Intel's Core 2 Extreme & Core 2 Duo: The Empire Strikes Back
by Anand Lal Shimpi on July 14, 2006 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Gaming Performance using F.E.A.R. & Rise of Legends
Our F.E.A.R. test should be fairly familiar by now, as it is the built in performance test included with the game. Computer settings were left at "Maximum" while the graphics settings were set to "High" with the resolution cranked up to 1600 x 1200. F.E.A.R. ends up still being more GPU than CPU bound at these settings, even with a pair of X1900 XTs at its disposal, but we do see some separation among the processors:
The top three spots still go to the top three Core 2 CPUs, with the E6300 falling around the level of the X2 4600+. A trend that we've been seeing all throughout this review is that the performance of these CPUs effectively falls into three groups: Core 2 processors at the top, Athlon 64 X2s in the middle and Pentium D at the very bottom of the charts. In a sense that's the easiest way to classify these three groups of processors: if you want the fastest it's Core 2, mid-range goes to the Athlon 64 X2 and if you don't like good performance there's always the Pentium D.
Rise of Legends is a newcomer to our game benchmark suite and what an excellent addition it is. This Real Time Strategy game looks very good and plays well too; it serves as good filler until the next Command & Conquer title eventually arrives for those looking for a RTS fix. We ran with the resolution set to 1600 x 1200 and the graphics settings set to the medium defaults. We recorded a custom playback of a 3 vs. 2 multiplayer battle and played it back at 4x speed, recording the average frame rate for 10 minutes of the battle. The 10 minutes we focused on contained a good mix of light skirmishes between opponents, base/resource management with very few characters on the screen and of course some very large scale battles.
As with most RTSes, Rise of Legends is extremely CPU bound. The performance variability between runs was fairly high in this test, mainly because of how disk intensive the playback can get. Differences in performance of up to 5% should be ignored, but the standings are correct - the Core 2 line of processors absolutely demolish the competition: you're looking at true next-generation CPU performance here. The E6300 isn't nearly as impressive when compared to its more expensive siblings, but when you compare it to AMD's lineup it looks very good, especially considering its proposed cost.
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finbarqs - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
just to show you how EASY it is to O/C the system! (and for the Futuremark junkies :-) )http://www.futuremark.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1...">http://www.futuremark.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1...
You would want one :)
if you want to know, 3DMark 2001SE posted a score of 45k, and 3DMark 2003 posted a 33k, FACTORY.
phaxmohdem - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
I was wondering if you could possibly do some "single core" performance testing in the CPU's by simply changing the HAL to "ACPI Uniprocessor PC" instead of "multiprocessor PC" This would tel windows to only use one of the Core2 Duo cores, and I think would give us a good indication of how it will perform when released. Especially on the 2MB cache models, since I'm guessing the single cores won't bust out the door with a full 4MB.Just some food for thought/consideration. I personally would love to see a few tests run this way and compared to some single/dual core A64's.
JarredWalton - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
Conroe-L is so far off that it's really an afterthought. The only reason it's not shipping is that Intel has a ton of Netburst stuff to offload, IMO. At $145, the PD 945 is still interesting in terms of certain computational tasks. (I miss the QMD Folding@Home cores....)fishbits - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
I had hoped AMD could gain even more market-share before something like this happened, would rather see the two CPU makers on more even footing. Intel just hit this one out of the park however, if pricing holds and availability is decent. Was looking at upgrading my 3500 (939) to a $300 X2 4600 after the price drop, but now? It looks like I'll probably keep this system and build a new rig around a $300 Intel 6600, which wins over or smokes the 4600 depending on benchmark. I really don't know what AMD can do to keep me in the short term, because I don't know if they can make any money dropping prices as far as it looks like they'll need to go.SpaceRanger - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
One thing to consider though, if you decide to go with the C2D 6600, then you will also have to spend $$ on a new Mobo + Memory (since your DDR RAM won't work on the platforms for C2D. Keep that in mind when you're upgrading.fishbits - Saturday, July 15, 2006 - link
When I said that if I went with Intel I'd keep my current rig and build a new one around the Conroe, didn't it dawn on you that I'd already "considered" the need to get a new mobo, memory, etc?SpaceRanger - Sunday, July 16, 2006 - link
Holy arrogance.. EXCUSE ME for pointing something out..epsilonparadox - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
Well the loads of money they made when they had the better performing architecture can hopefully keep them doing very well also the Opteron isn't really being challenged and thats really their moneymaker right now. They shouldn't have any problems lowering prices on their desktop chips while keeping the status quo on the Opterons.zsdersw - Saturday, July 15, 2006 - link
They can't really keep the status quo on the Opterons either. Woodcrest excels (or, at the very least, is equal to the Opteron) in the 1P and 2P server space.. which is a huge chunk of the overall server market.LoneWolf15 - Friday, July 14, 2006 - link
While I'm sad to see AMD lose the performance crown, I'm not so obtuse as to deny it's happening.I'm excited by Intel's newest chip, but I think the results for me will be that I'll buy a faster Athlon 64 X2 when the prices drop (assuming Socket 939 ones become cheaper as well, I don't plan a move to Socket AM2 for some time to come). So Intel's newest chip should benefit even those of us sticking with an AMD system. :)