Intel Core 2 Duo

Anyone got one of these yet? They sound pretty quick, outperforming even single core CPUs with higher GHz. I wonder if they are faster than single core CPUs on non-multicore-optimised games and apps?

I will try to get for a Merom based computer for the next time as i want to get away from fans, especially loud fans. Offer me a passive cooled, working, not overpriced computer with it and i will go for it, no matter if it's a pc or a mac...

As for your question: Aren't there enough benchmarks around on the net?!

uh.. is that the same as an Intel dual core like I have? Or is "core 2 duo" something else?

Core Duo is Yonah based, Core 2 Duo is Merom (mobile version) based which means larger caches, higher clocks, little architecture enhancements, 64Bit, blabla => more power (also a little bit more power consumption).

You're probably better off, as a software developer and if heat + fan noise isn't a concern, getting or staying with a pentium d 805 and spending the extra few hundred (remember core 2 duo mobos are expensive too) on faster hard drives or more ram, the lack of which will likely bottleneck what you do far more.

Of course if you can afford core 2 duo and fast hard drive and loads of ram, all the better!

RAM is always good but i never had issues with the speed of my harddrive. I'm no video user nor am i grabbing game movies all the time. Even the slow drive in the Mini is fast enough for what i need. The mobos are more expensive but if you want to spare money than go for a Yonah, a slower Merom or an Apple.

My bottlenecks are the noise which goes on my nerve, the dust pollution of my air and the power consumption of the system.

It will be interesting to see what Apple comes up next with, especially the Mini. If they would just release a Mini with a better gfx-card or a headless iMac this would be great.

My PC heats up my room unacceptably (not so bad in the Winter) but I am tempted to get a new one next year. Probably Core 2 Duo (unless Intel have released their quad core for a reasonable price by then). Only thing is, saving power consumption on CPU is a bit dumnb if graphics cards still eat it all up. I do have 1GB RAM which is fine on XP, and two drives, each partitioned so that the first 25% is used for fast stuff (OS/Games) and the other 75% for storage. Problem is bigger drives have rubbish access times.

I can empathise with the low fan noise. I got a quiet PSU and that's nice but my drives are noisy as is GPU (got a quiet CPU fan). When PCs are quiet and don't heat up the room, that will be great. Sometimes when I go to bed after a long go on the PC my ears a humming a bit as if they are compensating for the PC hum which is no longer there!

No one said that you only should save power consumption on the cpu side. Actually i would expect the vendor of such a low noise/power system to take care of all components.

I'm in no way anymore after one of the fastet gfx cards as today it's a) way to expensive, b) just totally crazy in terms of power consumption/size and c) you can't use it for client work as well as you can't count on it due to the low installed user base. Beside of some personal tryouts it's just a waste of money.

So gimme some low-mid range gfx card which is a good compromise at performance per watt and i'm happy with that. And this would still be faster than my good old 9800er...

Actually I think my dualcore fan noise is quite decent, my older system, from end 2002, makes way more noise than my new system. Also, I've put my PC cases in a sound-reducing case.. that also helps..

I've got the following hardware:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 CPU - 2.4Ghz @ 3.0Ghz Overclocked
Corsair PC8500 C5 2048MB DDR2-RAM - 1067Mhz
Asus P5W DH Deluxe i975X motherboard.

This setup is ~75% faster than my previous setup with same amount of RAM, but with a P4 3.2Ghz Prescott CPU.

3D rendering, Video editing and compression, and all such operations is lightning fast compared to the old setup.
Rendering a fair scene takes 30 secs on the old one, and 8 secs on the new one.
Games hover higher in the average fps range now, even though I have the same GFX card as I had on the old one. I don't reach the same low fps in complex scenes.

Using the demo of Ableton Live (music prog), I had a cpu utilization of around 20-30% when working with multiple soundtracks and midi tracks at once, but with this new setup, it barely goes over 5% on the toughest songs.

Rememeber that even games that are touted as single threaded, use threads for stuff like sounds/music and caching game content. (many many games use Miles soundsystem, and that one is fully multithreaded).

If there's anything you like me to test with my machine, let me know and I'll give you the results. (like compressing a file you have, Cinebench, whatever)

Yeah, Core Duo vs. Pentium D/VIIV, something to consider about. I believe that one's notebook based, and one's desktop based. Surprisingly, I believe that Apple uses Core Duo in their MacBooks AND smaller desktops (like the Mac Minis and iMacs), as well as most Windows notebooks. Just thinking about this, probably shuttle desktops require this smaller processor, too, for the small footprint, or the slim and trim desktops. I've always wanted to go small instead of monstrous with a desktop, I may give this a look about in another year or two.

