Toms Hardware guide biased?

[Neuromancer]

It is just too bad that the place where one reviews there information doesn't change the facts...

Sure, the i7 had a 160mhz advantage in the tests where the phenom II could stabalize itself, but that 160mhz is no excuse for the annihilation the core i7 exhibits against the phenom II.

The memory difference is due to their architectures. I guess they could have given phenom II 8gb, but is 4gb the phenom II's sweet spot like they say?

The motherboard may make an incy wincy difference, but probably not so much so than maybe 1 or two seconds or 2-3% increase and/or decrease in some the benchmarks.

I have my core i7 at 4.1ghz with turbo right now, and I compare my benchmarks to your guy's on here, and I'm averaging about 30% higher on every benchmark, and on some close to 100%. But, like they say, you get what you pay for.


One thing is for sure: if all you mainly do is game, then the phenom II won't let you down!!!

Yup, definitly better for gaming. Especially if you consider the avg 250 savings is the differnce between a 280 and a 295

So PII has the price/performance, if not outright performance, in medium res and higher gaming, normal desktop usage (websurfing etc) but loses in synthetic benchmarks, like winRAR and half of the CPU benchmarks.

I was pretty happy with my move from intel to phenom 9950BE, but was going to go back to Intel when I could afford i7. After reading some of these reviews though, I gotta say, I have got to do more research, because, some of these reviews seem to be showing that intel has the better benchmarker not hte better product. (Much like nVidia users claimed of the ATI vs nVidia stuff the last few gens, better gaming in nVidia higher 3dmark scores with ATi...)

i7 is without a doubt the more interesting common overclockers choice, with triple channel 2GHz ram and 4+ GHz being readily achieved. With 6+GHz Going on the phenoms, I would say PII is the more interesting extreme overclockers choice.

For the rest of us,

I for one am pretty sold, since upgrading to a PII will cost me $235 for a 920 and not 700+ dollars for a cheap i7 setup.

Although with AM3 boards around the corner, DDR3 prices are going to drop soon, and the AM3 boards are going to be hot, so expect some price gouging on that front... that will definitly close the price differnce, since I am sure intel will have released a p55 chipset in the 150 range by then...

edit:

...as has been pointed out the i7 fares significantly better on synthetic benches than it does in real applications. It's a great chip, but aside from encoding it's not the huge leap forward that C2D was over netbust. It's an evolutionary move forward.

I am glad I am not hte only one who noticed that

One thing though. The guru 3d review shows the PII performing very well in the encoding area, something that has been historically an intel arena. Less then 20% differnce. This is big jump for AMD.

 

[EarthDog]

A little coherent thought by those reading the reviews would be helpful as the review no matter how it was conducted provides information that is useful to those who can read, interpreter and interpolate.

Wow...I can read between the lines on that one.

 

[Enablingwolf]

One thing though. The guru 3d review shows the PII performing very well in the encoding area, something that has been historically an intel arena. Less then 20% differnce. This is big jump for AMD.

Why I was mentioning encoding. The PII is showing a good and very nice increase in this type of use.

Cost per unit of transcodoing(10 minute video blocks) is well worth it on an AMD. Has been for some time now. What I read so far, it only looks better now. Once you break down how much, or should I say less power they consume. It will even save that much more in the long run. Plus you can have a nice and silent machine too. Them low power AMD chips makes really nice silent machines.

 

[EarthDog]

Let me first say wolf you are correct. However let me play Devil's Advocate here...

I keep hearing this power thing... and while that is great for data centers, what does that have to do with a user and his PC? I mean the difference in wattage even if you encoded 24/7/365 that would save you what, $50 /year ? Now divide that by the actual time you encode and it wont even save 5 cents /year.

Am I off?

 

[TimoneX]

See any of these folding farms several of the guys here on OC forums have setup? Cut total system power consumption by 10w/system and it would show up on the power bill. FAH tends to be truly 24/7, but w/ EIST, C1E, CnQ, powerplay, etc. the power consumption of a modern computer drops dramatically. The first time I hooked my main rig to a killawatt meter & ran complete tests I stopped disabling EIST & C1E. If I cannot OC with them on then I won't OC. Here I am at 3.8Ghz and power consumption at idle is 92w. At load it's a whopping 320w.

 

[EarthDog]

Yes folders too...my Devil's advocate point still remains true though. I would bet maybe 10 members out of the entire site are data center managers, And maybe another 100 actually have folding farms (to me thats more than 5 PCs) active here. I dont know, personally, I could care less about power consumption. I F@H with my GPU only and my rig sits at 280W consumption oof my PCs. If I need to save money, I will stop folding to make a real difference. Im not trying to be a negative nancy or anything, thats just how I feel about it.

EIST and C1E are idle power management features right? And that wouldnt have much if anything to do with folders since it 100% load anyway...

For the record, I have never had problems overclocking with EIST and C1E on...though I know its an issue for some.

 

[TimoneX]

Correct, they are idle power reducing schemes which is why all the focus on TDP processor specs. Heck if i7 used allot less power than C2Q at load I would probably have swapped out. I could have justified the up front cost for lower power bills. Hopefully the new "e" C2Qs will have lower power gulping figures at load and not just idle.

Electricity isn't even all that silly pricey here in MI, but I can tell from the power bill just how "into" that new LAN game the kids are just by looking at my power bill history. Many places have far higher power rates.

