maybe I will crank the voltage more. I was trying to keep it the same. They also don't mention temps.

Yes, that info would be helpful to know.... It still shows some results with the 820 D @ 4.2GHz though.....

Rather this is an interesting article for those looking at using either an AMD or Intel dual-core processor in a gaming machine that will be overclocked. The overclocking results are what I would expect any D 820 or X2 4400+ processor to achieve with a good quality air-cooling or decent water-cooling solution.

I would assume they used water-cooling....

Considering I hang a bit at extreme now and then and the only 820 I have seen in that range was a chilled water setup.....some have 3.8ghz with standard water cooling and 3.5 to 3.6ghz seem about the high average with air cooling alone...Most say the stock cooler wont take you much more then 840 speeds....

 

[Leper Messiah]

Thanks MarkFW900. I was almost conisdering getting one of these for F@H, 'cause two instances of straight 450 QMD's would be nice, but it looks like they are duds.

 

[Duvie]

Of course there is the Athlon64 X2 3800+ which retails for $350 US but its just not going to deliver what the 4400+ can on the overclocking front. The lower clock multiplier dulls the processor right down, as does the L2 Cache which is cut in half.

This sums up some of the reason why this is nmot a good review....Lets compare the lowest speed chip of INtel with the medium, grade of AMD then talk about insanely high premiums...he knows nothing....

1) The 3800= can oC as high as the 4400+.....

2) the L2 cache makes a difference in some games but is a NO show in most other things.....

 

[Leper Messiah]

Originally posted by: Duvie

Of course there is the Athlon64 X2 3800+ which retails for $350 US but its just not going to deliver what the 4400+ can on the overclocking front. The lower clock multiplier dulls the processor right down, as does the L2 Cache which is cut in half.

This sums up some of the reason why this is nmot a good review....Lets compare the lowest speed chip of INtel with the medium, grade of AMD then talk about insanely high premiums...he knows nothing....

1) The 3800= can oC as high as the 4400+.....

2) the L2 cache makes a difference in some games but is a NO show in most other things.....

They're still stuck in the AXP days. Why do half these reviewers ignore this handy little fact. RAM DIVIDERS! For christsakes most NF3 and NF4 boards can get 300 HTT easy as hell, and its going to be really damn hard to get an X2 up to 3GHz without chilled water or vapo, and if you're buying those kind of cooling, you're sure as hell going to have a DFI or something that can do 350 HTT.

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: Leper Messiah
Thanks MarkFW900. I was almost conisdering getting one of these for F@H, 'cause two instances of straight 450 QMD's would be nice, but it looks like they are duds.

My other 512 meg to get me to 1 gig is here (but I am at work now) When I put that in, and pump the voltage some more for stability, I will try F@H again. It puked last night.

I CAN say right now the 3800+ is way easier to OC, WAY cooler, and we KNOW it takes WAY less power(166 vs 250 at stock I think). What I am try to find out, is for what appears to be less money, with a max OC, is it worth it ? Can you get one to 4.2 on the best air ? at what temps ? Stay tuned.

That article is crap, I will say it again. So they make you believe you can get 4.2 on air, but it requires chilled water ? Then why buy the cheaper CPU, when you loose it all on the more exspensive cooling solution ? I think my test is more fair for what to buy for less $ total. I only splurged $20 more for the big typhoon to give it an edge. Still only in the cpu/hsf $215 vs $380 for the 3800. (I did get a good ebay buy, so it would really be $305 vs $380, so $75 more ! in one year the electric bill covers that, not including the extra AC in the summer.

This is IF I can get this sucker stable at a decent OC. This is an Intel chipset mobo also !

 

[Technonut]

This is an Intel chipset mobo also

I may have missed it, but which mobo are you running? PSU? RAM, etc.....

EDIT: I see you are running the Fortron 450 PSU....

 

[Markfw]

Mobo ECS 945P-A, memory OCZ gold (I think) PC5400, PSU Fortron 450, PCI video card (taking NO power) Enermax C03 server case (I think thats it). So I got the best mobo the stay in line with my $80 MSI Neo4-F, and better memory, and a bigger PSU. (AMD is on 380 antec in a Sonata).

I put most of that at the top, but no memory or mobo.

 

[Technonut]

Mobo ECS 945P-A

I would not expect miracles....... I have heard that ECS has come along lately, but personally.... I would not bet the farm on it's OC'ing ability.....