Aren't bigger cases better for keeping down the temperature?

My next computer is going to be a Intel Core 2 Duo. I'm looking at Christmas/New Year (possibly even hanging on to get it with Vista).

I've seen a lot of good reports on Intel Core 2 Duo and it is certainly very gaming friendly.

Hmm, I'm sort of wondering what advantages the Core 2 Duo have over the AMD 64 x2 or Opteron?

A lot of comparison data and specs in here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/07/14/core2_duo_knocks_out_athlon_64/

@RAM - let me just say this - My processor, the E6600 is on par-or just above AMD's flagship - the AMD Athlon 64 FX-62 in all the tests out there.
AMD's processor costs more than $1050, and mine costs $420.
I've overclocked mine from 2.4Ghz to 3Ghz, so its on the same level as Intel's flagship - the Core 2 Duo X6800. (although you can overclock that one even higher)

I just have to say, this chip is the best buy I've ever made when it comes to computer hardware. Ever!

Yeah, AMD had their time, they were cheaper than the HT technology, but when it comes to dual-core, I guess that Intel finally won gamers over, after all these years. I almost thought that AMD would've had it made, since they always seemed to run more efficiently with heavier activities. Seems to me that Intel's trying to tell us something about AMD now.

it's the same as with anything else where there's good competition. One company has the edge for a while and the other comes up and takes the crown. Intel is ahead for the time being and somewhere down the road AMD will do something that will put them on top again. And the cycle will continue (as long as we are lucky that is).

When I placed my dual intel order, I also had the choice for an AMD X2 .. but it was more expensive, and according to the shop-wizz/tech, for audio/video the Intel won over AMD.

@Retro.hack. That's good to know as I currently have a P4 P4 3.2Ghz Prescott CPU too. I was reading all about the new Intel CPUs on tomshardware today which is why I started this thread. I was just paranoid that with lower Hz on each CPU, that single thread apps might actually run slower.

On the graphics front, I don't get enough time to play games these days, so in some ways having a slower GPU (9800XT) is good as it semi-mimics what my game buyers' hardware might be like.

I've got the P4 3.2Ghz machine with a Radeon X850XT running under the desk still. Thought it would be good for testing, but until that happens - it is used for research ;) (folding@home - grid.org)

Are you talking about dual core or core 2 duo? The old intel dual core were nice, but AMD were miles ahead, particularly for gaming. The new core 2 duo's are entirely different though, and considerably better than AMD's dual core chips, it would seem.

I have an 830 myself. It's nice and very handy for encoding a dvd and playing a game at the same time, but not on a par with either the AMD X2's or the Intel Core 2 Duo's for gaming performance.

As CS and Gabriel said as well... Intels have ALWAYS edged out AMD when it comes to video processing for some reason... But the AMDs were on top for quite a while (since the A64 came out) when it came to gaming. Now the Core2Duo appears to have taken the hot-seat for the time being. We'll see who comes out with the first quad cores tho. AMD says early next year. :)

I was talking dual core. I mentioned the shopwizz I wasn't interested in games (which is true, other than retrogames in an emulator :P), so he recommended me the intel config. (which is cheaper also)

@Kanati: Intel is releasing their Kentsfield processor late 2006. It contains 2x Conroe Core 2 Duo's and according to tests, it scales very well.
Cinebench reported x3.64 efficiency with Kentsfield compared to a single thread.
So if AMD really wants to gain control again, they need to unveil a radical new CPU design - or jump down to 65nm or lower pretty quick. Reports say AMD is having problem with stock speeds on their 65nm chips, which doesn't sound good.

Oh, if only Cyrix would make a comeback to the processor economy again...

this dual 2 core and quad core is really hot sh*t. Wait till we get Oct Core and Dodeca core etc. hehe centacore "your brand new centrium rips and compresses multi-petabyte Super-HD-DVD in less than 1 second", says Intel.

AMD and Intel really are neck on neck lately... The intel core 2 duo supposedly seems to lead again, but AMD's current architecture is *much* easily adaptable to more than 2 cores... Intel's current designs run into major bottlenecks in a quadcore configuration, unlike AMD's.

