Intel's Pentium Extreme Edition 955: 65nm, 4 threads and 376M transistors
by Anand Lal Shimpi on December 30, 2005 11:36 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Final Words
The Pentium Extreme Edition 955 finally starts to bring some respectable performance to Intel's high end processors, but there is no clear cut victory. In applications and usage scenarios where the EE's ability to execute four threads simultaneously comes into play, it generally can remain quite competitive with the Athlon 64 X2 4800+. However, looking at older applications, single threaded scenarios and some multithreaded applications that aren't optimized for more than two threads, the EE 955 falls significantly behind.
There are a few other conclusions that we can draw based on what we've seen thus far. For starters, Hyper Threading is quite important to the performance of the Extreme Edition 955. While it isn't always perfect, when under very heavy multitasking loads, the ability to execute more threads translates into better overall performance for the entire system.
We've also been able to take an early look at the state of multithreaded game development, through the latest Call of Duty 2 and Quake 4 patches. Although the performance in CoD2 was terrible in SMP mode, Quake 4 gave us some hope, with performance gains approaching the 50% mark on dual core processors at CPU bound resolutions.
As far as the processor at hand is concerned, Intel has done a reasonable job with the Pentium EE 955, but with Conroe not too far away, we just can't justify recommending it. If you absolutely must upgrade today, the Athlon 64 X2 is still probably going to be a better bang for your buck. However, as we have seen in the benchmarks, there are advantages to being able to execute four threads simultaneously.
It is pretty much a toss-up at this point, but we'd recommend sticking with AMD for now and re-evaluating Intel's offerings when Conroe arrives. If all goes well, we will have a cooler running, faster processor with Conroe that may provide some even tougher competition for AMD's Athlon 64 X2.
While we're not emphatically recommending Intel's latest and greatest, we are impressed with Intel's transition to 65nm thus far. If Intel can use Cedar Mill and Presler to ramp up their 65nm process, hopefully it will be primed and ready for Conroe's introduction later this year. From what we've seen of Yonah, Intel does have their work cut out for them in order to truly regain the performance crown with Conroe, but anything is possible. A successful migration to 65nm would be a definite step in the right direction for Intel.
More than anything, we're hoping not to be disappointed by Conroe. We vividly remember recommending to wait for the original Pentium 4's release and then once more for Prescott's release, and both times being terribly disappointed by Intel's decisions. Let's hope that with the Pentium M team at the helm, Conroe's introduction will be a change of tradition for Intel.
The Pentium Extreme Edition 955 finally starts to bring some respectable performance to Intel's high end processors, but there is no clear cut victory. In applications and usage scenarios where the EE's ability to execute four threads simultaneously comes into play, it generally can remain quite competitive with the Athlon 64 X2 4800+. However, looking at older applications, single threaded scenarios and some multithreaded applications that aren't optimized for more than two threads, the EE 955 falls significantly behind.
There are a few other conclusions that we can draw based on what we've seen thus far. For starters, Hyper Threading is quite important to the performance of the Extreme Edition 955. While it isn't always perfect, when under very heavy multitasking loads, the ability to execute more threads translates into better overall performance for the entire system.
We've also been able to take an early look at the state of multithreaded game development, through the latest Call of Duty 2 and Quake 4 patches. Although the performance in CoD2 was terrible in SMP mode, Quake 4 gave us some hope, with performance gains approaching the 50% mark on dual core processors at CPU bound resolutions.
As far as the processor at hand is concerned, Intel has done a reasonable job with the Pentium EE 955, but with Conroe not too far away, we just can't justify recommending it. If you absolutely must upgrade today, the Athlon 64 X2 is still probably going to be a better bang for your buck. However, as we have seen in the benchmarks, there are advantages to being able to execute four threads simultaneously.
It is pretty much a toss-up at this point, but we'd recommend sticking with AMD for now and re-evaluating Intel's offerings when Conroe arrives. If all goes well, we will have a cooler running, faster processor with Conroe that may provide some even tougher competition for AMD's Athlon 64 X2.
