Shocking Performance from Athlon II!

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PGHammer

2[H]4U
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I just helped a family member with their move-up from an older HP desktop to a newer one (both are low-end HP Pavilion towers). While the older Pavilion had 2 GB of RAM and a Pentium DC, the newer model featured an all-AMD core (Athlon II CPU and HD4200 graphics) and 4 GB of RAM. This actually makes the *second* time I had run into a version of this combo; however, this is the first time I'd seen it in *desktop clothes* (the Pavilion line of notebooks uses the mobile version of the HD4200 paired with a Turion64 CPU, also from AMD).

One thing they have in common - feed them at least 4 GB of RAM and they go through applications like piranhas at a political convention. (The A-II sports a processor WEI in Windows 7 HP x64 of 7.2, which is awfully high for a dual-core CPU of any sort; let alone one clocked bone-stock.)

While I'm a great fan of AMD's GPUs, I hadn't really been one of AMD's *desktop CPUs* (loved the Opteron; Athlons, not so much). However, if AMD can keep wringing performance like this from the low-end stuff, they could win converts.
 
Could? They already have: In the General Hardware subforum, we haven't recommended that many Pentium Dual Core or even a C2Q/C2D based setups in the past year and a half.
 
Yup. AMD owns the below $200 range. They had the $200 but the i5-750 took that crown away. They definitely made a convert out of me. Gave me a very fast triple core proc for $70!

They did own the entire GPU market but now the new GTX400 line has taken care of that especially now that the GTX470 and 480 have finally dropped in price to the 5870/5850 line.
 
Which processor was this? My Phenom II 550BE OC'd to 3.7 only scores 6.8 :-(
 
I think even at 200 AMD is very competitive. The 6 core 1055 is quite a steal for 200.
 
Almost all the builds I have been doing for people lately have been using AMD X3 and X4 CPU's. My personal P2 X2 555BE purchase for my HTPC, has to be one of the most rewarding purchases per dollar that I have ever made right up there with my old E4300 and Mobile A64 3000+. I mean unlocked to quad and easily does 3.6Ghz at stock voltage for $85 (was on sale with discount code at ewiz) is 100% goodness in my opinion.
 
I got my X4 965 for $150 because the local vendor didn't know what to do with it. lol They thought nobody would buy it.
 
mhenley said:
Which processor was this? My Phenom II 550BE OC'd to 3.7 only scores 6.8 :-(
Click to expand...

mine at stock gets the same. I unlocked the two extra cores and now its at 7.3 :D

haven't tried overclocking it while unlocked but when i do it should go even higher :D
 
haadij404 said:
mine at stock gets the same. I unlocked the two extra cores and now its at 7.3 :D

haven't tried overclocking it while unlocked but when i do it should go even higher :D
Click to expand...

Still, with power like the A-II has at stock, reasons for overclocking (let alone overbuying) have severely shrunk.

The A-II from HP the person bought was priced less than similarly-equipped HP Core i3s, let alone i5s (even from HP) and had a higher processor WEI than all of them (where the A-II started to fall behind the Intel camp was compared against either i7 or high-end i5).

Overclocking the Celeron DC made sense because the C2D was priced so much higher; however, with Athlon II and even Phenom II, AMD can really put some price pressure, especially at the low end, on the i3 and i5 (which are apparently aimed at killing off Celeron DC and C2D, respectively).

As I pointed out before, I was not much of a fan of AMD's desktop CPUs (in fact, I've built exclusively Intel since I moved up from my 386, which was, oddly enough, from AMD); however, as long as AMD can churn out bang for the buck like A-II, I may not stay with Intel Inside even personally, let alone for anyone else.

PS: Just swung by MC's Web store, and they are *still* running that AMD special (buy select AMD desktop CPUs, and get the mobo for either free or very little).

I sketched out a *migration* tag-team for Mighty Mouse (rig below):

CPU: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0337970

Motherboard: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0319627

RAM (I only need one!): http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0285254

Everything else migrates.

Why only one DIMM? I already have a single 2 GB DIMM (current mobo is single-channel and has a 3 GB practical ceiling due to a *chipset limitation*).

Note that the total cost is less than an Intel Q9550 (no S!) CPU alone (while I can migrate to a Q9550 with the current mobo, my RAM is maxed; worse, I'm stuck at single-channel) and also undercuts a Q8200/mobo combo (no RAM).

(spits out scales; I hate uncleaned trout!)
 
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jhatfie said:
My personal P2 X2 555BE purchase for my HTPC, has to be one of the most rewarding purchases per dollar that I have ever made....
Click to expand...

You know, Ive been eyeballing the 555 for a long time now. Even though my beloved X3 is doing great and scores about the same in CPU comparisons, I still really like the idea of a screaming fast dual core! Even if its not faster than a triple or quad core, for some reason, a dual core running 4.0 GHz just gives me wood. Doubt I could get it there with my midrange motherboard but Id still like to try.
 
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