i7 vs PII Deneb 940

[Antec-User]

Lets keep this as civil as possible..

I would like to hear the pros and cons of both.. For the VERY short time my PII 940 was running with the hardware in my sig, it was incredibly fast compared to my Phenom 9950 BE Juiced to 3.2g on air (Got it to 3.3g on water with a lower VCore and was more stable)

Line processes? Cache? I'm not too sure what we need here.

My buddy and I are thinking of trying Intel.. I like my Phenom II, but he is in dire need of a new rig and was conciderign the i7.. I seem to stay in touch with the newer tech more than him, he kind of fell off.. So he comes to me for some information from time to time.. Which is actually quite humbling seeing as he taught me how to build my first rig about 2 years ago, and he asked me for video card advise not too long ago.. -Very cool..


But anyway...

How do each processors stack up against each other? As soon as I get my GB Board (In sig) back from RMA I'm going to run a torture test on it using Prime 95 with liquid cooling, in stock 3.0g form. Then I will start to gradually juice it up and run a test @ roughly 3.5g.


Let's see if we can get some good points here to what each processor can handle as far as multi tasking, efficiency and power handling, gaming and torture testing.

 

[Hefemeister]

My thinking is that the i7 is a better cpu.

But, If you already have a am2 board and good ddr2 Ram it would be crazy not to get a pII. PII will get you more bang for the buck.

It just depends on each individual situation.
If money is not an issue and you want the best go i7. If money is an issue or you have equipment that can be utilized by the pII then that would be your best option.

They are both great cpu's and either would make anybody happy.

 

[Antec-User]

I am looking for more information backing the statement.. But I still appreciate the input..

I have a darn good AM2 board (In sig) with 8g 1066 ram.. But I'm still curious.. Maybe later this year.. I'm still waiting for SSD HDD's to come down in price.. LOL Thinking late summer early fall..

 

[Hefemeister]

Benchmark Results: Synthetics - Review Tom's Hardware : Overclocking: Core i7 Vs. Phenom II

Head to head - AMD Phenom II vs Intel Core i7 - Features - PC Authority

AnandTech: AMD Phenom II X4 940 & 920: A True Return to Competition

 

[Antec-User]

^ Holy crap...


THanx!

 

[Hefemeister]

Another good one is Bang per Buck where the take Benchmark score x 100 / price. The higher the number the better.

Intel e8500 .59
p x4 9850 .56
I7 920 .48
p2 x4 940 .41

It did not have the P2 x3 720 which I believe to be the best bang for the buck at the moment.

Also keep in mind this is for cpu only. The cost of an i7 system is far more than a p2 could be.

 

[Antec-User]

I didn't realize the higher end i7's were THAT pricey! P2 9850? Maybe a stupid question.

 

[Hefemeister]

whoops my mistake am fixing it now it is a phenom. slip of the fingers.

 

[Antec-User]

Ah.. ok The Phenom 9950 is a good CPU, but my PII 940 seems to run circles around it.. (From the brief time it was running.. Bad CPU and Bad MoBo.. What'r the chances.. )

I came from an X2 4200 with an A8V VM SE board to a PI 9950 BE w a M3A32 MVP board w a 9950 BE to what is in my sig now.. The M3A board died during the liquid install so I ordered a new MoBo and PII 940 Deneb CPU.. Both were bad.. (Long story).. Got the board out for RMA now.

My buddy started me on AMD and I've been here since..

 

[Apokalipse]

With the i7's, they are very fast CPU's. But:
a) you need programs to be heavily multithreaded to take advantage of it (even multithreaded games usually only use 2 cores so far)
b) the CPU costs a lot
c) the boards cost a lot
d) you have to use DDR3, which costs more than DDR2

The way I see it, the Phenom II's are high-end CPU's with a mid-end price tag.
You can spend half the amount on a 790GX AM2+ board as on an x58 board, and spend less on the RAM by going DDR2. And you can still run AM3 chips in your board.

DDR3 gives ~5% better performance over DDR2 with AM3 chips. It will be the better choice once prices drop, but it's not there yet.
DDR2-1066 is very cheap, and will still allow the Phenom II's to perform very well.