I've read reviews that say intel duo is faster than amd dual in 32bit, but amd is still ahead if you use 64bit. Hopefully AMD will jump ahead with their next cpu and prices will drop further.

still no one has been able to clarify if, even though each core runs at a slower GHz, if it's bettwe/worse on single threaded apps/games like Bmax for example...How could it be faster if only one slower core is working, or doesn't it work like that?

Grey,

I just watched a one and a half hour Apple video showing twin core Apples - now they are FASSSSSSSSTTTTTTTT!!!!

IPete2.

Fast at what though?

Even if an individual application won't use the 2nd core, the OS will still load-balance multiple applications across the two cores... So your Bmax application can end up with a core pretty much all to itself, and won't be held back by your antivirus software and other memory resident applications.

Ghz doesn't mean what it used to. It also matters as much or more how wide and how many data pipes there are and how much cache is available. It's quite possible for a slower clocked CPU to be much faster than a higher clocked counterpart. So no, it doesn't necessarily work like that any more.

@smilertoo

Just bought an AMD Turion X2 (dual processor ) (64 bit) laptop.

This is what seems to be competing with the Core Duo. Are you saying my machine should still be faster than a Core Duo, all other factors (like RAM) being equal? Can you give me a link to one or more of those reviews? Thanx

@xlsor & Kanati: thanks for the info, I get it now. NMuta: I was reading about the Core 2 Duo which is faster than all AMDs, go to www.tomshardware.com and look into it. You'll see you chip and standard Core Duos you can compare.

Grey,

Fast at everything they do, I should have been clearer with my initial post, thes new Apples should be called Quads as there are TWO dual core processors in them.

They also run Windows if you install Windows on them! As they are running on Intel products I guess that's expected, but will it mean I can buy a Mac and develop on the same machine, using the same applications I have now? Sorry hi-jacking the thread was not my intention.


IPete2.

hijacking no worries, I'm into "general discussion" anyway ;-) OK so they rock when in Macs, cool!

to answer the original question: I've "only" a normal CoreDuo T2500, but it is already faster at everything single core than my GFs AMD Venice core based with 2 Ghz, so it seems at least theoretically to outperform it.

As the CoreDuo 2 got some more FPU optimations I would assume its even faster.
Cache is something that only makes a difference in very few apps as already Yonah's have 2MB shared which means with single core app, the core has nearly 2MB cache ...

Hmm, it's something that Apple actually uses notebook technology in their iMacs and Mac Minis, even tho they are desktops. I guess this is the new trend in how to design any PC OR Mac these days in age. Intel seems to be better in mobile technology than anything else. AMD's got the desktop world won, IMHO.

The Core Duo not being 64 bit: what difference will this make? Will difference be seen on Windows Vista?

Is there any advantage that be be seen having 64 bit processor on a laptop that has only 2 gig RAM capacity?

The difference is more power when using 64-bit OS and applications. The 2GB RAM bit is just that Windows XP 32-bit has trouble using anything above 3GB. (so I've heard)

As for AMD winning over Intel's Core 2 Duo in 64-bit applications - yes, the tests indicate such, but with a fairly small margin and feels more like someone is grasping at straws.
32-bit performance is nothing short of stellar in comparison.

I hope AMD comes up with an even better architecture, because I do like the underdog best, but until then - Intel is the way to go for me.

Yeah, as I said, it was that big war between AMD and Intel that made Cyrix bow out of the picture. Haven't seen too many of their processors sell, if even they have the finances to return with dual-core of their own, which I doubt. I don't see them coming into the consumer PC perspective anymore.

AMD really made Intel sweat there for a while... Originally Intel's vision of 64 bit was the Itanium, with NO backwards compatibility for 32 bit... Then AMD came out with their x86-64 extensions, which allowed you to run both on the same chip. And at the same time, more computing power per MHz, getting more done at a lower clockspeed and thereby lower temperatures and energy usage.
Intel quietly implemented the AMD 64-bit extensions in their own offerings, becoming a follower instead of a leader. Their multi-billion investments in the Itanium line haven't quite had the expected results for them.

It's good to have two large companies neck-on-neck, the consumer wins.

Yeah, but still, without Cyrix there's hardly a brand for the independents to select anymore, or for those who want to support a true underdog.

Seems like VIA bought the rights to the Cyrix brand, but discontinued using it after a while. VIA produce their own x86 processor brand called Via C3 - embedded in their Mini-itx platform.

Yeah, and VIA probably doesn't build for the average consumer, either. What a deal that made, eh?

Eh? VIA may not be huge in the CPU market, but a *huge* percentage of motherboards are made around VIA chipsets.