 

[hooflung]

The reviews are just biased. Noone here or anywhere in their right mind is going to say the i7 isn't the best chip on the market technology wise. However, it seems that the people who bought the i7 or thinking about it just can't wrap their heads around the fact that we don't care.

The Phenom II is a fine processor. It has not been benchmarked very well at all on most sites. Especially some of the bigger named sites where they seem to have their heads up their asses and a grudge against the PII not being an i7 class chip.

In reality, their are only a handful of *insightful* reviewers who aren't armchair techies. Anandtech is one of those guys who knows his stuff. Not to mention the fact that the reviewers are just crap, pitting hardware that isn't comparable -when comparable setups are available to them- and then coming up with price conclusions influenced by incomparable setups. IE, trying to tell me that the Core 2 Duo option is still as cheap and just as fast if not faster when they didn't even test that, but instead used X48 / DDR3 / 12mb cache CPU's.

That is why I am pretty miffed at the review sites. They hold a lot of clout to purchasers and they are doing their damned to push out corrupted data. Phenom II fans, or other interested parties just want to see how much it can fight but we knew it was already a conceded battle. And it sounds like most of the posters in this thread rooting for i7 just want to keep rubbing it in just for kicks. To me its thread fodder and borderline trolling.

 

[TimoneX]

I welcome their opinions, but yeah there has to be that price to cost ratio factored into any conclusion. The Phenom II's real nemesis is C2Q not i7 at least until DDR3 prices drop further.

 

[EarthDog]

I welcome their opinions, but yeah there has to be that price to cost ratio factored into any conclusion. The Phenom II's real nemesis is C2Q not i7 at least until DDR3 prices drop further.

Agreed.

On the flipside, you want the best, you have to pay for the best. The Corvette ZR1 may be as fast as a Ferrari F430, but its still no Ferrari. they both have their place in the market.

 

[TimoneX]

Best is relative though. Here in MI both the Chevy & the F430 would be in the garage half the year. Plus our crappy roads would eat your sports cars. I know I blow out 17" tires on the beaten up highways. The Hummer though would pwn all! Defeated only by the corner gas station.

 

[EarthDog]

Like I mentioned in my late edit... they both have their market.

 

[TimoneX]

...yeah SoCal. Bastahhds.

Can you tell I miss my GSR rice burning hot rod? Just collecting cold in the garage. Here it is midday, the warmest it's likely to get today...all of -12c. Crap I hate winter.

 

[EarthDog]

**sighs** I miss by old boosted Si....(TL-S now though. ). Nothing like a 9k redline ehh (8.5 in your case on that b18c1?)? LOL

/threadjack - sorry.

 

[TimoneX]

Hardly. 9.2k TYVM. ...and thank you Hondata, Crower, performance engineering, etc...

 

[KTE]

The last time I was on THG forums was circa 2004 and we knew of their Intel bias even in their forum, which was heavily shilled and the place where most Intel and some AMD brand fanatics were born who've spread around now. Some reviews were very Intel biased and some were very AMD biased. In the end, their competance at presenting factual, undistorted, repeatable and reliable data was none. After that, I quit reading the place.

Very recently, they have started presenting articles above others in the IT journalism field. However, as soon as they seem to get going on the road to success, they let out a stinker which makes their previous ill reputation magnet flying back.

Their Deneb article was poorly done for the first few pages, however their more professional looking chart comparisons were not too bad, at least compared to the rest...

Some of you guys have mentioned the key traps already and I'll just present some data. The sites showing very wild data aren't THG, AT, etc, but others. THG actually stacks up very well this time around.

For now, see these charts, the rest are not public yet:
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/DXc7XxiOtUIThB0WUItgmQ?feat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/tuj-BFN9Es5874fQjS_5KA?feat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Ke3OPyG8OkxePDj99gWQAA?feat=directlink


The Deneb review list I used can be found here: http://www.lostcircuits.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=379#p379

The data speaks for itself... variation is huge in terms of actual numbers, percentages and the end conclusion it portrays for each benchmark to the reader.

 

[Rick James]

**sighs** I miss by old boosted Si....(TL-S now though. ). Nothing like a 9k redline ehh (8.5 in your case on that b18c1?)? LOL

/threadjack - sorry.

Nothing like no torque at all and a weedwhacker exhaust

 

[TimoneX]

tsk tsk

We're too good for these stereo types are we not superfreak? I'll tell you what when my car hits vtec x-over at 6200RPM it sounds like a day at Daytona not a day of yardwork.

 

[Rick James]

tsk tsk

We're too good for these stereo types are we not superfreak? I'll tell you what when my car hits vtec x-over at 6200RPM it sounds like a day at Daytona not a day of yardwork.

Actually i was just flashing back to my 02 cavalier Z24 with those comments.

I've driven a new SI and i don't really understand how anyone could stand that on a daily basis. No power at all till after 6000rpm.

Gas is cheap so i'll be sticking with my V8

 

[EarthDog]

Nothing like no torque at all and a weedwhacker exhaust

tsk tsk

We're too good for these stereo types are we not superfreak? I'll tell you what when my car hits vtec x-over at 6200RPM it sounds like a day at Daytona not a day of yardwork.

Nope. I had a very quiet exhuast...but you would still be able to hear it being behind me in a race anyway...

(ok seriously, done threadjacking, PM me to continue making fun of my 12 second car... )