Yonah article here on Anandtech

[Humble Magii]

I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

The new Yonah chip is actually quite impressive considering it's mobile chip at or near X2 levels of performance. The chip has no on die memory controller either and seeing as Intel may not do this at all may show that doing so would be bad for them or good for consumers. AMD limits itself I am sure in this way but it works at this time.

Anyways AMD still has alot to prove to me as a consumer and hopefully they deliver because Intel is hard to beat.

Time will tell but Intel CPU's are anything but crap regardless of what people say on the AT forums. AMD just can't touch Intel in the mobile arena period it's fact. I hope AMD comes out with some more impressive offerings this year but doesn't look like it as of yet. 2007 may be the year where we get some excitement.

 

[sharad]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

...

Please explain that part. What do you mean by "only recently"? Like the last 5 years?

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: Accord99

Originally posted by: Viditor
Except that Cpuburn is optimized differently for P5, P6, K7, etc...it isn't the same on the Turion as it is on the P-M. This means that using it as a benchmark for power usage is fairly useless...

Then you still have the Doom 3 test, where the P-M laptop used 30W less power for the same performance.

It's one of the reasons that I am more impressed with the Laptop Logic review, as they used a varity of tests and reran them under a variety of conditions. It gives a much better indication of the true relative power usage and battery life...plus, the benches they used weren't optimized for one CPU or the other...

All of laptoplogic's battery tests were synthetic tests.

1. on Doom, that is true...but then we get to the disparity of the systems themselves (which is where we started...)
2. The LL tests were somewhat synthetic, but there is a HUGE difference between running a looped piece of assembler code that is optimized for the CPU and running a benchmark suite of standardly used software.
For instance, Mobile Mark 2005 productivity:

The workloads in this category model a mobile professional at a fictitious automobile company. The worker creates documents using Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint, accesses email, and creates graphics and animation with Photoshop and Flash to include in a multimedia presentation. An Internet browser is used to view presentations. The user also invokes file compression and virus detection in the background

The results of this were 224 minutes for Turion, 225 minutes for P-M.

Or the Reader Test:

The user opens the Netscape browser and loads an HTML version of ?War and Peace.? The book consists of 17 HTML files (one per chapter) which are 100KB-400KB each, totaling 3.3 MB. Starting from the beginning, the user reads the book on his screen, and then advances to the next page after two minutes. He continues reading and advancing one page per two minutes until the battery of the notebook computer discharges

The results of this were 247 minutes for Turion, and 252 minutes for the P-M

Or the DVD Playback test:

The DVD playback 2005 workload is based on a 1 hours 55 minute movie that BAPCo has created from content provided by BMW®. The DVD playback test starts the movie player application, sets up a full screen playback, and the loops over the content on the disk in the DVD player. This playback will continue until system shutdown at battery depletion

The results of this were 191 minutes for Turion, 194 minutes for the P-M...

I consider this much less a synthetic than a benchmark suite of applications. While it's true that the settings on these tests can be manipulated by Bapco when they set them up, it still seems a far more realistic test than an optimised loop of assembler code (and traditionally, these tests have been far more optimised in Intel's favour...).

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

The new Yonah chip is actually quite impressive considering it's mobile chip at or near X2 levels of performance. The chip has no on die memory controller either and seeing as Intel may not do this at all may show that doing so would be bad for them or good for consumers. AMD limits itself I am sure in this way but it works at this time.

Anyways AMD still has alot to prove to me as a consumer and hopefully they deliver because Intel is hard to beat.

Time will tell but Intel CPU's are anything but crap regardless of what people say on the AT forums. AMD just can't touch Intel in the mobile arena period it's fact. I hope AMD comes out with some more impressive offerings this year but doesn't look like it as of yet. 2007 may be the year where we get some excitement.

Don't throw stones in glass houses...

