System setup and notes
Hardware
| CPU |
AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition |
AMD Phenom II X6 1055T* |
AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition |
AMD Phenom II X4 945** |
AMD Athlon II X4 635 |
AMD Phenom II X2 555 |
Intel
Core i7 980X EE |
Intel
Core i7 870 |
Intel
Core i7 930 |
Intel
Core i7 920 |
Intel Core i5 750 |
Intel Core i5 661 |
| Price |
£240 |
£160 |
£145 |
£125 |
£100 |
£80 |
£835 |
£435 |
£230 |
£180 |
£160 |
£160 |
| Frequency |
3.20GHz (16x 200MHz) |
2.80GHz (14x 200MHz) |
3.40GHz (17x 200MHz) |
3.00GHz (15x 200MHz) |
2.90GHz (14.5x 200MHz) |
3.20GHz (16x 200MHz) |
3.33GHz
(25x 133MHz) |
2.93GHz (22 x 133MHz) |
2.80GHz
(21x 133MHz) |
2.66GHz
(20x 133MHz) |
2.66GHz (20 x 133MHz) |
3.33GHz (25 x 133MHz) |
| Max turbo frequency |
3.6GHz |
3.3GHz |
N/A |
N/A |
N/A |
N/A |
3.6GHz |
3.6GHz |
3.06GHz |
2.93GHz |
3.2GHz |
3.6GHz |
| Cache |
3MB L2, 6MB L3 |
3MB L2, 6MB L3 |
2MB
L2, 6MB L3 |
2MB
L2, 6MB L3 |
2MB L2 |
1MB
L2, 6MB L3 |
1.5MB
L2, 12MB L3 |
1MB
L2, 8MB L3 |
1MB
L2, 8MB L3 |
1MB
L2, 8MB L3 |
1MB L2, 8MB L3 |
0.5MB L2, 4MB L3 |
| Cores/threads |
6/6 |
6/6 |
4/4 |
4/4 |
4/4 |
2/2 |
6/12 |
4/8 |
4/8 |
4/8 |
4/4 |
2/4 |
| Process |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
32nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
32nm |
| Form factor |
AM3 |
AM3 |
AM3 |
AM3 |
AM3 |
AM3 |
LGA1366 |
LGA1156 |
LGA1366 |
LGA1366 |
LGA1156 |
LGA1156 |
| TDP |
125W |
125W |
125W |
125W |
95W |
80W |
130W |
95W |
130W |
130W |
95W |
87W |
| Motherboard |
ASUS Crosshair IV Formula (890FX) |
ASUS P6T SE (X58)
|
Gigabyte H55M-UD2H (H55) |
ASUS P6T SE (X58) |
Gigabyte H55M-UD2H (H55) |
| BIOS revision |
0502
(26/03/10) |
0704
(11/01/2010)
|
F7 (12/02/2010) |
0704
(11/01/2010) |
F7 (12/02/2010) |
| Memory |
4GB
(2 x 2GB) Kingston DDR3-1,600 |
6GB (3 x 2GB) Crucial
DDR3-1,067 |
4GB (2 x 2GB) Corsair DDR3-1,600 |
6GB (3 x 2GB) Crucial
DDR3-1,067 |
4GB (2 x 2GB) Corsair DDR3-1,600 |
| Memory timings and speed |
9-9-9-24-1T
@ DDR3-1,600 |
7-7-7-20
1T
@ DDR3
1,067 |
9-9-9-24 2T @ DDR3 1,333 |
7-7-7-20
1T
@ DDR3
1,067 |
9-9-9-24 2T @ DDR3 1,333 |
| Graphics card |
Sapphire Radeon HD
5850 1,024MB |
| Graphics driver |
Catalyst 10.2 |
| Disk drive |
Corsair Nova V128GB |
| Operating system |
Windows 7 Ultimate
(64-bit) |
| PSU |
Corsair HX1000W |
*replicated from AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition
**replicated from AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition |
Software
| Benchmarks |
SiSoft
Sandra 2010 (16.26), aggregate bandwidth and memory latency
HEXUS.PiFast to 10m places
CINEBENCH R11.5 multi-CPU, 64-bit
POV-ray 3.7.0 beta 35a
wPrime v2.02
Bibble v5.02 image-processing benchmark - 200 photos
x264 HD v3.0 media-encoding benchmark - both passes noted
7zip v4.65 built-in
file-compression benchmark
Far Cry 2 v1.03 -
1,024x768 medium quality, DX9, and 1,680x1,050 HQ, DX10
Power-consumption
tests - idle and 2D load
Overclocking tests - AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition only
|
Testing notes
Intel's Core i7 980X is in a league of its own - a fact illustrated by its lofty price tag - but AMD will be hoping to best the similarly-priced competition, namely the £230 Core i7 930.
Readers may be interested to know that the asking price of another competing Intel chip - the Core i7 920 - appears to have dropped from just over £200 to £180 in recent weeks. An early attempt to scupper AMD's launch, perhaps?
Focusing solely on AMD's Leo platform, the manufacturer's inability to compete with Intel in terms of raw performance has resulted in tantalising prices. Gone are the days of paying close to £800 for AMD's range-topping processor. Instead, users can now pick up the entire Leo platform - consisting of hexa-core CPU, 800-series chipset and Radeon HD 5800-series graphics for less than £500. You could, rather easily, build a complete PC based on the Leo platform for less than the cost of a single Intel Core i7 980X chip.
A bargain in the making? We'll soon find out. To help make the following graphs easier to digest, each one is accompanied by a simple table illustrating the performance divide between the Phenom II X6 1090T and five hand-picked comparisons; the Phenom II X6 1055T, Phenom II X4 965 BE, Core i7 980X, Core i7 930 and Core i7 920.
