I'm feeling a little uncertain about why anyone would want to rush out and purchase a new AM2 system ASAP. What advantage would you gain over a 939 rig? Right now, DDR2 memory is loads more expensive than DDR, and according to Tom's Hardware's analysis, there isn't any advantage. Well, at least, not theoretically until DDR2-800 becomes available, but even so, are we going to see a significant increase in performance? It seems that the smart move is to set up a 939 system, dump it full of good, cheap DDR RAM, and save your pennies for the new DirectX 10 graphics card that will be available at the end of the year when Vista comes out. I just see DDR2 as the next logical transition, especially with chip makers changing over time to DDR2, but you won't see me jumping on the bandwagon any time soon....
WTF is up with this review in terms of spelling errors and inconsistencies??
quote: The tightest timings were maintained on the PC2-5300 kit, which held 3-2-2-8 timings up to an FSB of 345 (13X multiplier producing 1382.5 MHz set at DDR533 memory strap).
The tightest timings are NOT the PC2-5300 kit according to the table, but RATHER THE OCZ DDR2 PC2-4200.
The only one I see that achieves 3-2-2-8 at FSB of 345 is OCZ DDR2 PC2-4200, not the Crucial PC2-5300 kit.
quote: This produced buffered bandwidth of 8455 MB/s on Sisoft Sandra Professional 2005, and 4616 MB/s unbuffered bandwidth.
Plus, CONSISTENT spelling errors that say MB/s. I sure don't want my memory bandwidth to be single digit MB/s even on a 486 PC.
He explains this in the article. Overclocking the FSB on intel's chips is different than on AMD chips. You can much finer tune an AMD because of the adjustable multiplier...unless you have mega-cooling to allow the processor to scale with the memory speed...It's kind of tough.
Last time I checked DDR800 is 400 MHz real frequency. I've looked through the heap of hard to manage screenshots, (yes what happened to graphs?) but the highest I saw was 350 MHz. Did I miss something? Were you not able to reach 400 MHz?
Not to take anything away from Crucial or OCZ but DDR2~800 @ 4-4-4-12 has been on the market since last year!!!
Like the article said "Other competing manufacturers such as Corsair and OCZ Technology will be able to source the same IC's......". This isnt just Corsair and OCZ, there are others. Mind you these US memory companies get their work done a lot by Taiwan manufacturers. How about Geil and PQI?? PQI have TurboMemory DDR2~900 @ 4-4-4-12 and a DDR2-1000 @ 5-5-5-15 and both are 1Gb sticks.
What makes these Crucial sticks special?? Nothing apparently according to the benchmarks. It is nothing more than a publicity advertisement for them......New DDR2 Standard?? I think not!!!!
Unless you have a rare batch of TCCD equivalent in DDR2 form, the playing field seems pretty even between memory manufacturers to me at the moment.
slightly confused because i don't think i ever see the pc2-6400 running at 400mhz? just give me a chart with the max speed with varying timings and i'll be happy. if not, i'll get some myself and do it :p
why the heck would anyone get phase change on a 35W CPU, thats complete freaking overkill. I hope its not because you intend to overclock it becasue then you will be sorely disapointed. How do you think AMD got it down to 35W? they replaced the current highspeed transistors with ones that sacrifice speed for power consumption. OF course with the FX-62 they have to go the other way and therefore get 125W, but great speed. Seeing as that only a 50% clock increase for more then 3x the power consumption. The new low power transistors will be low-voltage, low-power, and low-speed. Sorry, no free lunch, everything comes at a cost, and here its power for speed.
Haha, lower speed transistors, you think they would honestly engineer two versons? I highly doubt it, I don't know a lot about CPU's but my guess is that these low power chips are got the same way the turions are they are tested and binned for speed and voltage. The ones that work at lower voltages at high speeds become these special low wattage CPUs and the others become regulars. I dont know about overclocking but I would guess they would overclock better too. Just a guess because no one knows yet though.
its always interesting when people mock you and then follow it by saying "I don't know a lot about CPU's". But, you are right, they will do the same that they did with Turion. And what they did with Turion was to use differnet transistors than they did in the A64... Before making statements its best to confirm with Google, takes 10 seconds and make you not look like an idiot...
Am I the only pne who can't wait for DDR2 to be supported by AMD on 6/6/6? Rumour has it unofficial DDR2-800 support - combined with A64 superior memcontroller 3-2-2 800 possible? I hope it's tested Wes.