Statements like "AMD just can't touch Intel in the mobile arena period it's fact" would usually call for some points to back it up, else you run the risk of being called an "Intel mobile fanbois"
I am not a true "fan" so much as I'm an investor...I own a fairly large block of AMD shares (and a far, far smaller block of Intel shares). I also help to develop and work with both Intel and AMD systems for multimedia...
But mostly, I digest information for my own edification...it's what I love to do!

 

[BrownTown]

I still don't get what power consumption has much to do with how good a CPU is, when you're plugged into AC power you can use as many watts as you want. Its not like anyones gonna be doing CPU intensive work on a notebook with only the battery. So it doesnt matter what the watts used at full load is. When you off AC power its gonna disable 1 core and run at 800mhz, so it will use like 3 watts, not 30 if its off of AC power.

 

[BrownTown]

sorry - double post

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: BrownTown
I still don't get what power consumption has much to do with how good a CPU is, when you're plugged into AC power you can use as many watts as you want.

Yeah, as long as it isn't a Prescott space heater. :laugh: You make a pretty good point though. The extreme overclockers wouldn't be too concerned with power usage due to compressors or peltiers. Some enthusiast computers are also loaded down with huge wattage video cards and multiple hard drives. In a notebook overall system power draw for say 60W to 80W is huge, but that same 20W just doesn't have the same impact when your system is drawing 280W versus 300W and running off AC power.

 

[Humble Magii]

Originally posted by: sharad

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

...

Please explain that part. What do you mean by "only recently"? Like the last 5 years?

You must be relatively newer to systems since I can count on one or two fingers that a AMD processor is overall faster desktop chip .

Anyways the biggest concern for me regarding AMD is whether they can deliver and stay competitive for years to come I certainly hope so. AMD needs to prove to people they can continually produce a quality desktop CPU which they have a great start but it needs to continue. I want AMD and Intel to sweat and innovate and make things better and learn from each other it's a win win. I remember when the Athlon launch was coming up first time I actually used an AMD CPU in a rig for a secondary game machine . Prior to Athlon and Slot A though they were a mediocre at best Pentium alternative for cheap money and they didn't do much in my house. The Athlon MP's were a great product had two servers running with these was great albeit they were too scarce. My dual P2 450 server was the one machine that took everything thrown at it I just don't get that spark with the Athlon MP or X2 however I haven't had more time with my X2 yet. I may have to nab a opteron too to play with .

 

[Leper Messiah]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii

Originally posted by: sharad

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

...

Please explain that part. What do you mean by "only recently"? Like the last 5 years?

You must be relatively newer to systems since I can count on one or two fingers that a AMD processor is overall faster desktop chip .

Anyways the biggest concern for me regarding AMD is whether they can deliver and stay competitive for years to come I certainly hope so. AMD needs to prove to people they can continually produce a quality desktop CPU which they have a great start but it needs to continue. I want AMD and Intel to sweat and innovate and make things better and learn from each other it's a win win. I remember when the Athlon launch was coming up first time I actually used an AMD CPU in a rig for a secondary game machine . Prior to Athlon and Slot A though they were a mediocre at best Pentium alternative for cheap money and they didn't do much in my house. The Athlon MP's were a great product had two servers running with these was great albeit they were too scarce. My dual P2 450 server was the one machine that took everything thrown at it I just don't get that spark with the Athlon MP or X2 however I haven't had more time with my X2 yet. I may have to nab a opteron too to play with .

LOL. AMD has certainly been competive with Intel at least since 99 when the K7's came out. They lost a little bit of ground when the nortwoods were competing against the Tbreds and bartons, but from an OC'ers P.O.V. mobile bartons were still the way to go. You're living in the past man. Hell, if you really want to go waaay back, AMD's socket 3 5x86 133 was faster than a Pentium 75 or 90 for a lot cheaper...

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii

Originally posted by: sharad

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

...

Please explain that part. What do you mean by "only recently"? Like the last 5 years?

You must be relatively newer to systems since I can count on one or two fingers that a AMD processor is overall faster desktop chip .

