Why did you chose Intel over AMD?

Why did you chose Intel over AMD?

  • Better overclocking

    Votes: 86 46.5%

  • Better motherboard/platform

    Votes: 42 22.7%

  • Brand preference

    Votes: 12 6.5%

  • other (please please list!)

    Votes: 45 24.3%
  • Total voters
    185
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Intel currently make faster CPUs. I started out with Intel (386, Pentium, Pentium II), then switched to AMD when they became the performance leaders (Athlon, Athlon 64), then back to Intel once they were getting over the Pentium 4 mistake (Pentium M, Core 2). If AMD produce the fastest processor next time I buy a new PC, I'll probably go for an AMD processor, provided the platform is fine.
 
if you want to go cheap AMD would be the choice , if you want performance go INTEL.
Well in the end it always depends on your budget and what you are gonna use your computer for.
 
translatingthename said:
Wow thank you for the feedback everyone! This is very useful to me. Keep it coming!

What do you think the general reasons that most consumers in general would chose the Intel models over the competing AMD ones? (might not be the same reason you had?)

Thanks!!!! :D
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When was the last time you saw an AMD commercial on TV?

People are like - "AMD..... What's that?"

I for one wish that AMD had processors that performed as well as Intel ones and overclocked just as well also.

That being said, if you have programs that need higher memory bandwidth at stock speeds, AMD currently wipes the floor with Intel.

I'l just say that when I had my Opty 175 system, with DDR1 running at DDR-533, it had just as much memory bandwidth as an Intel Core2 DDR2 setup running the RAM at DDR-800.
 
Intel this time due to power and heat. Performance was seconday as AMD Phenom's perform just fine. AMD may not be the leader of the pack by they are still solid performers and many people are quite happy with them and I've been very pleased with their CPUs in my previous computers.

I don't take overclocking into account anymore as I see that as just a bonus and while C2D and C2Q usually OC quite well you can always get a dud and I'm not the type to RMA or return a CPU because it doesn't overclock.

This is my first Intel system and I'm very happy with it. In the future I'll weigh my options just like I did this time with this system which I only built about a month ago. Took me ~4 weeks to finalize what I wanted too so I did a lot of back and forth between AMD and Intel while researching different things.
 
I was just reading about the upcoming (in a couple of months?) 45nm "Deneb" Phenom CPUs. It looks like those can overclock a lot better and use a lot less power (roughly half).

Do you think when those are released that AMD will become more popular for the same market we're talking about here?
 
translatingthename said:
I was just reading about the upcoming (in a couple of months?) 45nm "Deneb" Phenom CPUs. It looks like those can overclock a lot better and use a lot less power (roughly half).

Do you think when those are released that AMD will become more popular for the same market we're talking about here?
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Maybe a little but early benchmarks show that Deneb will only now bring AMD within reach of current C2D and C2Q. They still won't have the performance crown and with Nehalem right around the corner...
 
translatingthename said:
I was just reading about the upcoming (in a couple of months?) 45nm "Deneb" Phenom CPUs. It looks like those can overclock a lot better and use a lot less power (roughly half).

Do you think when those are released that AMD will become more popular for the same market we're talking about here?
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Not really. Deneb will be competing more against Yorkfield than Nehalem. It'll close the gap on Yorkfield in per clock performance and overclocking, but neither will hold a candle to Nehalem performance wise.

Then again, Nehalem will cost significantly more, not the CPU itself (at least the $284 2.66GHz model), but the platform (X58 + DDR3) as a whole will be more expensive.
 
2 reasons, performance and platform.On the platform side since I have been running Intel chipsets the odd little quirks that AMD platforms in the past could exhibit from time to time have vanished.

Performance wise Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad just blow AMD away at the moment. How many Phenom's get a 1200 mhz overclock on air cooling ? :D
 
speed and OCing
Intel is just faster to start with add on that C2 OCs very well no point not get it :D
 
About a year ago i was searching for a new system. I decided to wait to see the AMD response. Among other things i was reading about intelligent frequency management between the cores, monolithic quad core against intel's "fake" quad and so on. Phenom was announced for september...september came, nothing happened. After multiple delays, Phenom came out and it was a complete failure. Cpu itself was not as bad as the whole platform. The southbridge was subpar, compared to intel's and problematic. The motherboards were few, with buggy bios and AMD Overdrive never worked. So, i decided to go with Q6600 and P35 and i never regretted it!
 
Yeah I see what you mean. I almost want to go with AMD just because everyone else has Intel and I want to be different... :D

Does anybody know about any price drops or anything? Maybe a price drop would make AMD processors more attractive.

Lastly, I read about how this new southbridge (I don't know what a southbridge is) called SB750 is supposed to increase the overclockability of the Phenom chips. Is that true? That might be another thing to pull people to AMD.
 