While we're not emphatically recommending Intel's latest and greatest, we are impressed with Intel's transition to 65nm thus far. If Intel can use Cedar Mill and Presler to ramp up their 65nm process, hopefully it will be primed and ready for Conroe's introduction later this year. From what we've seen of Yonah, Intel does have their work cut out for them in order to truly regain the performance crown with Conroe, but anything is possible. A successful migration to 65nm would be a definite step in the right direction for Intel.
More than anything, we're hoping not to be disappointed by Conroe. We vividly remember recommending to wait for the original Pentium 4's release and then once more for Prescott's release, and both times being terribly disappointed by Intel's decisions. Let's hope that with the Pentium M team at the helm, Conroe's introduction will be a change of tradition for Intel.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
84 Comments
View All Comments
skunkbuster - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
cramitpal is that you?coldpower27 - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
This is the Pentium Extreme Edition of course it's price is going to be 999US.If you want cheaper Presler cores, wait for the Pentium D 920 to 950 line to com out in Mid January.
Betwon - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
INQ says Presler 920 will be about 240$.It is very interesting that PD820 defeat FX-57 in a SMP game.
phaxmohdem - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
Let's recap, the X2 4800+ was ahead in most tests, and at worst could probably be called the 955 EE's equivilent....
955EE = $999
4800+ = ~$785
Yeah, I'd definately recommend "sticking with AMD for now and re-evaluating Intel's offerings when Conroe arrives."
Did anyone else notice how the lowly 3800+ did better in most gaming scenarios?
955EE = $999
3800+ = ~$315
Tasty :)
GhandiInstinct - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
LOL, honestly your post is the only necessary post here. It compares and contrats the two perfectly in terms of which is a better buy, given the reader has seen all of the benchmarks in which the 4800 beats the 955EE.Intel just can't win because of EGO.
Anemone - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
Kudos because no matter where you sat personally you seemed to have called the shots fairly. I'd agree with the conclusion as well, that you are either Conroe or A64, that the P4 is an overdue dead end. It performs well, but it is hot and uses lots of electricity to do so. Overclocking wasn't needed because, quite frankly the X2 chips oc too, and you'd find they probably do it better.Socket M2 is again, something you "should" wait for if you can, as is Conroe. These are heavy recomendations, you really would be very smart to wait for these two things. Barring that, given the better of two bad options (meaning you have to upgrade now when you should be waiting), AMD is the better choice, partially for the power consumption, partially for the "less of a dead end than a P4" issue.
Still, heavy, heavy emphasis on "you should wait", as a complete changeover is going on with both AMD and Intel and your ability to perform minor upgrades 1-2 years from now will depend on waiting patiently for a few more months.
:)
JarredWalton - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
Socket M2 doesn't appear to be anything special. Why wait 6 months for a 5% performance boost and a RAM change? Just like waiting for Prescott ended up being much ado about nothing, M2 isn't going to be wildly different from today's 939 chips. Get a good socket 939 system with an X2 and SLI, and you should be set for at least 18 months.Calin - Tuesday, January 3, 2006 - link
I don't find SLI important - except for the possibility to run two top of the line video cards. And increased speed won't come from higher RAM speed - not so much anyway in order to keep you waiting.I just wonder how long will the Socket 939 be kept - considering that the value line is the cheaper Socket 754 (cheaper in having a single memory channel, so half as many lines to memory banks). Or if Socket 754 will be abandoned before Socket 939, or if Socket M2/2 (single channel DDR2 memory) will appear.
nserra - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
Two cores on the same packing is an excellent idea!Will amd do that with m2?
Could lower the dual core price and even at 90nm could put 2 dual core processors on the same packing and build a 4 core processor (fake one, but 4 cores there).
ViRGE - Friday, December 30, 2005 - link
The problem with 2 physical cores is that you're forgoing any sort of on-die communication benefits by doing so. It's certainly cheaper for Intel to make things this way, but it's a poor way to go for performance, as it makes it harder for the cores to quickly send data to each other and share resources. It's certainly a valid solution(especially given how Intel didn't have any inter-core communication even when both cores were on the same die), but ultimately a combined die for inter-core communication is superior for performance and scaling.