1600x1200 Gaming with Core 2 and CrossFire on 975X

D

Destroyo

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Joined
Jul 14, 2006
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6
"We test Intel's Core 2 Duo and Extreme using real-world gaming. Don't let a bunch of canned benchmarks lie to you about gaming performance, real gameplay experience tells a different story. Unless of course you game at 800x600."

Those were the words of Kyle. Now, I completely agree that no one likes to game at 800x600. So here are the 1600x1200 with the key difference: Crossfire setups. No one likes to game with an obsolete graphic card, now, do they?

Don't give me that bullshit that no one can afford to game with SLI. If you can buy an expensive top of the line processor, why not complement your system with top of the line graphics? In other words, why hamper your CPU capabilities because of your GPU? *cough* Kyle *cough*

Our gaming performance analysis starts out with Quake 4 running at 1600 x 1200 with High Quality visual settings. We used version 1.2 of Quake 4 and SMP was enabled:
http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/core2duolaunch_07130680720/12587.png
-----
Our F.E.A.R. test should be fairly familiar by now, as it is the built in performance test included with the game. Computer settings were left at "Maximum" while the graphics settings were set to "High" with the resolution cranked up to 1600 x 1200. F.E.A.R. ends up still being more GPU than CPU bound at these settings, even with a pair of X1900 XTs at its disposal, but we do see some separation among the processors:
[IMG]http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/core2duolaunch_07130680720/12591.png
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Rise of Legends is a newcomer to our game benchmark suite and what an excellent addition it is. This Real Time Strategy game looks very good and plays well too; it serves as good filler until the next Command & Conquer title eventually arrives for those looking for a RTS fix. We ran with the resolution set to 1600 x 1200 and the graphics settings set to the medium defaults. We recorded a custom playback of a 3 vs. 2 multiplayer battle and played it back at 4x speed, recording the average frame rate for 10 minutes of the battle. The 10 minutes we focused on contained a good mix of light skirmishes between opponents, base/resource management with very few characters on the screen and of course some very large scale battles.
[IMG]http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/core2duolaunch_07130680720/12593.png
-----
Oblivion has never been kind to Intel's NetBurst processors, but it loves the new Core 2 processors:
[IMG]http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/core2duolaunch_07130680720/12589.png

[IMG]http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/core2duolaunch_07130680720/12590.png[[/CENTER]

[url]http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2795&p=13[/url]


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they convienetly dont say that they max out the ingame setting they just put it at a higher resolution.

I want to see the benchmarks with all ingame eye candy turned on as what they did is just another way to make things look worse then they may be

did he just call a 7900 obsolete ?
 
"Our gaming performance analysis starts out with Quake 4 running at 1600 x 1200 with High Quality visual settings. We used version 1.2 of Quake 4 and SMP was enabled:"
 
dajet24 said:
they convienetly dont say that they max out the ingame setting they just put it at a higher resolution.

I want to see the benchmarks with all ingame eye candy turned on as what they did is just another way to make things look worse then they may be

did he just call a 7900 obsolete ?
Click to expand...

Obsolete when compared to whats available and what CPUs are offering.
a single 7900GTX is obsolete on it's own considering whats available.

I would love to see resuts on a 7950 SLI setup...
 
They didn't call a 7900 obselete, but there are no nForce boards to test SLI with Conroe on yet.
 
Hey dude! Learn to read an article!

"When it comes to playing games, the only persons that need to be even a little concerned with upgrading their CPU to a Core 2 processor might be those with high-end SLI, CrossFire, or GeForce GX2 video cards and we have yet to prove that due to the testing limitations we ran into."
 
DimFilter said:
Hey dude! Learn to read an article!

"When it comes to playing games, the only persons that need to be even a little concerned with upgrading their CPU to a Core 2 processor might be those with high-end SLI, CrossFire, or GeForce GX2 video cards and we have yet to prove that due to the testing limitations we ran into."
Click to expand...

So then why don't you drop your resolution as a second test to see what you'd get with a lower resolution if you were going to bottleneck and if you knew, just to see what the performance difference would be?
 
StealthyFish said:
So then why don't you drop your resolution as a second test to see what you'd get with a lower resolution if you were going to bottleneck and if you knew, just to see what the performance difference would be?
Click to expand...