Anyways the biggest concern for me regarding AMD is whether they can deliver and stay competitive for years to come I certainly hope so. AMD needs to prove to people they can continually produce a quality desktop CPU which they have a great start but it needs to continue. I want AMD and Intel to sweat and innovate and make things better and learn from each other it's a win win. I remember when the Athlon launch was coming up first time I actually used an AMD CPU in a rig for a secondary game machine . Prior to Athlon and Slot A though they were a mediocre at best Pentium alternative for cheap money and they didn't do much in my house. The Athlon MP's were a great product had two servers running with these was great albeit they were too scarce. My dual P2 450 server was the one machine that took everything thrown at it I just don't get that spark with the Athlon MP or X2 however I haven't had more time with my X2 yet. I may have to nab a opteron too to play with .

You don't think that for the last 5 years they have shown that they have a good product ? and currenly their Opteron server chips can't be beat for performance, stability or power consumption ? And that many of the top 100 companys (I think it was 80%, don't have the stats right off hand) own Opteron server because they offer better value and less power consumption, and generate less heat ? 5 years in the computer industry is an eternity. What planet have you been living on ?

 

[mamisano]

Hell, if you really want to go waaay back, AMD's socket 3 5x86 133 was faster than a Pentium 75 or 90 for a lot cheaper...

Holy flashback Batman! I had a few systems with that chip and it was fast for the time. I was even able to overclock it a bit, one of my earliest experiences of doing so

 

[carlosd]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

The new Yonah chip is actually quite impressive considering it's mobile chip at or near X2 levels of performance. The chip has no on die memory controller either and seeing as Intel may not do this at all may show that doing so would be bad for them or good for consumers. AMD limits itself I am sure in this way but it works at this time.

Anyways AMD still has alot to prove to me as a consumer and hopefully they deliver because Intel is hard to beat.

Time will tell but Intel CPU's are anything but crap regardless of what people say on the AT forums. AMD just can't touch Intel in the mobile arena period it's fact. I hope AMD comes out with some more impressive offerings this year but doesn't look like it as of yet. 2007 may be the year where we get some excitement.

fatty??

 

[carlosd]

Originally posted by: carlosd

The TDP of the Dothan is 27W. You're under the mistaken impression of desktop TDP's being at 75% of maximum, or whatever that is.

Look in the Pentium M datasheet and see how intel defines TDP, I am not inventing that.

 

[carlosd]

Originally posted by: dexvx

Process doesn't mean anything. When Prescott was taping out, people thought the transition would be similar as Willamette to Northwood; higher performance per clock, more cache, less heat per Mhz. Instead it was a disaster.

Process doesn't mean anything??? The presscot was a disaster becaused intel increased the number of pipelines from 20 to 30, this increased the transistor count sighnificantly, also the currents were increased (increasing also drain currents dramatically) to reach higher clockspeeds and going to a smaller proccess wasn't enough. That's the reason it was a disaster. Its a different story if you preserve the transistor count and drain currents within reasonable limits, look the transition from Clawhammer to san diego, the 90nm parts from AMD consumes significantly less than 130nm parts.

 

[dexvx]

Originally posted by: carlosd
Process doesn't mean anything??? The presscot was a disaster becaused intel increased the number of pipelines from 20 to 30, this increased the transistor count sighnificantly, also the currents were increased (increasing also drain currents dramatically) to reach higher clockspeeds and going to a smaller proccess wasn't enough. That's the reason it was a disaster. Its a different story if you preserve the transistor count and drain currents within reasonable limits, look the transition from Clawhammer to san diego, the 90nm parts from AMD consumes significantly less than 130nm parts.

It was built on a faulty design; because I know some people from the Prescott design team that confirmed it. Willamette increased pipelines compared to Coppermine from (10?) to 20. Yet it raised the ceiling from 1Ghz to 2Ghz. On a per clock basis, it also lowered heat dissipation.

Originally posted by: Viditor
2. Process CAN mean quite a bit...the 65nm process is the only real difference between the Prescott and Cedar Mill, and the Cedar Mill has a much better power/performance ratio. It was also a difference for the A64 when they moved to 90nm. There are however limits to this...Netburst tends to push at the edge of those limits quite quickly.

