TheOverclocker Issue 11 | Page 12

Benchmarks We performed these tests on the industry standard 3600 MHz on an unoptimized fresh install of Windows 7. SuperPI 8m: 3DMark06: 3DMark Vantage: P17423 (GPU Score: 17056, CPU Score: 18625) GT1: 53.39 GT2: 46.41 CT1: 2420.63 CT2: 28.62 Everest read: Everest write: Everest copy: Everest latency: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T 3m 51.255s 20803 Marks SM2: 7607 SM3: 9951 CPU: 6423 10314/MBs 9353/MBs 13819/MBs 45.4/ns Recommended Award RRP: $295.99 | Website: http://products.amd.com/en-us/DesktopCPUDetail.aspx?id=640 Test Machine • ASUS M4A89TD Pro • 5870 stock using Catalyst 10.2 driver • Corsair GTX2 2250 and G.Skill Flare 2000 • WD VelociRaptor 600GB • Antec 1200 OC • Windows 7 32-Bit I ntel has had the performance market cornered for a while, and unless AMD can do something dramatic, it looks to stay that way for a while still. Not oblivious to this fact, AMD has been doing what they can to compete, targeting performance at specific price points over outright performance. The AMD Thuban core fits into this criteria ad understandably so because not many end-users can spend $1000 on a CPU just to benchmark, let alone for gaming. The 1090T comes in at around 30% of that price and this is great news for everyone, in particular enthusiasts. We 14 The OverClocker October 2010 have said it before and will say it again, AMD is a genuinely fun platform to overclock and the fact that the products are so affordable provides an excellent excuse for any overclocker to get involved with AMD. Analysis The first thing we can determine from comparing 2D results directly against Phenom II X4 (Deneb) is that there is no tangible change in performance. Thuban and Deneb results are identical (clock for clock) in single threaded benchmarks but that is not the case when we take look at some multithreaded benchmarks such as 3DMark 06 and Vantage. 3DMark06 scores 20803 on the Phenom II X6 1090T up from 20003 marks on the Deneb core. We saw a huge boost in the CPU score by moving from four to six cores. Vantage was similar in scaling, the GPU scores remained near identical but the CPU score increased by 6000 points increasing the overall score by over 2000 marks, a massive increase. It is evident the IMC (Integrated Memory Controller) on the Thuban core is much improved over the one in on the Deneb core. The improved IMC affected the NB (North Bridge) frequency as in addition to the memory frequency. Looking at the NB frequency on 1090T, we could quite easily surpass 3000 MHz using air-cooling, comfortably running LinX at 3200 MHz, in contrast to the Deneb core, where if you could run above 2900 MHz your NB would have a very strong North Bridge. This might not seem like a big shift, but in 32M, a performance gain of 300MHz can mean a reduction of 10 seconds. Moving onto memory clocking, this is where the Thuban core began to shine. Chew publically took the record for highest memory frequency on Deneb last year