you Must understand the CPU that tomshardware got was an Test CPU, thay realy should of not done an benchmark as the CPU it self was not fully working and the DDR2 ram that was used was could only work at DDR2 666 and the timeings was stuck at 4-4-4-12 and may have been limted by the broken DDR2 contorler in it as well (you realy should look at it and not trust the resluts at all and thay have told you that its not to be trusted as well as its not an retail product as toms' stats)
basicly at the time when P4 came to use DDR2 the timeing speed of DDR2 was silly DDR1 would out perform DDR2 this is why amd have not gone to DDR2 as ram speeds are now to the point where it will not be an bottle neck (and Ram price between DDR1 and 2 are not that must £10-£40 $40-$80 depending on size)
testing the Ram performance in am P4/P5 system is not usefull any way as it can not use it (get some intresting resluts when AM2 fully comes ot)
(the date is 06/06/06 when it comes out)
my self i am going to stick my AMD X2 3800+ 939 and mobo and 2Gb of ram in me server (board is dieing caps are leaking on this P4 mobo) and get AM2 when 65mm fabs come out for AM2 and fast ram by then (and some good mobos)
all that will probly be end of year i can wait my 3800+ X2 is running at 2.4ghz (basicly 4600+X2 as the ram is running at DDr480 as well)and its happy and cool keeps me happy
DDR1 outperforming DDR2 wasn't the main reason AMD didn't go to DDR2 right away. The main reason (if you read AMD's lawsuit against Intel's marketing practices) was because Intel created separate consortium to design DDR2 with the memory manufacturer's with the full intent of keeping AMD out of the loop. Thus AMD was a year or 2 behind Intel in developing the memory controller for DDR2 (as they couldn't see the specs till it was finished) nor did they have any input in the design of the specification.
And thus DDR2 sucks more than it should had AMD been involved :)
I'll admit that I mostly skimmed through this article, but since much of the data seemed to be in the form of screenshots that are too small to be easily legible without cliking on them to get the enlarged version, I found it hard to get a quick glimpse of what this article might have to offer.
I would much prefer results to be presented in traditional graphs and tables, instead.
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Griotspeak - Sunday, March 12, 2006 - link
2GB PC-5300 modules should be available?i KNOW there isnt much hope of a definite answer, but i'd like to have some idea since i could wait a month or so.
Regs - Saturday, February 25, 2006 - link
Maybe i'll wait until it has a use.pnyffeler - Thursday, February 23, 2006 - link
I'm feeling a little uncertain about why anyone would want to rush out and purchase a new AM2 system ASAP. What advantage would you gain over a 939 rig? Right now, DDR2 memory is loads more expensive than DDR, and according to Tom's Hardware's analysis, there isn't any advantage. Well, at least, not theoretically until DDR2-800 becomes available, but even so, are we going to see a significant increase in performance? It seems that the smart move is to set up a 939 system, dump it full of good, cheap DDR RAM, and save your pennies for the new DirectX 10 graphics card that will be available at the end of the year when Vista comes out. I just see DDR2 as the next logical transition, especially with chip makers changing over time to DDR2, but you won't see me jumping on the bandwagon any time soon....IntelUser2000 - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=270...">http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=270...WTF is up with this review in terms of spelling errors and inconsistencies??
The tightest timings are NOT the PC2-5300 kit according to the table, but RATHER THE OCZ DDR2 PC2-4200.
The only one I see that achieves 3-2-2-8 at FSB of 345 is OCZ DDR2 PC2-4200, not the Crucial PC2-5300 kit.
Plus, CONSISTENT spelling errors that say MB/s. I sure don't want my memory bandwidth to be single digit MB/s even on a 486 PC.
leexgx - Saturday, February 25, 2006 - link
what spelling errors (ram does not work at 9000GB/s) that result is right
IntelUser2000 - Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - link
I was likely referring to the fact that the table and the paragraph below is inconsistent. There are no such numbers on the table.
hwhacker - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
He explains this in the article. Overclocking the FSB on intel's chips is different than on AMD chips. You can much finer tune an AMD because of the adjustable multiplier...unless you have mega-cooling to allow the processor to scale with the memory speed...It's kind of tough.RTFA. ;)
Marlowe - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
They could reach 400 MHz mem easily with the 4:5 divider. (would require 320 MHz FSB)Marlowe - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
Last time I checked DDR800 is 400 MHz real frequency. I've looked through the heap of hard to manage screenshots, (yes what happened to graphs?) but the highest I saw was 350 MHz. Did I miss something? Were you not able to reach 400 MHz?ATWindsor - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
Why do I suddenly hae to enable referer logging to see the pictures in the article?gudodayn - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
Not to take anything away from Crucial or OCZ but DDR2~800 @ 4-4-4-12 has been on the market since last year!!!Like the article said "Other competing manufacturers such as Corsair and OCZ Technology will be able to source the same IC's......". This isnt just Corsair and OCZ, there are others. Mind you these US memory companies get their work done a lot by Taiwan manufacturers. How about Geil and PQI?? PQI have TurboMemory DDR2~900 @ 4-4-4-12 and a DDR2-1000 @ 5-5-5-15 and both are 1Gb sticks.
What makes these Crucial sticks special?? Nothing apparently according to the benchmarks. It is nothing more than a publicity advertisement for them......New DDR2 Standard?? I think not!!!!
Unless you have a rare batch of TCCD equivalent in DDR2 form, the playing field seems pretty even between memory manufacturers to me at the moment.