Cedar Mill is better than Prescott because there was no design change, save for an addition of a few instructions that probably account for less than 1% of die space. Northwood to Prescott was a shrink, but also a design overhaul.

What I should say is a die shrink does not correlate to lower power/higher performance. Design plays a more important role.

Originally posted by: Viditor
Except that Cpuburn is optimized differently for P5, P6, K7, etc...it isn't the same on the Turion as it is on the P-M. This means that using it as a benchmark for power usage is fairly useless...

Not really... If you think about it, since each CPU has a different micro-archietecture, what would be full load on 1 design (say Turion) would not be full load on another. But thats getting a little too picky on software usage...

Originally posted by: Viditor
1. He's right in that TDP isn't a power measurement at all...in fact it's not a measurement of any kind! It's a guesstimate and guideline of heat dissapation given by the manufacturer to OEMs.

You can have a CPU draw 100W and disspiate 1W TDP. However, such things are not realistic. In general, TDP is an accurate measurement on power draw. The higher the TDP, the higher the power draw, as we can generally assume that efficiency (in terms of heat/power) between processors is about even.

---


BTW, I still stand by my statement that Idle != General Usage.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: mamisano

Hell, if you really want to go waaay back, AMD's socket 3 5x86 133 was faster than a Pentium 75 or 90 for a lot cheaper...

Holy flashback Batman! I had a few systems with that chip and it was fast for the time. I was even able to overclock it a bit, one of my earliest experiences of doing so

Jumper motherboard to 40MHz, instant 160MHz CPU!!! Well, not all of them were able to do that but some were.

 

[dexvx]

Originally posted by: Zap

Originally posted by: mamisano

Hell, if you really want to go waaay back, AMD's socket 3 5x86 133 was faster than a Pentium 75 or 90 for a lot cheaper...

Holy flashback Batman! I had a few systems with that chip and it was fast for the time. I was even able to overclock it a bit, one of my earliest experiences of doing so

Jumper motherboard to 40MHz, instant 160MHz CPU!!! Well, not all of them were able to do that but some were.

Actually, the K5-133 was faster than the Pentium-133 and for cheaper. However, it was about 1 year late to market, and by that time there were Pentium-MMX's a 166/200. It was also better to just raise the clock multiplier, because they were clock-locked. Raising the FSB was prone to some out-of-spec components that didnt always work properly.

 

[Zap]

I wasn't aware that it had higher multipliers. I remember being able to lower it, but not raise it. Most systems in those days were designed to at minimum hit 40MHz and some would hit 50MHz (remember the 486DX-50?).

 

[dexvx]

Originally posted by: Zap
I wasn't aware that it had higher multipliers. I remember being able to lower it, but not raise it. Most systems in those days were designed to at minimum hit 40MHz and some would hit 50MHz (remember the 486DX-50?).

Actually it was the DX2-50; the higest was a DX-33.

But Pentiums and K5's used a 66 FSB. So it'd be 2x66 = 133. However, since they werent clock locked, you can usually bump it to 2.5x66.

 

[PetNorth]

Originally posted by: dexvx

Originally posted by: carlosd
Turion ML TDP is 35W , look at specs, Pentium M is 34W max, this has something to do with the plataform and DDR2 use, but I am talking about Turion MT line MT not ML those 2 letters are very important.

The TDP of the Dothan is 27W. You're under the mistaken impression of desktop TDP's being at 75% of maximum, or whatever that is.

Moreover, the MT max'es at 1.8Ghz. It simply cannot compete with a 2.26 Dothan or a 2.2 ML in that sense.

Not really

MT-40 2.2ghz 25W

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Pro...ormation/0,,30_118_12651_12658,00.html

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: dexvx

You can have a CPU draw 100W and disspiate 1W TDP. However, such things are not realistic. In general, TDP is an accurate measurement on power draw. The higher the TDP, the higher the power draw, as we can generally assume that efficiency (in terms of heat/power) between processors is about even.