Let's just be honest here, some folks just might be a little *hyper* at seeing AMD spanked like that. By maxing out the GPU and slowing the systems down, AMD doesn't look so bad.
 
Yeah i'm *hyper*. I could give a damn. I know Conroe is the truth in the near term. It just pisses me off when OP makes it out like the review is wilful deception. Here let me spam Anand graphs all over creation.

I want one just like everyone else. :)
 
Why are you so enraged...[H] uses a single GTX and they are not striving to provide apples to apples comparisons, they never have. They find the max playable game settings with both set-ups, and when you are @ 1600x1200 w/4xaa and 16xAF on a single card you are talking about GPU limitation

They have evaluations of things other than gaming if you would like to read those
 
From HARDOCP:

when core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


when athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."

Can someone say f4n boi?
 
cupholder2.0 said:
when core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


when athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."

Can someone say f4n boi?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm not liking the non deserved luke-warm reception H gave it...

To be honest I'm only here for the forums...cos Anandtech kicks ass all around
 
gersson said:
Yeah, I'm not liking the non deserved luke-warm reception H gave it...

To be honest I'm only here for the forums...cos Anandtech kicks ass all around
Click to expand...


That was from [H] btw. And yes, Anandtech is one of the best. lol
 
gersson said:
Yeah, I'm not liking the non deserved luke-warm reception H gave it...

To be honest I'm only here for the forums...cos Anandtech kicks ass all around
Click to expand...

Unfortunately for H, their reputation is going down the drain. Kyle's bias towards AMD processors is apparent especially when he tests AMD CPUS with LOW-res for gaming performance. No joke, check out the following links:

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=Nzg3LDQsLDIw
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTA2NSw3LCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjI2LDUsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjAyLDQsLGhuZXdz
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NTc1LDQsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0

And I quote him:

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."

The hypocrisy of Kyle's statements are incredulous...
 
Donnie27 said:
Let's just be honest here, some folks just might be a little *hyper* at seeing AMD spanked like that. By maxing out the GPU and slowing the systems down, AMD doesn't look so bad.
Click to expand...

well, then let's get 2 256mb sticks of DDR2 400 and let's run more benchmarks :)
 
Destroyo said:
Unfortunately for H, their reputation is going down the drain. Kyle's bias towards AMD processors is apparent especially when he tests AMD CPUS with LOW-res for gaming performance. No joke, check out the following links:

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=Nzg3LDQsLDIw
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTA2NSw3LCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjI2LDUsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjAyLDQsLGhuZXdz
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NTc1LDQsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0

And I quote him:

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."

The hypocrisy of Kyle's statements are incredulous...
Click to expand...


Nice find destroyo. [H] has lost all their credibility now. Look at how [H] is quick to turn the resolution down for AMD to show the lead on the K8 system.

They use this argument to defend their reviews that used low resolutions. :

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."



When they switched to a Conroe they suddenly contradicted themselves and stated:

"Let's just cut to the chase. You will see a lot of gaming benchmarks today that just simply lie to you. That is right, you will see frames per second numbers that are at best total BS, and at their worst a terrible representation of what difference a new Intel Core 2 processor will make in your gaming experience. The old ways of video game benchmarking do little to tell you about exactly how a new CPU will affect how you play your games or what experience your system supplies to you. Having more CPU power is a very cool thing, but being able to utilize it is not an easy thing to do nowadays.
"


It looks like [H] changes testing methods based on how they want to depict a product. As expected, AMD is portrayed as a miracle and is often congratulated for their “hard work”, but when Intel makes a revolutionary CPU, [H] talks about upcoming price cuts from AMD. Need I say more? Or is the bias clear enough for you to see.



Don’t forget what [H] said:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


When athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
cupholder2.0 said:
Nice find destroyo. [H] has lost all their credibility now. Look at how [H] is quick to turn the resolution down for AMD to show the lead on the K8 system.

They use this argument to defend their reviews that used low resolutions. :

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."



When they switched to a Conroe they suddenly contradicted themselves and stated:

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."

It looks like [H] changes testing methods based on how they want to depict a product. As expected, AMD is portrayed as a miracle and is often congratulated for their “hard work”, but when Intel makes a revolutionary CPU, [H] talks about upcoming price cuts from AMD. Need I say more? Or is the bias clear enough for you to see.



