Desktop CPUs: 1H' 2007

Summer dormancy in the IT industry. New products are coming only in autumn, so we can make up some interim conclusions for the year 2007 in the sphere of desktop CPU. Let's start with the high-end sector - no changes so far: only Intel is offering quad-core CPUs which provide a three-fold performance gain in optimized applications. But.. software like that is still a rarity and most applications still load only one CPU core.

Nevertheless, we can state that today dual-core CPUs appear to be the most balanced solution. First, they are already affordable: both Intel and AMD are offering models priced below $100. Secondly, Windows is a multitasking operating system: launch the Task manager and you will see 20-30 various processes which are run in the background. That means, if a game is running, all these processes will not slow it down (and if will, that is insignificant).

Intel offers the most powerful dual-core CPUs. These are various models based on the Conroe core with 4 MB L2 cache, with the system bus 266 MHz and 333 MHz (QPB: 1066 MHz and 1333 MHz, respectively).

Among the CPUs of mid-end pricing category are Conroe processors of 2 MB L2 cache and AMD's top-end processors. The low-end CPUs are Conroe-1M and the remaining AMD's processors. Besides, there is a value category for which Intel has introduced Celeron CPUs based on another modification of the Conroe core.

Celeron CPUs have always been phenomenal: their performance used to be very low (we can even say, there was no performance!), but they did sell solely because a PC can't operate without the CPU! In the end, the PC community quite rightfully called Celeron "a cap for the socket".

But currently Intel is using the Conroe-L core which appears to be a modified Conroe core. The modifications are as follows: the system bus speed has been minimized (200 MHz), so has the L2 cache (to 512 K). The reduction in the number of CPU cores from two to one is in our view an unimportant fact. While testing E2140 and E2160 (both based on Conroe-1M), we found that the reduction in FSB speed and reduction in L2 cache results in an insignificant drop of performance. If we continue reasoning in this way, we can expect quite a decent operating speed from new Celeron processors. To verify this assumption, we purchased the cheapest Celeron 420 running at 1.6 GHz priced $44.

On the reverse side, processors based on the Conroe-L core are easy to distinguish by the number and positioning of capacitors:

The CPU-Z displays the following information:

The utility reports 512 K of L2 cache and FSB=200 MHz (800 MHz QPB). We note that functionally the Conroe-L core is not superior to the elder brethren and supports all the extended instruction sets, starting with MMX up to SSSE3 and EM64T. The same can be said about support for C1E (Enhanced Halt State), Execute DisableBit, and ThermalMonitor 2 .

As regards the physical parameters of the core, the operating power supply voltage is within 1.225V to 1.325BV, the typical heat emission being 35W; the Conroe-L core is manufactured following the 65 nm process technology.

To make the tests be impartial, we purchased an AMD processor. In fact, since the moment of release of Conroe we shared unfairly with the products of this company because of the unattractive "price/performance" ratio. But now AMD has significantly pushed the prices down for both the single-core (at price, they equaled Intel Celeron) and dual-core CPUs. To find out how competitive modern processors are, we purchased one of the cheapest dual-core processors - Athlon X2 4200+. Its retail price is $90; it is as much as that for E2140 based on Conroe-1M.

The CPU-Z displays the following information:

We compare this processor versus the 1-year old model - the single-core 3500+ (currently, a CPU like that costs $50 and is a competitor to Celeron).

It is easy to see that the only difference is in the second core in the 4200+ model. Evidently, it's just this fact which allowed AMD to raise the performance index by 700 points.

Overclocking

The overclocking capability of Conroe-L has turned out to be not as impressive as it was in Conroe-1M, but nevertheless we attained 3 GHz without much efforts.

The overclocking of Athlon X2 4200+ proved disappointing - the maximum stable frequency was 2.75 GHz,

which fully meets the overclocking of 3500+ released a year ago.

This means only one thing: a complete lack of any progress in terms of technical advancement in AMD.

Performance

In our test setup, we used the following hardware:

Let's first take a look at the results of synthetic tests.

These are exclusively synthetic benchmarks which demonstrate the theoretical performance.

Tests of gaming applications

Final Words

The most important is: however surprising it is, the performance of Conroe-L core even at a small clock speed(1.6 GHz) is so high that it makes it possible to compete against the best processors of the NetBurst architecture. It's just this fact which does not let us call Celeron "a cap for the socket"; this is a full-fledged processor which provides quite a decent performance level!

Secondly, the reasonable pricing policy of AMD allows to maintain a competitive edge for its products. In particular, the 4200+ model provides the speed comparable to that of the CPUs based on Conroe-1M. But no more than that! If you are indeed into a high performance at reasonable price (good value for money), we can give the only advice - choose a CPU based on Conroe with 2 or 4 MB L2 cache.

The third conclusion, also important: the NetBurst architecture is dead. That means there is no one reasonable argument in favor of purchasing one of such processors (including the best models on the Presler core)!

We are now moving on to the most exciting part - the overclocking. At that, we can only make a simple and one-one conclusion: if the user is familiar to the overclocking principles and has the required knowledge and skills, he would be able to attain the top performance with minimum money. But he can only get that with only CPUs on Conroe core (any of the available modifications)! The lower Conroe models do not require additional costs in the form of powerful cooling or an expensive motherboard.

There is one point, though: the PSU must be of high quality.

A high-quality PSU must be fitted inside even the weakest computer, since that is the most important system component which determines the functioning of the whole PC!

All the conclusions which we arrived at will hold true until at least end of 2007, and you can safely use them when purchasing (or upgrading) your computer. The only point to note: before the Christmas sales we will conduct additional investigation of attraction for the CPUs. By the end of the year, there may be released new CPU models and, besides that, the pricing policies of the manufacturers may change .

Conclusion

Best CPU for multitasking computations

• 4-core Intel Core 2 Quad;

Best performance CPU

• Intel Core (Conroe) (4 MB L2);

Best "price/performance" CPU

• Other versions of Conroe core with L2=2MB;

Best inexpensive CPU

• Intel Conroe-1M;
• AMD Windsor;

Best value (most affordable!) CPU

• Intel Celeron (Conroe-L);

Best CPU for overclocking

• Only Intel Conroe (of any modification);