AMD's dual core Opteron & Athlon 64 X2 - Server/Desktop Performance Preview
by Anand Lal Shimpi, Jason Clark & Ross Whitehead on April 21, 2005 9:25 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Development Performance - Compiling Firefox
Our Quake 3 compile test was getting a bit long in the tooth, so we're introducing a brand new test: compiling Firefox. We followed the instructions diagramed here. 
The Real Test - AnandTech's Multitasking Scenarios
Before our first dual core articles, we asked for feedback from the readers with regards to their multitasking usage patterns. Based on this information, we formulated some of our own benchmarks that would stress multitasking performance. We've already gone over the impacts of dual core CPUs on subjective interactions, so we'll just point you back to previous articles for our take on that if you haven't read them already. In the end, we know that dual core CPUs make our systems much more responsive and provide the same sort of smooth operation that SMP systems have done for years. But, the question now is: who has better multitasking performance? AMD or Intel? And that's exactly what we're here to find out.We started with a test bed configured with a number of fairly popular applications:
Daemon ToolsWhat's important about this list is that a handful of those programs were running in the background at all times, primarily Microsoft's AntiSpyware Beta and Norton AntiVirus 2004. Both the AntiSpyware Beta and NAV 2004 were running with their real time protection modes enabled, to make things even more real world.
Norton AntiVirus 2004 (with latest updates)
Firefox 1.02
DVD Shrink 3.2
Microsoft AntiSpyware Beta 1.0
Newsleecher 2.0
Visual Studio .NET 2003
Macromedia Flash Player 7
Adobe Photoshop CS
Microsoft Office 2003
3ds max 7
iTunes 4.7.1
Trillian 3.1
DivX 5.2.1
AutoGK 1.60
Norton Ghost 2003
Adobe Reader 7
Cygwin
gcc
mingw
Doom 3
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
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Jep4444 - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
I don't like how you use the Opteron to give a rough estimation on the A64 X2 as their are other architectural changes between Opteron and A64That aside maybe AMD could bring out X2s using 256KB of cache per core to get slightly lower price points and atleast compete with the 830(3ghz)
I doubt it'll be too bandwidth limited given AMD is selling Semprons with only 128KB of L2 cache
KillerBob - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
It is usual to see that Anandtech favors the AMD, looks at the artificial tests, and not the real-world tests, where Intel wins out (as usual).In other tests itis pointed out the the PEE can be overclocked past 4GHz, in which case it'll kick everything's ass.
KillerBob - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
dannybin1742 - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
drool, i want oneDoormat - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
Typo P13: Intel's "975x" at bottom of page.The high price of the dual core opterons kinda puts me off. I was hoping for 2x the price of the single core, instead of 3.5x (I'm looking at 246 vs 270s). It looks like I'll be going single core (or just holding off) instead of dual core (at least until the end of the year and AMD gets price competition from Intel on the server DC front).
The 3.5x doesn't even make sense from the yield standpoint. If AMD's yeilds are 70% (wild talking-out-of-my-ass guess, no real factual grounding in picking that number), then their dual core yields will only be 49% (70% for the first core, 70% for the second core). So out of a batch of 1000 chips, instead of 700 you only get 490. Thats 210 chips you need to make up for. If opterons have a Avg selling price of $500, then the "adjusted" selling price would be around $715, an increase of 43%, not 250%. Granted, if AMD's yields are higher, the numbers look better (from our perspective - lower prices), but if their yields are less, it looks really bad (if their yield was only 50%, they'd only get 25% yield on dual core, and would have to double price).
I guess AMD is just trying to squeeze every dime they can out of this... hopefully that extra money goes to pay for Fab36 and more capacity.
cbuchach - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
Wow....Very impressive offering from AMD. I think the quote that sums it up best for me is: "you no longer have to make a performance decision between great overall performance or great media encoding performance, AMD delivers both with the Athlon 64 X2."I was very impressed with Intel dual core chips, but now I know that my next system will go back to be AMD-based. Overall the dual core Athlon64 should be killer.
As for cost, yes it is expensive, but the performance is really phenomenal. I am sure that it too will come down.
Griswold - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
All hail teh X2!bob661 - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
All I can say is.....WHOODOGGIE!!!!Brian23 - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
ME WANTY!!!jamawass - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
quote: Despite AMD's lead in getting dual core server/workstation CPUs out to market, Intel has very little reason to worry from a market penetration standpoint. We've seen that even with a multi-year performance advantage, it is very tough for AMD to steal any significant business away from Intel, and we expect that the same will continue to be the case with the dual core Opteron. It's unfortunate for AMD that all of their hard work will amount to very little compared to what Intel is able to ship, but that has always been reality when it comes to the AMD/Intel competition."This statement should be qualified. The Rendering market is much more adventurous than the standard server market(didn't they use winxp-64 beta running on opterons to render SWIII?) and will continue to rapidly adopt opterons.There're tangible benefits (faster rendering, lower energy costs=$$$) in moving to opteron for rendering farms. Also more oems like supermicro and broadcom have embraced AMD which should result in much more rapid market penetration than 2 yrs ago.