Don’t forget what [H] said:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


When athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Click to expand...

That's pretty sad. I don't know else we can show everyone that Hardforum is biased toward AMD. If you really still don't see this, I don't know what we'll do with you.
 
Hmm so a year ago 640x480 was acceptable but not anymore when it comes to the first decent CPU from Intel in a long time. I do wonder if Kyle could give a valid enough argument for that? I am running AMD btw but want to get back to some smp goodness in the very near future. While calling out on credibility is probably wrong it would be nice to offer a more thorough review asap in my opinion.
 
meanmodda[H] said:
Hmm so a year ago 640x480 was acceptable but not anymore when it comes to the first decent CPU from Intel in a long time. I do wonder if Kyle could give a valid enough argument for that? I am running AMD btw but want to get back to some smp goodness in the very near future. While calling out on credibility is probably wrong it would be nice to offer a more thorough review asap in my opinion.
Click to expand...

lol more like 3 months ago!!

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTA2NSw3LCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==
 
I wonder how well conroe will do in gaming performance with the next-gen dx10 video cards and games compared to AMDs latest offerings.
 
cupholder2.0 said:
Nice find destroyo. [H] has lost all their credibility now. Look at how [H] is quick to turn the resolution down for AMD to show the lead on the K8 system.

They use this argument to defend their reviews that used low resolutions. :

"As usual, we use low-resolution benchmarks to take the video card as far out of the equation as possible. Do not think that the below benchmarks represent a true gaming experience. Today's games are terribly dependent on video cards for their performance, but that does not mean that your CPU still does not play a growing role in your gaming, especially as newer games arrive. (Please check out our article on CPU scaling and your video card from last summer.) Your CPU still has many calculations to do in order to address such things as in-game world physics and AI, plus many other things. Our benchmarks below are designed to show you what CPU can give you the greatest power benefit when gaming although that may not always turn up in a frames per second graph of actual gameplay."



When they switched to a Conroe they suddenly contradicted themselves and stated:

"Let's just cut to the chase. You will see a lot of gaming benchmarks today that just simply lie to you. That is right, you will see frames per second numbers that are at best total BS, and at their worst a terrible representation of what difference a new Intel Core 2 processor will make in your gaming experience. The old ways of video game benchmarking do little to tell you about exactly how a new CPU will affect how you play your games or what experience your system supplies to you. Having more CPU power is a very cool thing, but being able to utilize it is not an easy thing to do nowadays.
"


It looks like [H] changes testing methods based on how they want to depict a product. As expected, AMD is portrayed as a miracle and is often congratulated for their “hard work”, but when Intel makes a revolutionary CPU, [H] talks about upcoming price cuts from AMD. Need I say more? Or is the bias clear enough for you to see.



Don’t forget what [H] said:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


When athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Click to expand...


I second all this , it is pretty sad.Guess everybody suffers from lack of attention from time to time and then surrounds himself with cheerleaders...
 
si0dine said:
I wonder how well conroe will do in gaming performance with the next-gen dx10 video cards and games compared to AMDs latest offerings.
Click to expand...

Much better obviously , today's video drivers aren't even optimized for Conroe.The more powerfull the video card the more Conroe's advantage increases.
This doesn't mean Conroe won't help if you have a weak GPU.

Heck , I imagine Conroe would get more FPS on modern games by SW rendering than a FX5200. ;)
 
savantu said:
Much better obviously , today's video drivers aren't even optimized for Conroe.The more powerfull the video card the more Conroe's advantage increases.
This doesn't mean Conroe won't help if you have a weak GPU.

Heck , I imagine Conroe would get more FPS on modern games by SW rendering than a FX5200. ;)
Click to expand...

lol that may actually be true
 
I'm definitely here just for the forums. Everyone knows Kyle is so heavily AMD-biased that he might as well be on their payroll at this point. It's almost like he's unwilling to except Conroe's superiority, and he's trying to dissuade people from believing it too.

Kyle - People who buy Core 2 Duo processors are NOT going to be gaming at 800x600. So how about you stop the canned benchmarks before HardOCP completely loses whatever is left of its respect in the community.
 