---


BTW, I still stand by my statement that Idle != General Usage.

Huh?? TDP is a design point, not an actual measurement...Intel's spec says:

?The numbers in this column reflect Intel?s recommended design point and are not indicative of the maximum power the processor can dissipate under worst case conditions.?

TDP is strictly "Thermal Design Power", i.e. it is a level of heat dissapation that Intel suggest OEMs to design a system for.
BTW, if a CPU draws 100W of power and dissapates only 1W of heat, it has massively changed the laws of physics. Remember that a HSF is part of the thermal design...

 

[IntelUser2000]

Look here: http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2529

The other 945 chipset launched in Q1 2006 is the Intel 945GT Express chipset. (Yeah, "GT", that's not overused at all....) This chipset expands on the existing 945G chipset with a custom system profile for All-In In-One and entertainment PC platforms.

That's chipset that supports Yonah and its a desktop 945 chipset made to support Yonah, its not a mobile chipset.

http://www.mikeshardware.co.uk/RoadmapQ106.htm



Common misconceptions regarding Turion vs. Pentium M:
-Pentium M has advantage of using low power DDR2
-DDR2 makes Pentium M slower
-27W TDP for Intel means much higher since Intel's TDP=75% of max power while AMD states max power as TDP

1. DDR2 has half the power of DDR when its on same CLOCK SPEED. So DDR2-400 has half the power consumption of DDR400. DDR2-533 would have ONLY 33% less power consumption than DDR400, not as significant as you think. Yonah, using DDR2-667, would decrease the advantage to 16.7%. As a overall platform, DDR2-533 advantage is around 5%.

So much for those people believing DDR2-667 on Turion would have advantage on power consumption over DDR400 now.
2. If people are not dumb and lazy and actually take care to look at reviews, you would see DDR2=better performance than DDR.
3. Umm, if you look at this review: http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfis...on-64-Pentium-M-Asus-A6000-327%2f11%2f

Its clear Pentium M has LOAD battery life advantage over Turion, rather SIGNIFICANTLY, though I doubt anyone cares for 1 hour vs 1 hour 30 min.

amazing at the fud that is being passed around here. The Turion is below the Pentium M in battery life for typical use. People who say otherwise are stupid fanboys.

A fanboy is a person who looks at the links that surely says competitor's CPU is CLEARLY better while still does not believing in it(that's right I am talking to you Hacp).

Looking here: http://www.laptoplogic.com/reviews/detail.php?id=87&part=full&page=9

Pentium M has advantage over Turion in EVERYTHING for battery life. That advantage folks, is not 5%, but rather 40-50%, for a whole system.



Its right that system differences make a difference in battery and performance score. Even different manufacturers have different performance and battery life. Looking however Turions are more optimized as evidenced by Acer using ONLY Turions for its gaming Ferrari, Pentium M is still way better than Turion in battery life.


Pure CPU comparison=complete and utter BS, because CPUs from different manufacturer nowadays NEVER have same platform.

I think people fail to realize the fact that Yonah just takes out the weakness that Pentium M had, which is significant.

 

[Eug]

Originally posted by: dmens
Pretty good for a power-conscious laptop part. Can't wait to get the powerbook.

I'm so buying one, when they release that dual-core Yonah 1.66 GHz 13" widescreen 1280x800 PowerBook.

Well, maybe not. I'm thinking of waiting for Merom, considering my current laptop is only 4 months old. It'd be nice though in a year or so to get a dual-core Merom 1280x800 13" PowerBook with Mobility Radeon X1300 and H.264 decode/transcode acceleration, as well as a Blu-Ray (or HD-DVD) drive. I'd buy that in a heartbeat. Or if that doesn't exist, I'd take a version of that with dual-core 1.83 GHz Yonah too.