The problem with buying AMD for gaming, even if cheap, is that future upgrades are lacking.
To get the full performance from the top graphics cards (and future cards) you need a fast Intel CPU that is clocked even higher.
This puts me off recommending AMD for casual gamers as it limits their migration to more serious gaming because the hardware isnt as capable.
Also, for office machines, there is hardly anything between the prices of lower end Core 2 and AMD products and Intel has the better upgrade path.
To top it all, Phenom consumes more power than Intel despite being slower.
Not a good time to be AMD.
 
9850 BE is about just as good if not a little better than the Q6600 in terms of specs and stock performance.
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I dont run anything stock so the price performance was (and still is) all Intel. I build high performance gaming machines for beer money and I have never seen a Q6600 that will not do 3.2GHz without breaking a sweat even on a modest AF7 heatsink. With that fact in hand, nothing can touch it for price/performance in gaming. Most of my customers are hard core gamers with 2 cores running the game and teamspeak/ventrillo on the 3rd or run two instances of the game so 4 cores are certainly not a waste at all.

My other system is an AMD mobile barton highly overclocked on an NF7-s motherboard also watercooled and is still in almost daily use as the machine is still very capable despite being over 5 years old.

My point is, I personally, I buy the parts that at the time will with "tweaking" provide the best bang for the buck over a long life, regardless of who makes them. That does not necessarly mean the least expensive. Intel won hands down last cycle.

For instance, I am seeing no need to go to nehalem, I will probably just get a Q6600 just before they become rare/discontinued and upgrade the video card for another 3+ years of use out of my current presonal machine. (and be able to retire the bot machine /sigh) The good news is that gives AMD 3 years to get back on track if they are even still around. I hope they will be.
 
translatingthename said:
Lastly, I read about how this new southbridge (I don't know what a southbridge is) called SB750 is supposed to increase the overclockability of the Phenom chips. Is that true? That might be another thing to pull people to AMD.
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Even with all of that, Intel still has the superior platform. Phenoms are topping out at 3.4GHz at best on the new southbridge, whereas the G0 Q6600s can nearly always hit 3.6GHz and perform better clock-for-clock. The 65nm Phenom platform is a dead end. It performs below par, kicks out a ton of heat, and just doesn't do the job particularly well. Deneb might make the Phenom a viable CPU, but at the moment there's no compelling reason to go with a Phenom rather than an Intel quad.
 
Yeah I just read up on Phenom temperatures and it didn't look too good, especially when overclocked.

Do you need to use water cooling on Phenoms or is air cooling usually fine? I would probably want to use the stock cooler.

Also, for motherboards, do all of the AMD 700 series motherboards support every phenom model or is there some sort of limitations?

At this point I am kind of thinking Intel is the better choice, but the promise of the SB750 and the 45nm phenom is very enticing!!
 
Air cooling is usually fine. Unfortunately not all AMD 700 series motherboards support every Phenom CPU out there. The main limitations are the VRMs, limited or no cooling on the mosfets and phase power designs on the motherboards which cannot support the higher wattaeg Phenom CPUs IIRC.
 
I think for the average user, a 2.6ghz Athlon X2 with a 780g mobo is ideal. However, if your posting in these forums your probably not the average user. I went with an e7200 with an ASUS p5q-e, it suited my budget and my needs, AMD didn't suit my needs this time around.
 
1.) Better overclocking
2.) Better performance/price ratio
3. Cooler

When I was looking to switch the intel platform with the Core 2 procs offered me the best damn performance/price ratio that I wanted to spend not just that but I could do a 30% overclock giving me some extra performance out of what I got.
 
In my case it was pretty simple.
I bought the E6600 shortly after it was released.
It had everything going for it:
- It was faster than any AMD processor available.
- It was much, MUCH cheaper than any AMD processor available (I paid 300 euros for mine, the closest CPU was the 6000+, which was 700 euros at the time).
- It used less power than AMD (the E6600 is 65W TDP, the 6000+ is 125W TDP).
- It had far more overclocking potential than AMD.

Aside from that, I've always found the Intel chipsets to be very reliable, have good performance and have a nice featureset. My previous PC was an Athlon XP with a VIA chipset, which never was quite a problem-free experience. So I had reservations about going with AMD again anyway. It'd be either VIA which I didn't trust, or nVidia, which I heard some disturbing stories about aswell.
My PC is now about 2 years old, and still a good performer. I can just drop in a quadcore if I need the extra power, and go for another 2 years or so.
 
Bang for buck. Got an E6400 not long after it came out, which performed great at stock and even better at 3.2Ghz. A few months back, when Microcenter was selling the Q6600 for $199, I grabbed one of those and a new mobo and haven't looked back. Great performance at stock settings, awesome performance overclocked. From what I understand, AMD chips just can't compare right now. Not to mention I'm a huge fan of Intel chipsets... :D
 
pxc said:
A. Better overclocking
B. Better motherboard/platform
C. Brand preference
D. other (please please list!)