Kyle has, rather surprisingly, stayed well clear of this thread to date. ;)

I do agree the double standards are astounding though, it really is quite sad that a (previously) reputable hardware review site can be so biased towards a particular brand.
 
I like them both. I don't think anyone will say that the built in memory controller hasn't been darn useful in the past few years.

I read the article, and yes I did think to myself "last holdouts for AMD". However, let me point out some benefits of the article as well. We all, as enthusiasts, have a tendency to forget that at high resolution and high eye candy, you can bring nearly every system to its knees. Back when all of us were reading Athlon FX articles, I noticed a few sites showing high res stats, and funny even the P4's didn't do so badly when they were all stacked up trying to do 1920x1200. Back then, that was the res that no common geek was ever going to use. And to be fair, many still don't. But the #'s of folks using high res is growing, and it always will, as it becomes cheaper and cheaper to own that fancy monitor.

Anyway, what I think the article served to remind us of, is that very thing. At very high res the differences in cpu's blur. It is very true that CF and SLI change the game. Just like 1920 lcd's changed it too. But what I think we needed to see, was that if you leave your entire system the same (and many, many folks do not use SLI or CF), and drop in this fancy new cpu, you may not see much difference. Imagine such a person feeling a bit robbed of the promised experience of greatness, and then remember that articles that highlight the many sides of the benefits are good for us. It serves to remind us that the cpu is only part of the game.

What I think was bad about it, was that, as you have a system and it grows older, the most commonly replaced part is the gpu. EVEN if you don't use SLI or CF now, 2 generations of 7900 later (about 1-2 years worth) and you are likely to have cards 2x as fast as 7900 SLI. That's the painful penalty of SLI, it costs a lot to be so little ahead of the curve, timewise. But...there are folks who need or just want that, even at a price. Anyway, if the gpu goes 2x or 4x faster and you still have the same cpu, what then, is the better cpu now at a given price? Don't just blurt an answer, no matter which side you are on. At a given price point it is worthy of just looking carefully at what you want. I personally think Conroe has the cards right now, but that's because I'll buy at the top end. In the middle, and at every level, you can expect AMD to put up a price fight. So no, I don't think a win for one side or the other is a done deal.

Anyway there are other strong points of the architectures at hand. Do be aware how many times Intel has made you go out and replace your whole system to make a cpu upgrade. Think about how many upgrades socket 939 owners got. Now, do you believe a 45nm Kentsfield is going to absolutely run on every 975/590 motherboard out there? Do you instead believe that AMD's quad core will happily drop into the AM2 socket and start up without a hitch? These are the subtle things. Keep them in mind.

I believe the value in the many hardware sites that exist is that they have the opportunity to view things in many ways. This tends to paint the fuller picture of just what your money buys you. Yes you have to read between the lines. But I don't think that another cut and dry review of how Conroe rocks was what everyone needed. There are tons of those. What people need is to learn the subtleties about what works and what doesn't, about what you gain for your money, and what things "seem" like a great deal but might not be for some users. So I agree with the poster, in that with SLI/CF or a future vid card, Conroe is a great chip. What I also agree with is [H] showing us that there are instances where the chip isn't nearly as spectacular as some reviews want you to believe. We need to see both, so we understand the full picture. That makes us wiser buyers, whether we agree with an article or not.

$.02
 
To the thread starter: You might want to edit out those linked images, it's taking bandwidth away from anandtech without people even visiting the site. (and anandtech basically gets no traffic/advertising revenue)

edit: Those Rise of Ledgends numbers are insane. The performance difference of the E6300 and E6600 is rather large though (almost 50%) for it's clockspeed difference. Perhaps it's the 4MB cache flexing?
 
"Look Mum how high I can jump without the GPU limitation !"
nsojsjkf.gif


On a more serious note , If you guys check the Display forums , there´s a lot of people that are playing in nasty resolutions , all well above 1600x1200 because of the native wide aspect ratio of the new 20-24" , say 16:10 etc..

I would love to see some head to head action , a review with SLI or XFire is in order to the real gaming performance that people actually play.

As I said before the review was not flawed but quite incomplete.
 
cupholder2.0 said:
From HARDOCP:

when core 2 launched:


"I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."


when athlon 64 launched:


"The Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 FX 51 should be considered AMD engineering marvels. Kudos to the engineers at AMD for their hard work on the K8 core; they certainly deserve it."