P.S. I'm confused as to why people are saying Yonah's desktop performance is disappointing. Yonah seems to me to be focused on the laptop, and even then performance will be pretty good desktop wise, considering that at launch there will be a 2.16 GHz model. (Anand's review tested the 2.0.) Plus, there should be a 2.33 GHz model 6 months later.

However, the real desktop parts will be Conroe, which is based of Merom. My guess is that there will be few desktop Yonah's around, except for SFF models.

 

[Fox5]

Originally posted by: Humble Magii

Originally posted by: sharad

Originally posted by: Humble Magii
I find it funny there are so many die hard AMD fans. I use an AMD X2 for my main system now however for years AMD has been the slower cheapo alternative to Intel and only recently have they had any sort of performance advantage.

...

Please explain that part. What do you mean by "only recently"? Like the last 5 years?

You must be relatively newer to systems since I can count on one or two fingers that a AMD processor is overall faster desktop chip .

Anyways the biggest concern for me regarding AMD is whether they can deliver and stay competitive for years to come I certainly hope so. AMD needs to prove to people they can continually produce a quality desktop CPU which they have a great start but it needs to continue. I want AMD and Intel to sweat and innovate and make things better and learn from each other it's a win win. I remember when the Athlon launch was coming up first time I actually used an AMD CPU in a rig for a secondary game machine . Prior to Athlon and Slot A though they were a mediocre at best Pentium alternative for cheap money and they didn't do much in my house. The Athlon MP's were a great product had two servers running with these was great albeit they were too scarce. My dual P2 450 server was the one machine that took everything thrown at it I just don't get that spark with the Athlon MP or X2 however I haven't had more time with my X2 yet. I may have to nab a opteron too to play with .

AMD's been running with the Athlon since like 1999, that's almost a lifetime in the computing world.
First the Athlon came and beat P2 and P3. (the top of the line K6-3 also beat the initial P3, I think it even beat the initial Athlon, on the other hand it had something like 3MB of cache)
Then Intel integrated the cache onto the P3 chip, and took the performance per mhz lead, though I think AMD's overall higher mhz made it so they kept the performance advantage.
Then AMD integrated their cache with Socket A, and took a major lead over the P3 in both total performance and mhz per mhz.
Then Intel came out with the P4, which sucked.
Then Intel worked on upping the P4's power, while AMD worked on lowering heat output.
Intel came out with Northwood, and AMD and Intel traded back and forth on performance until the Northwood C, which took the performance lead for a few months unitl the Athlon 64 came out. (AMD did surpass the Northwood B's with XPs though)

However, AMD has always been cheaper, though it wasn't until they lost the performance advantage to Northwood that they finally got a stable platform. (and not just stable for the good high quality motherboards, but stable from top of the line all the way down to the bottom)

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: IntelUser2000
A fanboy is a person who looks at the links that surely says competitor's CPU is CLEARLY better while still does not believing in it(that's right I am talking to you Hacp).

Looking here: http://www.laptoplogic.com/reviews/detail.php?id=87&part=full&page=9

Pentium M has advantage over Turion in EVERYTHING for battery life. That advantage folks, is not 5%, but rather 40-50%, for a whole system.



Its right that system differences make a difference in battery and performance score. Even different manufacturers have different performance and battery life. Looking however Turions are more optimized as evidenced by Acer using ONLY Turions for its gaming Ferrari, Pentium M is still way better than Turion in battery life.


Pure CPU comparison=complete and utter BS, because CPUs from different manufacturer nowadays NEVER have same platform.

I think people fail to realize the fact that Yonah just takes out the weakness that Pentium M had, which is significant.

You are comparing laptops there, not the PM and the Turion...in other words, the Turion and the PM have very little to do with the power differential.
If you took a desktop X2 3800 and put it on an SLI32 with both cards, then added Wifi and a few drives...you would probably have close to the same power draw as a barebones Pentium D 820 system...
While it's true that you can't (at least not easily) directly compare 2 CPUs in laptop, it can and has been done on the desktop. It requires measuring directly from the power rails on the mobo...
That said, you can come VERY close in mobile platforms and judge from there...