Xenoterranos - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
Ah winbond megachips, where have you gone to??ozzimark - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
slightly confused because i don't think i ever see the pc2-6400 running at 400mhz? just give me a chart with the max speed with varying timings and i'll be happy. if not, i'll get some myself and do it :pAvalon - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
No, I'm with you Zebo. I can't wait for DDR2 on AMD's AM2. I'll be getting one of those 35w X2 3800+ CPUs and some phase change ;)BrownTown - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
why the heck would anyone get phase change on a 35W CPU, thats complete freaking overkill. I hope its not because you intend to overclock it becasue then you will be sorely disapointed. How do you think AMD got it down to 35W? they replaced the current highspeed transistors with ones that sacrifice speed for power consumption. OF course with the FX-62 they have to go the other way and therefore get 125W, but great speed. Seeing as that only a 50% clock increase for more then 3x the power consumption. The new low power transistors will be low-voltage, low-power, and low-speed. Sorry, no free lunch, everything comes at a cost, and here its power for speed.Leonidas1 - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
Haha, lower speed transistors, you think they would honestly engineer two versons? I highly doubt it, I don't know a lot about CPU's but my guess is that these low power chips are got the same way the turions are they are tested and binned for speed and voltage. The ones that work at lower voltages at high speeds become these special low wattage CPUs and the others become regulars. I dont know about overclocking but I would guess they would overclock better too. Just a guess because no one knows yet though.BrownTown - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
its always interesting when people mock you and then follow it by saying "I don't know a lot about CPU's". But, you are right, they will do the same that they did with Turion. And what they did with Turion was to use differnet transistors than they did in the A64... Before making statements its best to confirm with Google, takes 10 seconds and make you not look like an idiot...ozzimark - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
there are "fast" and "slow" transistors actually.. ;)Zebo - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
Am I the only pne who can't wait for DDR2 to be supported by AMD on 6/6/6? Rumour has it unofficial DDR2-800 support - combined with A64 superior memcontroller 3-2-2 800 possible? I hope it's tested Wes.Googer - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
Zebo, I think I am staying away form any RAM that has Satanic Memory Timings.As for the Socket AM2 Tomshardware has already benchmarked it.
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/02/21/a_look_at_a...">http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/02/21/a_look_at_a...
leexgx - Saturday, February 25, 2006 - link
you Must understand the CPU that tomshardware got was an Test CPU, thay realy should of not done an benchmark as the CPU it self was not fully working and the DDR2 ram that was used was could only work at DDR2 666 and the timeings was stuck at 4-4-4-12 and may have been limted by the broken DDR2 contorler in it as well (you realy should look at it and not trust the resluts at all and thay have told you that its not to be trusted as well as its not an retail product as toms' stats)basicly at the time when P4 came to use DDR2 the timeing speed of DDR2 was silly DDR1 would out perform DDR2 this is why amd have not gone to DDR2 as ram speeds are now to the point where it will not be an bottle neck (and Ram price between DDR1 and 2 are not that must £10-£40 $40-$80 depending on size)
testing the Ram performance in am P4/P5 system is not usefull any way as it can not use it (get some intresting resluts when AM2 fully comes ot)
(the date is 06/06/06 when it comes out)
my self i am going to stick my AMD X2 3800+ 939 and mobo and 2Gb of ram in me server (board is dieing caps are leaking on this P4 mobo) and get AM2 when 65mm fabs come out for AM2 and fast ram by then (and some good mobos)
all that will probly be end of year i can wait my 3800+ X2 is running at 2.4ghz (basicly 4600+X2 as the ram is running at DDr480 as well)and its happy and cool keeps me happy
Jedi2155 - Sunday, February 26, 2006 - link
DDR1 outperforming DDR2 wasn't the main reason AMD didn't go to DDR2 right away. The main reason (if you read AMD's lawsuit against Intel's marketing practices) was because Intel created separate consortium to design DDR2 with the memory manufacturer's with the full intent of keeping AMD out of the loop. Thus AMD was a year or 2 behind Intel in developing the memory controller for DDR2 (as they couldn't see the specs till it was finished) nor did they have any input in the design of the specification.And thus DDR2 sucks more than it should had AMD been involved :)
DigitalFreak - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
The AM2 platform launches on June 6, 2006 (6/6/6). Those aren't memory timings.Spacecomber - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
I'll admit that I mostly skimmed through this article, but since much of the data seemed to be in the form of screenshots that are too small to be easily legible without cliking on them to get the enlarged version, I found it hard to get a quick glimpse of what this article might have to offer.I would much prefer results to be presented in traditional graphs and tables, instead.
Olaf van der Spek - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
What is the information about the AMD CPU doing in this test?Too much copy/paste?
JustAnAverageGuy - Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - link
Yeah, that does seem out of place.Authors also need to go back and recheck their MB\GB , MHz\GHz labels. I sure don't want any 4.5MB\sec RAM.
96redformula - Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - link
My faith in crucial is gone.