Test notes
Although we used the results from our Socket AM3 Phenom II review, we did a little hedge trimming and left out several configurations. The Core 2 Extreme QX9775 "Skulltrail" config and Core 2 Extreme QX9770 were the first to go, since the QX9770 is discontinued now, and the QX9775 setup's high asking price would make our scatter plots harder to read. Besides, we really wouldn't recommend blowing three large on a pair of Core 2 processors today, since the Core i7 is available.
We also removed our DDR3-powered Phenom II X4 810 setup for consistency's sake. That shouldn't be particularly consequential, because the X4 810 performed almost identically in our real-world tests regardless of the memory type we used. If you'd like to see the DDR3 performance results anyway, feel free to check out our review.
As for our remaining setups, we carried over several little testing peculiarities: our Core 2 Quad Q8200 is actually an underclocked Q8300, the Phenom II X4 920 is an underclocked X4 940, and the Core 2 Quad Q9550 is an underclocked Core 2 Extreme QX9650. We expect the performance of these "simulated" CPUs to be identical to the real things, but we kept some of them out of our power consumption testing because we do anticipate power use would vary slightly from the actual products.
Our testing methods
As ever, we did our best to deliver clean benchmark numbers. Tests were run at least three times, and the results were averaged.
Our test systems were configured like so:
| Processor | Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4 GHz |
Core 2 Duo E8400 3.00 GHz Core 2 Duo E8600 3.33 GHz Core 2 Quad Q8200 2.33 GHz Core 2 Quad Q9300 2.5 GHz Core 2 Quad Q9400 2.66 GHz Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83 GHz |
Core i7-940 2.66 GHz Core i7-940 2.93 GHz |
Core i7-965 Extreme 3.2 GHz |
Athlon 64 X2 6400+ 3.2 GHz |
Phenom X3 8750 2.4 GHz |
Phenom II X4 920 2.8 GHz Phenom II X4 940 3.0 GHz |
| Phenom X4 9950 Black 2.6 GHz |
Phenom II X3 720 2.8 GHz Phenom II X4 810 2.6 GHz |
||||||
| System bus | 1066 MT/s (266 MHz) |
1333 MT/s (333 MHz) |
QPI 4.8 GT/s (2.4 GHz) |
QPI 6.4 GT/s (3.2 GHz) |
HT 2.0 GT/s (1.0 GHz) |
HT 3.6 GT/s (1.8 GHz) | HT 3.6 GT/s (1.8 GHz) |
| HT 4.0 GT/s (2.0 GHz) | HT 4.0 GT/s (2.0 GHz) | ||||||
| Motherboard | Asus P5E3 Premium | Asus P5E3 Premium | Intel DX58SO | Intel DX58SO | Asus M3A79-T Deluxe | Asus M3A79-T Deluxe | MSI DKA790GX Platinum |
| BIOS revision | 0605 | 0605 | SOX5810J.86A.2260. 2008.0918.1758 |
SOX5810J.86A.2260. 2008.0918.1758 |
0403 | 0403 | 11/25/08 |
| 1.6 (1/21/09) | |||||||
| North bridge | X48 Express MCH | X48 Express MCH | X58 IOH | X58 IOH | 790FX | 790FX | 790GX |
| South bridge | ICH9R | ICH9R | ICH10R | ICH10R | SB750 | SB750 | SB750 |
| Chipset drivers | INF Update 9.0.0.1008 Matrix Storage Manager 8.5.0.1032 |
INF Update 9.0.0.1008 Matrix Storage Manager 8.5.0.1032 |
INF update 9.1.0.1007 Matrix Storage Manager 8.5.0.1032 |
INF update 9.1.0.1007 Matrix Storage Manager 8.5.0.1032 |
AHCI controller 3.1.1540.61 | AHCI controller 3.1.1540.61 | AHCI controller 3.1.1540.61 |
| Memory size | 4GB (2 DIMMs) | 4GB (2 DIMMs) | 6GB (3 DIMMs) | 6GB (3 DIMMs) | 4GB (2 DIMMs) | 4GB (2 DIMMs) | 4GB (2 DIMMs) |
| Memory type | Corsair TW3X4G1800C8DF DDR3 SDRAM |
Corsair TW3X4G1800C8DF DDR3 SDRAM |
Corsair TR3X6G1600C8D DDR3 SDRAM |
Corsair TR3X6G1600C8D DDR3 SDRAM |
Corsair TWIN4X4096-8500C5DF DDR2 SDRAM |
Corsair TWIN4X4096-8500C5DF DDR2 SDRAM |
Corsair TWIN4X4096-8500C5DF DDR2 SDRAM |
| Memory speed (Effective) | 1066 MHz | 1333 MHz | 1066 MHz | 1600 MHz | 800 MHz | 1066 MHz | 1066 MHz |
| CAS latency (CL) | 7 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 5 |
| RAS to CAS delay (tRCD) | 7 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 5 |
| RAS precharge (tRP) | 7 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 5 |
| Cycle time (tRAS) | 20 | 20 | 20 | 24 | 12 | 15 | 15 |
| Command rate | 2T | 2T | 2T | 1T | 2T | 2T | 2T |
| Audio | Integrated ICH9R/AD1988B with SoundMAX 6.10.2.6480 drivers |
Integrated ICH9R/AD1988B with SoundMAX 6.10.2.6480 drivers |
Integrated ICH10R/ALC889 with Realtek 6.0.1.5704 drivers |
Integrated ICH10R/ALC889 with Realtek 6.0.1.5704 drivers |
Integrated SB750/AD2000B with SoundMAX 6.10.2.6480 drivers |
Integrated SB750/AD2000B with SoundMAX 6.10.2.6480 drivers |
Integrated SB750/ALC888 with Realtek 6.0.1.5704 drivers |
| Hard drive | WD Caviar SE16 320GB SATA | ||||||
| Graphics | Radeon HD 4870 512MB PCIe with Catalyst 8.55.4-081009a-070794E-ATI drivers | ||||||
| OS | Windows Vista Ultimate x64 Edition | ||||||
| OS updates | Service Pack 1, DirectX redist update August 2008 | ||||||
Thanks to Corsair for providing us with memory for our testing. Their products and support are far and away superior to generic, no-name memory.
Our single-socket test systems were powered by OCZ GameXStream 700W power supply units. The dual-socket system was powered by a PC Power & Cooling Turbo-Cool 1KW-SR power supply. Thanks to OCZ for providing these units for our use in testing.
Also, the folks at NCIXUS.com hooked us up with a nice deal on the WD Caviar SE16 drives used in our test rigs. NCIX now sells to U.S. customers, so check them out.
The test systems' Windows desktops were set at 1600x1200 in 32-bit color at an 85Hz screen refresh rate. Vertical refresh sync (vsync) was disabled.
We used the following versions of our test applications:
- WorldBench 6 beta 2
- Half-Life 2: Episode Two
- Crysis Warhead
- Far Cry 2
- Unreal Tournament 3 1.3
- Valve VRAD map build benchmark
- Valve Source Engine particle simulation benchmark
- Cinebench R10 64-bit Edition
- POV-Ray for Windows 3.7 beta 29 64-bit
- notfred's Folding benchmark CD 9/28/08 revision
- The Panorama Factory 5.2 x64 Edition
- Windows Media Encoder 9 x64 Edition
- x264 HD benchmark 2.0 with x264 version 0.59.819
- LAME MT 3.97a 64-bit
The tests and methods we employ are usually publicly available and reproducible. If you have questions about our methods, hit our forums to talk with us about them.