A + B
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same here, which leads to better performance for your dollar. :D
 
GORANKAR said:
The same reason I chose AMD when socket 939 was king. I bought the fastest available computer I could afford when I decided to buy.
Next time around, I will do the same regardless of Blue or Green.
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QFT and ditto

On top of that I must say the Q6600 has been rock solid for me at stock and overclocked. I could keep mine at stock voltage 24/7 stable at 3ghz which is incredible to me.

I like air cooling so anything that makes that path easy to OC and still run quiet works great for me, and while the Quads do run a bit warmer than the Dual Cores, its still a lot better than I expected by far.
 
Mtnduey said:
QFT and ditto

On top of that I must say the Q6600 has been rock solid for me at stock and overclocked. I could keep mine at stock voltage 24/7 stable at 3ghz which is incredible to me.

I like air cooling so anything that makes that path easy to OC and still run quiet works great for me, and while the Quads do run a bit warmer than the Dual Cores, its still a lot better than I expected by far.
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qft x 2, the only brand loyalty I have is my hard earned green backs...whatever gives me the best bang for my buck @ the time I'm upgrading, is where I'll be spending my $$
 
BillParrish said:
For instance, I am seeing no need to go to nehalem, I will probably just get a Q6600 just before they become rare/discontinued and upgrade the video card for another 3+ years of use out of my current presonal machine. (and be able to retire the bot machine /sigh) The good news is that gives AMD 3 years to get back on track if they are even still around. I hope they will be.
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When I put together my desktop system in March 2007 it was the best bang for the buck for the performance I could find. So I went with an Intel platform and a E6400.

I have the same goal for my pc as BillParrish being I normally don't upgrade often, I'll update the cpu, probably to a cheap Q6600 and the video card to maybe a cheap 8800GT. Which should keep me rocken till 2010. :D
 
intel is just a better chip right now than amd. i am fanboy of getting the most for my money.
 
Right now Intel's products out perform AMD's products. Even the aging Q6600 defeats many Phenom processors at stock speeds and overclocked there is no contest. Add to that the stability and quality of Intel chipsets and a ton of great boards using their chipsets there is no contest.
 
A+B+C+D

Ever since AMD started suing Intel for being better I have sided with intel. Intel has a far better product even without overclocking.
 
stevedave said:
A+B+C+D

Ever since AMD started suing Intel for being better I have sided with intel. Intel has a far better product even without overclocking.
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If I remember correctly, AMD was suing long before Conroe's release. I think it began around the end of June 2005, while Conroe didn't come out until the end of July 2006. Of course the damage was already done - 2 years of A64, and still not commanding marketshare, except among gamers who actually knew not to buy Netburst.
 
game14 said:
well , as long as u dont look for matx boards .:(
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I don't use mATX boards so that isn't an issue. My Silverstone HTPC case accepts full sized ATX motherboards and as a result that's what I put in it.
 
Ive always purchased INTEL processors since day one which was DEC 1992. And ever since then Ive purchased around 32 processors and once AMD which i returned it the very next day.

Ive always loved INTEL better BRAND, better Performance and better name INTEL. :p
 
MCRAYGSX said:
Ive always purchased INTEL processors since day one which was DEC 1992. And ever since then Ive purchased around 32 processors and once AMD which i returned it the very next day.

Ive always loved INTEL better BRAND, better Performance and better name INTEL. :p
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LOL fanboy much? :p
 
I have a spare AGP AMD64 board and a backup PC using PCie AMD64 (which is on all day).

I decided to dump AMD (sold them) just because single-core CPU is unresponsive in Vista and getting a dual-core 939 isn't cheap. Plus getting 2GB DDR is much more expensive than buying a 2Gb DDR2.

Plus the fact I got a very good deal on a brand new Foxconn 975X board (last 1 in stock) and traded my Q6600 for a E6600 and E6750 which is think is highly favorable to me. :)

so I decided to move to newer tech via the Intel route.
 
Currently All of the above + better performance.

In the past, when AMD had an edge over P4, etc... I still chose Intel, b/c of motherboard stability & brand preference.
 
Dan_D said:
I don't use mATX boards so that isn't an issue. My Silverstone HTPC case accepts full sized ATX motherboards and as a result that's what I put in it.
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lucky you. Im still waiting for decent Intel matx board that fits my needs and budget or a decent AMD cpu that holds up to the performance of INTEL cpus before i upgrade.Till then I stick to my good old S939.
 
game14 said:
lucky you. Im still waiting for decent Intel matx board that fits my needs and budget or a decent AMD cpu that holds up to the performance of INTEL cpus before i upgrade.Till then I stick to my good old S939.
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Why must you have an mATX motherboard?
 
Dan_D said:
Why must you have an mATX motherboard?
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2 QPacks , one for gaming , the other one as HTPC/fileserver.Thinking of an upgrade for a while now since S939 doesnt really cut it any more, but as said I havent found a INTEL matx board yet that fits my needs and budget.There are some nice AM2+ boards out there that I like , but in my opinion there is no decent AMD cpu out there right now to upgrade too.
So for now Im still waiting whats to come out.
 
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