Can someone say f4n boi?
Click to expand...

Let me join the fray:
Did intel slash prices by almost 50% when the K8 was launched? QED.
Erc said:
"Look Mum how high I can jump without the GPU limitation !"
nsojsjkf.gif


On a more serious note , If you guys check the Display forums , there´s a lot of people that are playing in nasty resolutions , all well above 1600x1200 because of the native wide aspect ratio of the new 20-24" , say 16:10 etc..

I would love to see some head to head action , a review with SLI or XFire is in order to the real gaming performance that people actually play.

As I said before the review was not flawed but quite incomplete.
Click to expand...
show me someone with the top-of-the-line xfire solution and I show you at least seven people without.


hardware AMD intel dell ATi nvidia asus seagate samsung xeon compaq
 
I personally don't think H is biased towards either AMD or Intel, but rather, the remarks in the Core 2 Review have been harshly altered by the Hype Intel has been generating towards Conroe. Huge benchamarks showing how amazing their processors are, 20fps gains in leading games, etc.

I mean, yes, those statements made by Kyle (and whoever else wrote the review) DO seem biased, yet, had Conroe kicked the pants off of AMD's offerings (gaming, not just "lifestyle stuff") and the processor had lived up to the HUGE benchmarks Intel had released earlier, then I'm sure Kyle's choice for words would have been different. But, they don't. Sure, superpi 1M in under 20 seconds on Air is amazing, but to be honest, 1fps in most games (95% off of Intel's claim) would have smugly lead any tester towards some in-benchmark Bias. I don't think there's anyone here that wouldn't like to review something that's supposed to be the "next technological marvel" and have it come out maybe only 10% on top.

Honestly, I was a little sad to see that Conroe DIDN't destroy AMD's offerings in gaming, re-affirming the view that Today's Games Need Better Graphics Cards. Even as an AMD fan (Well, for the desktop platform anyways, I'd never consider AMD for a laptop), I'm always excited to see new technology, but I have no tollerance towards fugged benchmarks, as that shows X company's PR team is LYING to their customer base.

I'm just glad we got some real numbers.
 
drizzt81 said:
show me someone with the top-of-the-line xfire solution and I show you at least seven people without.
Click to expand...

I agree 100% with you.
:cool: .However to see the big picture you can´t limite you review at only those resolutions.
You have to see the benchs at low resolutions ( to compare CPUs and not make the GPU the main factor ) , where you "think" the people are playing ( as 1280x1024 , what this review was about ) and test the big guns ( SLI , XFIRE ando some overclock in the mix ).

Only then you can make a bold statement like (the now famous) : "I would advise everyone that is thinking of rushing out and purchasing their latest upgrade that we are sure to see HUGE pricing slashes out of AMD before the end of the month."

I´m expecting too much ? I´m insane ?
 
show me someone with the top-of-the-line xfire solution and I show you at least seven people without.
Click to expand...

Funny you say that cos I'm actually looking for Core 2 Duo as part of my Crossfire setup. I knew I was CPU limited in Oblivion and Anand's tests confirm my suspicion. I was getting the same performance with HDR+2xAA, HDR+4xAA, HDR+2xAAA. Mostly the low FPS are my problem. Hope my low average can make a nice little jump.
 
drizzt81 said:
Let me join the fray:
Did intel slash prices by almost 50% when the K8 was launched? QED.
Click to expand...



A few months ago, Intel dropped the price of Pentium Ds and many other CPUs significantly. My Pentium D 950 used to cost 750 dollars, it now costs less than 300. The pentium D 940 can be found for 170 at frys along with a motherboard (Keep in mind that not so long ago that CPU cost 500+). Then we also have the Pentium D 805 which is a 100 dollar CPU, it OCs very well. Soon the Pentium 4 524 and other 5 series will drop below 70 dollars.. Don't talk about value and AMD, AMD sucks at it now(For the most part). Intel even without conroe wins in Performance per price. Once conroe comes, EVEN IF AMD cuts prices by over 50 percent, it won't be enough for them to match intel. If you made the FX-62 cost 500, it still gets murdered by the E6600. Not to forget the E6600 OCs far better, uses less power and costs less.
 
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