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
Earlier this month, Intel introduced their first dual core desktop CPUs - the Pentium D and the Pentium Extreme Edition. Coupled with extremely aggressive pricing designed to move the majority of the desktop market to dual core within the next two years, Intel's launch did not cease to impress. The ability to bring workstation class performance in multithreaded and multitasking environments to the desktop, at an affordable price, is something that we've been hoping for for years. Intel's launch was pretty interesting, but today, AMD has more bang.
From the beginning, AMD has talked about how they were going to bring dual core to the K8 architecture. The on-die north bridge, a part of every Athlon 64 and Opteron CPU, was designed from the ground up to be able to support multiple cores. AMD had designed their first dual core K8 CPUs years ago. They were simply waiting for manufacturing processes to mature in order to actually make producing such a chip a feasible endeavor.
With their 90nm process finally maturing, it made business and financial sense to introduce their first dual core products. AMD wasn't alone in their decision, as it's obvious that Intel waited for 90nm before making their move to dual core as well. The problem for both AMD and Intel is that at 90nm, a dual core chip is getting a bit on the large side. Intel's first dual core CPUs weigh in at 230 million transistors on a 206 mm2 die, and AMD's new CPUs are a bit obese themselves at 233.2 million transistors on a 199 mm2 die. While the dual core CPUs that we have tested from both AMD and Intel are no slouch, it's clear that both companies are working to transition to 65nm as quickly as possible to make manufacturing these chips much more reasonable.
Although this may seem like a tangent to the topic at hand, manufacturing has a lot to do with today's announcements from AMD. What exactly is being announced? Well, for starters, AMD is announcing their first dual core Opteron parts. The word "announcing" in this sense means that they are declaring availability of their 800 series dual core Opteron CPUs, and promising that 200 and 100 series dual core Opteron CPUs will be made available starting next month. Before we move on to the rest of the announcement, pay very close attention to the parts for which AMD is announcing availability - the 800 series parts. The Opteron 800 series CPUs are for use in 4 or more socket servers and are AMD's most expensive CPUs, and thus, their lowest volume CPUs. Remember that at 90nm, AMD can produce around half as many dual core CPUs as they can single core CPUs per wafer - so they need to be very careful about demand. You will notice later on in this article that AMD's strategy involves keeping prices higher and introducing lower quantity CPUs first, in order to ensure that their single core CPUs still have a market and that they aren't committing to more than what they can deliver. At the end of the day, AMD is still a much smaller manufacturer than Intel and thus, they have to play their cards very differently, which leads us to the second part of AMD's announcement today: the new dual core desktop Athlon 64 X2 line.
The Athlon 64 X2 will be AMD's new brand for dual core desktop CPUs. This line is being talked about today, but an official announcement with full benchmarks won't come until June. That being said, we have made it a point to bring you a preview of Athlon 64 X2 performance in this article, despite the fact that AMD isn't introducing the chips for another two months. So, for all of you who are interested to see how AMD's dual core desktop CPUs stack up against the recently introduced Pentium D, never fear, we have what you're looking for.
This article will serve two purposes. First and foremost, we're interested in the new dual core Opterons as a server solution - and we run them through our usual web and database serving tests. Next, we're going to take a look at the Athlon 64 X2 and how it compares in performance to Intel's recently announced Pentium D. We've developed even more desktop multitasking tests for this article, so we'll be able to provide you with an idea of how well AMD will be able to compete in the multi-core world.
- The Athlon 64 4000+ was the last single core member of the Athlon 64 line.
- The Athlon 64 FX will continue as a single core CPU line, with the FX-57 (2.8GHz) due out later this year.
We are missing a look at workstation performance between the Opteron and Xeon, but rest assured that such a comparison is in the works. The usual mix of very limited time and hardware problems (which we will also discuss in this article) forced us to exclude one of the comparisons, and thus, the workstation comparison will have to wait for another day.
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saratoga - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
" The three main languages used with .NET are: C# (similar to C++), VB.NET (somewhat similar to VB), and J# (fairly close to JAVA). Whatever language in which you write your code, it is compiled into an intermediate language - CIL (Common Intermediate Language). It is then managed and executed by the CLR (Common Language Runtime)."
Waaah?
C# is not similar c++, its not even like it. Its dervived from MS's experience with Java, and its intended to replace J#, Java and J++. Finally the language which is similar to c++ is managed c++ which is generally listed as the other main .net language.
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/express/
Shintai - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
#80, #81Tell me how much faster a singlecore 4000+ is compared to a 3800+ and you see it´s less than 5% in average, mostly about 2%. Your X2 2.2Ghz 1MB cache will perform same or max 1-1½% faster than a singlecore 2.2Ghz 1MB cache in games. So 10% lower for is kinda bad for a CPU with higher rating. Memory wont help you that much, cept in a fantasy world.
