Reviews - AMD Phenom II X6 1090T: hexa-core computing for the masses

[Biscuit]

Good work from AMD, really giving the performance for the price and keeping within a reasonable power envelope aswell.

[zoomee]

and the most amazing thing is I am currently priming for 17hrs+ rock solid stable with only 1.42v at 4 Ghz on all six cores!!!! - these chips are awesome - respect to AMD

[Scribe]

An encouraging release! I've got a 1090T on order just waiting for damned stock of the Geforce 480s.

It shows AMD are still well in the game. The i7 is a newer architecture built on 32nm and with tripple-channel memory support on high end motherboards; yet AMD are still putting up a great fight and with a lower TDP on an older architecture built at 45nm.

AMD have a lot of wiggle room and clear upgrade paths for future releases. If only they had better access to newer manufacturing techniques!

Next step bring back SLI, don't be so picky about the Radeons.

[kalniel]

Next step bring back SLI, don't be so picky about the Radeons.

You assume it's AMD stopping you from using SLI do you?

[HW_90]

The i7 is a newer architecture built on 32nm and with tripple-channel memory support on high end motherboards;

Yes, but not at the same time, and iirc triple channel is to be no more with sandy bridge

yet AMD are still putting up a great fight and with a lower TDP on an older architecture built at 45nm.

putting up a great fight, yes. Lower TDP, no, 140w>130w. Older Architecture, no, Nehalem is based on Pentium III which is 1999 and Istanbul is based on Athlon 64 which is 2003.

AMD have a lot of wiggle room and clear upgrade paths for future releases.

Poor statement seeing as the next generation is completely different to current x86 processors.

If only they had better access to newer manufacturing techniques!

heard of Global Foundries? apparently not, they have 28nm ready for processors now or at least within a few months, that's ahead of Intel's 32nm.

Next step bring back SLI, don't be so picky about the Radeons.

it's not AMD's fault none of their boards support SLI, it's more nvidia's for making crappy chipsets and board manufacturers for thinking that $10 is too much for a license to use for what is considered a budget brand.

[ehhhhhhh]

Older Architecture, no, Nehalem is based on Pentium III which is 1999...

Do you have any source to support your above statement? I would be interested in reading it.

[kalniel]

Yes, but not at the same time, and iirc triple channel is to be no more with sandy bridge

You're right, it's now quad channel for the enthusiast segment.

heard of Global Foundries? apparently not, they have 28nm ready for processors now or at least within a few months, that's ahead of Intel's 32nm.

GF are not ahead of Intel when it comes to the kind of die size and complexity we're talking about here. Intel are executing really well at the moment.

Do you have any source to support your above statement? I would be interested in reading it.

He just means they stopped going down the netburst route, which is correct at the core of the chip so they're both similar in that respect (although AMD is arguably pentium pro at the core level). But the rest is obviously much newer design.

[sawyen]

Correct, the basics in the Athlons really never deviated too far off the design of the old Pentium basics..

Likewise, getting down to the nitty-gritty, the design for Pentium III is basically a much more fine tuned Pentium II, which is reminiscent to a Pentium Pro...

We can keep going back really, but what matters is what we get from AMD this very moment..

In which case.... its crackin' good for the money! Feels like the K6 and Barton K7 days

[scaryjim]

putting up a great fight, yes. Lower TDP, no, 140w>130w.

The X6 1090T has a 125W TDP, which last time I checked *is* lower than 130W...

Older Architecture, no, Nehalem is based on Pentium III which is 1999

Except Pentium 3 didn't have 64bit instructions or a 4-issue design. Nehalem is actually Conroe based (~2006), which was more inspired by P3 than derived from it. Phenom II is much more directly derived from Athlon 64.

... heard of Global Foundries? apparently not, they have 28nm ready for processors now or at least within a few months, that's ahead of Intel's 32nm.

Have you heard of Core i3 / i5 Clarkdale processors? Apparently not, otherwise you'd know Intel is already selling 32nm processors - so GF is clearly *not* ahead of Intel.

[TooNice]

In general, how does the Phenom compares with Nehalem from a performance per watt perspective?

[Scribe]

Yes, but not at the same time, and iirc triple channel is to be no more with sandy bridge



putting up a great fight, yes. Lower TDP, no, 140w>130w. Older Architecture, no, Nehalem is based on Pentium III which is 1999 and Istanbul is based on Athlon 64 which is 2003.



Poor statement seeing as the next generation is completely different to current x86 processors.



heard of Global Foundries? apparently not, they have 28nm ready for processors now or at least within a few months, that's ahead of Intel's 32nm.



it's not AMD's fault none of their boards support SLI, it's more nvidia's for making crappy chipsets and board manufacturers for thinking that $10 is too much for a license to use for what is considered a budget brand.

Sorry, maybe I should have rephrased my SLI statement in which I meant I would like to see SLI with AMD chipsets (for example on the Crosshair IV motherboard) and I'm not trying to state who is the cause of the matter either.

Agreeing with above posts, yes 125W vs 130W not 140W?

