Intel vs AMD Dual Core Chips
 

Has anyone seen a benchmark of how the two main chip maker's dual core entries fare against one another? And also, does AMD make a chip that competes with the Intel Core Duo in the laptop arena? And if they do, which manufacturers use them?

Use Google to find the benchmarks. They've been all over for more than 6 months now. Suffice to say that at this exact moment AMD's chips destroy Intel's in performance, but the benchmarks for the soon-to-be-released Conroe core chips are nothing short of stunning, while the initial AMD AM2 Core benchmarks don't represent a significant gain over current chips.

Basically:

AMD > Intel

and soon enough later...

Intel will be > AMD (But cost a lot)

But search about, its out there.

You know, the cost argument in the Athlon 64 age is pretty fucking ridiculous. AMD's high-end chips cost just as much as Intel's. I'd say right now the situation looks more like:

AMD > Intel (on the desktop)
Intel > AMD (in the laptops)

And soon, with Conroe and Merom, Intel will be better on both fronts. Then AMD really will have to find a way to push prices down, because that'll be their only big selling point.

I'll mostly agree. Yes Intel's Core Duo is a better mobile chip. While AMD's chips are better at the same price point on the desktop than Intel's.

I disagree that the cost argument is ridiculous however. Yes the top end costs about the same, but that's not a 1:1 performance comparison. No matter how you do the math, the Athlon chips are better price/performance chips. The only area that Intel has a better price/performance ratio is with it's ultra low end Pentium D (805, 920), these are good value, but low power CPUs.

If i recall correctly AMD chips also have less power comsumption and thus less heat. Often AMD's stock fans work just fine as far as cooling is concerned but I've heard of people needing to buy a 3rd party fan for Intel chips. Aside from that upgrading right now wouldn't be a good idea. Wait until Intel's new chips come out and AMD's new socket type before comparing and buying.

i didnt think the latest benchmarks were SLI or Duel Core~ so it wouldnt take it into account would it? Making it an unfair test? though i could be wrong on this one !_!

What is it that everyone's looking for in a CPU these days? Is it still just Mhz/Ghz? FSB? Serves breakfast?

No, but with such high power consumption (and thus, heat) they can heat up your daily morning coffee.

I'm looking for performance/power consumption. I want it to be fast, but I don't want it to be a damned furnace. Hence why Conroe and Merom (now dubbed Core 2 Extreme and Core 2 Duo respectively) are interesting to me.

When purchasing any type of CPU, I find that lots of websites say that you should use a third-party fan as the pre-bundled fans aren't as good or something. I've always been curious of why this is because I find no problems in using the standard fan in both my computers.

The reason why I ask is for my new machine, I don't know if it would be worth forking out the money on another fan if the one I get with the CPU will work fine.

1 Keeping it cooler will increase it's lifespan.

2 If you have other hot components in your machine it can actually be a problem with the higher end CPUs, the heat from all the other components overheats the CPU, and the CPU overheats the other components. Especially big concern with systems that have high end Pentium 4s and fanless GPUs etc. It's just not a balanced system and can smoke your GPU. Or if you have really hot GPU(s) they can overheat your CPU.

3 Overclocking is often in the back of reviewer's minds if not expressly mentioned. When overclocking CPUs it's always a good idea to have tons of cooling.

4 Some produce less noise as well, this is a concern for some.

When I was first building my computer I didn't even know CPU's came with fans. :)

When it comes to temperatures, how hot is too hot for a CPU? I don't really know how to gauge whether or not my fan is doing a decent job or not. I bought the Socket A version of one of these last year, but I had trouble installing it so I never got to find out if it was any better than what I've got now.

The new Intel chips are pretty good though, and I'd wait for them to become more mainstream on desktops. AMD was better for a brief period of time, however its lost its edge since Intel realized there was a problem.

The new AM2 X2 3800+ will only consume 35w of power, making it an attractive choice for me. Hell, I might even forgo spending only $700 on a PC to get an AM2 3800+, it could pay for itself with lower power bills :)

The safe temperatures a CPU can handle vary quite a lot by model. This .PDF has some information on what a Socket A CPU should run at http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/cont...docs/23794.pdf

Wow, so my Duron can theoretically be fine at close to 90c ?_? I'd immediately turn off if I saw it at even 70 though.

I was getting worried seeing my cpu averaging 50. I even bought a new case because of this.

35W? Wow, that's like the former 800MHz processors.
Good job for AMD!. The current 100+ Watts are insane.

Here's the source, it still seems though that the high-end CPUs will be sucking watts like no tomorrow. But 35W is awesome. My current PC, a 700MHz Slot A Athlon, uses up 42W; what a difference it makes when CPU manufacturers actually look at their laptop CPUs and put their power saving features into a desktip CPU.