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Ancient AMD Athlon 64 Beats Intel Atom While Using Less Power
Posted by Matt Buchanan at 8:20 AM on August 19, 2008
A few years ago, AMD was the king of performance per watt with its K8 architecture, while Intel kept pushing the Pentium 4 faster and hotter, until it basically had to chunk its NetBurst architecture. So this is something of a nostalgia trip for AMD fanboys: In Tom's Hardware's tests, a 1GHz Athlon 64 2000+ using the years-old K8 architecture "beats the Intel Atom 230 in energy consumption and processing power" and "outperforms [it] in several benchmark tests" even though the Atom chip is running at 1.6GHz chip. How?
In part, because the K8 architecture is just damn good, but also because AMD's 780G desktop platform is more modern—so it has more features too—while the Intel 945GC chipset is old and busted. The AMD system is quieter too, because it doesn't even need a cooling fan. So while the 8-watt Athlon 64 2000+ processor technically uses more power, the AMD system on the whole consumes less than the Intel setup, idling or under a full load. AMD winning at something—between this minor victory and ATI's latest on top of the world, it's almost like the good ol' cutthroat days again. Almost. [Tom's Hardware]
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
ARP
Posted 8:56 AM 19/8/08
I hope the popularity of netbooks will finally help bring performance per watt back as a valid means of reviewing chips. It's too bad AMD was forced to compete by upping raw horsepower because of the marketing might of Intel and consumer ignorance. This is similar to what is happening now in the Megapixel wars in digicams.
Now that Intel finally has backed away from putting a flashing GHz marquee number on every chip, hopefully the better chip will prevail.
ARP
Reilaos~
Posted 8:53 AM 19/8/08
Does the Athlon have the incredibly small size thing down, though?
Reilaos~
ZekeSulastin
Posted 8:45 AM 19/8/08
@twilight-arc: If they do that, they're just as bad as Intel - they should improve upon it and truly defeat them!
ZekeSulastin
twilight-arc
Posted 8:42 AM 19/8/08
Maybe AMD should simply rebrand their old chip?
twilight-arc
lsim001
Posted 8:37 AM 19/8/08
I'm not a super techie but this sounds like Intel just reinvented the wheel...except that the new wheel isn't as good as the old one but has a fancier name. Sounds like great marketing.
lsim001
mhlaxp
Posted 8:34 AM 19/8/08
So can I get that new mini-Inspiron with one? Of course not. Curse you, Intel!
On another note, anyone who understands this stuff know if a dye shrink and a little elbow grease could put AMD on top of Intel's jazz in future ultra-mobile junk? Or is this info just good for laughing at Intel?
mhlaxp
VakeroRokero
Posted 8:34 AM 19/8/08
I'm glad AMD is back, Intel is taking too long to make something better than the Core 2 Duo, and 8 cores in 3 years is too long in computer years.
VakeroRokero
jkr's bold comment
Posted 8:25 AM 19/8/08
That image scream, romp pounding. Somebody's been a bad, bad boy.
jkr's bold comment
Fourthletter
Posted 9:25 AM 19/8/08
Technically impressive [always loved my old Athlon 64 3000+]
But I think Atom is designed to be two things, small & cheap. If AMD can equal that then my next netbook will be AMD.
Also will the 2000+ chip include support of SSE3 & 4 ?
Fourthletter
bitgod
Posted 9:31 AM 19/8/08
I'm waiting for a Nano system to come out to use for a new quiet server, wonder if I should just switch to my old Athlon 64 I have sitting around doing nothing. I think it was a 3000+ though, or maybe that was after the OC. Hrmmm, don't recall.
bitgod
geowrian
Posted 11:16 AM 19/8/08
@Fourthletter: No it doesn't support SSE3 or SSE4, but they are extremely rarely used in any typical user application. Only a very small handful require them. It'd be nice to have more SSE supported added to the chip, but I don't think it's worth putting the $$$ into.
geowrian
DisposableInterloper
Posted 10:58 AM 19/8/08
w00t!
I'm so happy that AMD is starting to become a serious competitor again. Now all that needs to happen is for Intel to make a new chipset that'll promise to wipe the floor with AMD, and the processor war shall resume on a new front. Hell, with the way this is shaping up, I wouldn't be surprised if Via would jump in the fray too.
DisposableInterloper
Ryanraven
Posted 1:06 PM 19/8/08
I would enjoy intel's secret weapon! Actually.......i would like to see Nvidia's :)
Ryanraven
bjarnia
Posted 1:31 PM 19/8/08
@VakeroRokero & DisposableInterloper: How is AMD "back"? This is an ancient chip they were testing, now a new one. Read the story.
bjarnia
dingus
Posted 2:27 PM 19/8/08
@lsim001: Intel did that before when they ditched Pentium-M in favor of NutBurst.
dingus
dingus
Posted 2:37 PM 19/8/08
@ZekeSulastin: Intel's culture leads them to redo major portions of their architecture every few years. Sometimes it works (P-M, Core2), and sometimes it doesn't (Netburst, Atom). AMD doesn't have the luxury of starting from scratch that often, so their design process is more modular. Add some more cache here, extra HT links there, and you have a server part like Barcelona. Cut some cache, drop down to two cores, add some clock gating and you have a portable platform like Puma.
dingus
Purple Dave
Posted 7:30 PM 19/8/08
@dingus:
And sometimes Intel just uses AMD architecture as their "R&D". Right after selling their old gimpy chip designs to Apple.
Purple Dave
PigVenus
Posted 9:49 PM 19/8/08
@ARP: I agree, performance per watt benchmarks make the most sense, but only so long as the CPU under test delivers the minimum required horsepower to satisfy the user's requirements. A super efficient CPU is worthless as an entertainment center CPU if it can't even decode DVD/Blu-ray in real time.
It would probably be a bad move for AMD to try to die-shrink this and sell it as an Atom competitor. Usually even the most mundane of die-shrinks take some time and have some hiccups. It would probably just be safer to just re-release this line of chips and underclock them.
PigVenus
aR-Tard
Posted 12:25 AM 20/8/08
@VakeroRokero: Intel promised us 32 cores by 2013 if I remember right..
aR-Tard
Echostrike
Posted 10:01 AM 19/8/08
...cracking open a commador right now to see if ALL old tech pwns.....
Echostrike
w1lster
Posted 8:51 AM 19/8/08
Am I the only one that realized the Athlon is 10 times the size of the Atom. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. I'd like to see AMD fit an Athlon 64 and its chipset in a nettop device.
w1lster