And less take a game as example.
Halo:
127.7FPS with a 2.4Ghz 512KB cache singlecore.
119.4FPS with a 2.2Ghz 1MB cache dualcore.
And we all know they basicly have the same PR rating due to cache difference.
And the cheap singlecore here beats the more expensive, powerusing and hotter dualcore CPU with 7% faster speed.
So instead of paying 300$ for a CPU, you now pay 500$+, get worse gaming speeds, more heat, more powerusage....for what, waiting 2 years on game developers? Or some 64bit rescue magic that makes SMP for anything possible? It´s even worse for intel with their crappy prescotts, 3.2Ghz vs 3.8Ghz. Atleast AMD is close to the top CPU, but still abit away.
Real gamers will use singlecores the next 1-2 years.
Shintai - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
Forgot to add about physics engine etc. For that alone you can add a dummy dedicated chip on say..a GFX card for it for 5-10$ more that will do it 10x faster than any dualcore CPU we will see the rest of the year. Kinda like GFX cards are 10s of times faster than our CPUs for that purpose. Not like good o´days where we used the CPU to render 3D in games.The CPUs are getting more and more irrelevant in games. Just look how a CPu that performs worse in anything else as the Pentium M can own everything in gaming. Tho it lacks all the goodies the P4 and AMD64 got.
It makes one wonder what they actually develop CPUs after, since 95% is gaming, 5% workstation/servers and corporate PCs could work perfectly and more with a K5-K6/P2-P3.
Then we could also stay with some 100W or 200W PSU rather than a 400W, 500W or 700W.
cHodAXUK - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
make that 'performed to 91% of the fastest gaming cpu around'.cHodAXUK - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
#79 Are you smoking something? A dual core 4400+ running with slow server memory and timing plus no NCQ drive peformed within 91% of the fastest gaming chip around. Now the real X2 4400+ with get at least a 15% pefromance boost from faster memory timings and unregistered memory and that is before we even think about overclocking at all.Shintai - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
So what the tests show is like 64bit tests.Dualcores are completely useless the next 2+ years unless you use your PC as a workstation for CAD, photoshop and heavy encoding of movies.
And WinXP 64bit will be toy/useless the next 1-2years aswell, unless you use it for servers.
Hype, hype, hype...
In 2 years when these current intel and amd cores are outdated and we have pentium V/VI or M2/3 and K8/K9. Then we can benefit from it. But look back in the mirror. Those early AMD64 and those lowspeed Pentium 4 with 64bit wont really be used for 64bit. Because when we finally get a stable driverset and windows on windows enviroment. Then we will all be using Longhorn and nextgen CPUs.
Dualcores will be slower than singlecores in games for a LONG LONG time. And it will be MORE expensive. And utterly useless cept for bragging rights. Ask all those people using dual xeons, dual opterons today how much gaming benefit they have. Oh ye, but hey lets all make some lunatic assumption that i´m downloading with p2p at 100mbit so 1 CPU will be 100% loaded while im encoding a movie meanwhile. yes then you can play your game on CPU#2. But how often is that likely to happen anyway. And all those multitasking things will just cripple your HD anyway and kill the sweet heaven there.
It´s a wakeup call before you be the fools.
games for 64bit and dualcores ain´t even started yet. So they will have their 1-3years developmenttime before we see them on the market. And if it´s 1 year it´s usually a crapgame ;)
calinb - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
"Armed with the DivX 5.2.1 and the AutoGK front end for Gordian Knot..."AutoGK and Gordian Knot are front ends for several common aps, but AutoGK doesn't use Gordian Knot at all. AutoGK and Gordian Knot are completely Independent programs. len0x, the developer of AutoGK, is also a contributor to Gordian Knot development too. That's the connection.
calinb, DivX Forums Moderator
cHodAXUK - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
Hmm, it does seem that dual core with hyperthreading can be a real help and yet some times a real hinderance. Some benchmarks show it giving stellar performance and some show it slowing the cpu right down by swamping it. Some very hit and miss results for Intel's top dual core part there makes me wonder if it is really worth the extra money for something that can be so unreliable in certain situations.Zebo - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
even if i can't spell them.Zebo - Thursday, April 21, 2005 - link
Fish bitsWords mean things sorry you don't like them.
Cripple is true. The X2 is crippled in this test since it's not really and X2.
It's a "misrepresentation" of it's true abilities.
I was'nt bagging on Anand but highlithing what was said in the article then speculating of potential performance of the real X2 all things considered.
Sorry I did'nt attend PC walk on my tip toes class. I say what I mean and use accurate words.