 

[Pabster]

Throw it in a P5WD2 Premium and let us know the results. Or send me the chip, as I've got a board waiting

ECS boards are fine. Not o/c champions but for the price you can't argue.

 

[Markfw]

It has voltage adjustments like you wouldn;t believe. Dividers (can't remember them all) and memory settings. Its the one thing I sort of like about this setup. And when it fails an OC, it resets only the OC'ing parameters speed in the bios (not time, and etc..)

BTW, I have Allways had very good luck with ECS.

 

[Hacp]

Ow ya another note, I would not expect good overclocks with Pds on air , Logic is just against it.

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: Hacp
Ow ya another note, I would not expect good overclocks with Pds on air , Logic is just against it.

Well, if you need water, then whats the use of saving $100 on the CPU to spend that or more on water-cooling ? And you are still sucking a lot of power and creating a lot of heat (AC still needs to cool the house)

Edit: I see the smiley. I was trying to validate somebody belief that cheaper is good. Not sure its even cheaper, and definitely not good.

 

[Duvie]

Imagine what a heater like the nvidia and ATi high end vid cards would do to case heat and power...I bet you this 450watter may not be able to handle it.....Marks 380 antec could not handle an X2 oc'd to 2.55ghz and a 6800GT...needed a antec 430 for that....


I say you need to generate mass heat and frankly without a newer vid cad that will be a bit moot....So I would run dual prime95 large FFT or SNM which is dual core optimised now....dual prime gets about 1-2c higher with small FFT over F@H and SNM gets over 4-5c....Since you dont have the vid crad screwing with the ambient case temp you should run a program like that to get a more realistic temperature load for a full system....

just a thought......

I frankly feel little to NO heat coming off the air of the cpu hsf and the hsf is only mildly warm to the touch on full load for 4 weeks now non stop..Mark says the air pumping from the hsf is noticeably warm.....

He also had some funky scores when he had it at 3.6ghz...i would say regardless what speedfan is saying he should run a throttlewatch and or 2 instances of cpu_z and watch both cores frequencies simultaneously....

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: Duvie
Imagine what a heater like the nvidia and ATi high end vid cards would do to case heat and power...I bet you this 450watter may not be able to handle it.....Marks 380 antec could not handle an X2 oc'd to 2.55ghz and a 6800GT...needed a antec 430 for that....


I say you need to generate mass heat and frankly without a newer vid cad that will be a bit moot....So I would run dual prime95 large FFT or SNM which is dual core optimised now....dual prime gets about 1-2c higher with small FFT over F@H and SNM gets over 4-5c....Since you dont have the vid crad screwing with the ambient case temp you should run a program like that to get a more realistic temperature load for a full system....

just a thought......

I frankly feel little to NO heat coming off the air of the cpu hsf and the hsf is only mildly warm to the touch on full load for 4 weeks now non stop..Mark says the air pumping from the hsf is noticeably warm.....

He also had some funky scores when he had it at 3.6ghz...i would say regardless what speedfan is saying he should run a throttlewatch and or 2 instances of cpu_z and watch both cores frequencies simultaneously....

You rock Duvie! ^

 

[josh609]

I still want those pictures of his setup. C'mon Mark!

 

[stevty2889]

I agree with running throttlewatch. With my 3.4 P4 I finaly got rid of, my performance was getting worse the farther I overclocked. It appears that the throttling kicks in at a lower temperature as you increase clockspeed and/or core voltage.

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: josh609
I still want those pictures of his setup. C'mon Mark!

cpu 820d
820 before cable maint
820 after cable maint
820 from the side
3800 close (XP 90 looks small compared to big typhoon!
820D upper left, 3800 lower right, 3000@2.3 lower left
Computer room right wall
Computer room left wall

Any more pictures You want ? I need to get busy benching, and fixing a computer, but I finally get it back up running at 3.5 at 1.36v It wouldn;t boot at 1.5v ???? Still looking, right now at 57C, 3800+ is at 41c, both full load 2x F@H !!! in the same room (see pics)
Edit: I had the side cover off to take pictures on the 3800+. After putting it back, its back to its normal 46c !!

 

[n7]

Nice chair

 

[Markfw]

Finally got it to run overnight at 3.5 ! More benches tonight !