I'm afraid the i7 architecture is new, as everyone has stated, if you base it off the similarities of previous architectures you can always find the routes at the first ever processor as all transistor technology is derivative, there's common elements in all CPUs. I didn't see a pentium III with turbo boost, multiple cores, 64-bit instructions, 4-issue, hyper-threading, DDR3 support? Are you telling me they just slapped some P3 cores together without making significant changes to the architecture and it worked?

It's well known that intel have often had better ACCESS to new technologies, not that they're unavailable to use but AMD don't have the capacity to test and trial these like intel who can spare resources to test products whilst maintaining a full production line. This may no longer be the case but seeing intel push out a high volume 32nm line so quickly clearly shows that they've had more time to work with the technology. Just having the technology isn't enough, take the nVidia fermi for example, TSMC had 40nm technology, but without a lot of time, effort and trialing could not produce reasonable production numbers for nVidia's architecture.

How are the next generation chips going to be different? Do we know they're going to jump straight to DDR5 or a new standard? That would be very unlike AMD to jump gun so fast, so would they not explore the possibility to expand channels like intel? Would they not also lower their manufacturing size like intel? They already have a low TDP so does this not mean they should be capable of squeezing more performance from their architectures if they raised this? I don't see just what point you're trying to make.

[kalniel]

How are the next generation chips going to be different? Do we know they're going to jump straight to DDR5 or a new standard? That would be very unlike AMD to jump gun so fast, so would they not explore the possibility to expand channels like intel? Would they not also lower their manufacturing size like intel? They already have a low TDP so does this not mean they should be capable of squeezing more performance from their architectures if they raised this? I don't see just what point you're trying to make.

Next generation is still not going to be different at the basic x86 level, as you say, it's always building on previous work. The biggest change AMD are doing is doubling up some of the integer processing within one core (or alternatively, spreading the FP processing across two cores). This will massively increase integer IPC with a shortfall in FP IPC, which is expected to be filled by using GPU processing to contribute massive FP resources. Sharing x86 instructions with the GPU (if we can call it that) is relatively new.

[crossy]

I'm just confused now ... I'd pretty much set my mind on going Intel (920/930/860 or possibly 750) multi-core.

I mainly use the old desktop for games (big CoD fan) and video/mp3 ripping, so I'm guessing that the fast cores are probably the best for what I want.

But does anyone out there have a view whether I should still be going Intel or whether this Phenom II is worth looking at? I figure that it's about the same price as the Intel gear, so it's down to features - I'm thinking that a hexacore system with a shedload of memory would make a sweet host for VirtualBox or VMware (using AMD-V) - and the AMD processor seemed to be a little more power efficient, and I guess can still use the power-saving features when the cores are idle.

I'm sure I saw that a lot of the CD rippers are able to make use of multicore boxes - so does that mean the more the merrier?

Whatever I get is going to be a heck of a lot better than what I've got that the moment - a very old Athlon64 (single core!) mildly overclocked.

Bob

[baius]

Got a link to Fusion in this article. First time I'd seen any definite details.

[kalniel]

I'm just confused now ... I'd pretty much set my mind on going Intel (920/930/860 or possibly 750) multi-core.

I mainly use the old desktop for games (big CoD fan) and video/mp3 ripping, so I'm guessing that the fast cores are probably the best for what I want.

But does anyone out there have a view whether I should still be going Intel or whether this Phenom II is worth looking at?

Yes, it's certainly worth looking at, especially for your uses.

I figure that it's about the same price as the Intel gear, so it's down to features - I'm thinking that a hexacore system with a shedload of memory would make a sweet host for VirtualBox or VMware (using AMD-V) - and the AMD processor seemed to be a little more power efficient, and I guess can still use the power-saving features when the cores are idle.

Ish. They downclock, but they're not able to shut off like intels multi-core chips. Overall efficiency is very high though.

I'm sure I saw that a lot of the CD rippers are able to make use of multicore boxes - so does that mean the more the merrier?

Sometimes.. Some applications don't scale that well beyond a couple of cores.

Got a link to Fusion in this article. First time I'd seen any definite details.

Llano is not that exciting, it's still a phenom based core, more akin to the i3/i5 6** that you can already buy from Intel. Bulldozer is the 'real' fusion.

[crossy]

Power saving on Phenom II hexacore( Ish. They downclock, but they're not able to shut off like intels multi-core chips. Overall efficiency is very high though.

Thanks for that - I'd understood that the AMD power saving (is it still called "Cool n' Quiet"?) was more effective than Intel's - so your info that Intel's cpu's do actually power down unused cores makes them more appealing to me. Maybe I'm just mean but I hate the idea of burning more leccy than I need to if all I'm doing at the time is reading Hexus. Maybe I've just been spoiled by the Power6/7 processors that I use @ work.

Kind of looks like my processor choice is going to be down to what's on special offer @ Scan ( ) - although they seem to be doing a really good price on the old i7-920's atm ...

Again, thanks for the sage advice.

Bob