AMD vs Intel?

[sharrukin]

I am going to be buying a new computer and I need it to be at least;

Recommended:
- 3 GHz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor
- 1GB System Ram
- ATI Radeon X800 series, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series or higher video card

Minimum System Requirements:
- 128MB Direct3D compatible video card with DirectX 9.0c compatible driver
- DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card

What I would like to know is what is an equivalent AMD processor as my understanding is that they are more efficient than Intel?

Supported Video Cards:
- ATI Radeon X1900 series
- ATI Radeon X1800 series
- ATI Radeon X1600 series
- ATI Radeon X1300 series
- ATI Radeon X850 series
- ATI Radeon X800 series
- ATI Radeon X700 series
- ATI Radeon X600 series
- ATI Radeon X300 series
- ATI Radeon 9800 series
- ATI Radeon 9600 series
- ATI Radeon 9500 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7900 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7800 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7300 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6500 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6200 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6100 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5900 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5500 series

The other question is what is the best card for the money here?

[sbroadbent]

I'm not sure if you got any information or made any decisions on this, but these are my observations.

First, you definately don't want to be looking at Pentiums. There is so much more that gives you better performance for the price.

My choices depending on the platform of your choice would be either an Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (it runs at 2.13 Ghz, but it does much more per clock than older generation P4's), or an AMD64 3800 X2 (runs at 2.0Ghz). For a bit more performance you could go for a 4200 or 4600, depending on the money you plan to spend.

AMD used to be undisputably more efficient than Intel, but with Core 2, Intel has some viable alternatives which consume way less power and have more performance.

If you plan to go AMD, you'll probably be looking at an AM2 platform. Unfortunately the 939 will be phased out. If so, you'll require DDR2 memory (pretty much the same for Intel). For the best performance you'll want to find DDR2 memory running at 800Mhz (with CL around 4). Because of the memory controller integrated into the CPU, AMD has better memory performance, but is more sensitive to latency.

As to video cards, if you don't require Shader Model 3 support, an ATI Radeon x850 XT gives pretty good performance. Otherwise an x1900 gives good price/performance. If you are on a budget, you could go with an x1800 which still gives good performance. Avoid the x1300 and x1600. They just aren't worth it.

I'm not too familar with Nvidia cards, but you could probably find some comparisons between the ATI cards mentioned above and their "equivalents" for Nvidia. An important thing to note is that as of this moment, Nvidia's cards are unable to do both Anti-aliasing and HDR lighting at the same time. You're limited to one or the other. If your game can do both, and you want to utilize both, go with ATI for now. Note: Valve did their own version of HDR in Half Life 2, and so you can use both AA and HDR on Nvidia cards.

As to the best price/performance, you'd be looking at either an x1900XT or a 7900GT. They give excellent performance for the price you're going to spend. You can of course spend more to get more performance, but you're paying alot more for not as much of a performance boost. Since prices are continually dropping, this advice would obviously need revising. They'd either be cheaper or something even better would fill the slot.

I am going to be buying a new computer and I need it to be at least;

Recommended:
- 3 GHz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor
- 1GB System Ram
- ATI Radeon X800 series, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series or higher video card

Minimum System Requirements:
- 128MB Direct3D compatible video card with DirectX 9.0c compatible driver
- DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card

What I would like to know is what is an equivalent AMD processor as my understanding is that they are more efficient than Intel?

Supported Video Cards:
- ATI Radeon X1900 series
- ATI Radeon X1800 series
- ATI Radeon X1600 series
- ATI Radeon X1300 series
- ATI Radeon X850 series
- ATI Radeon X800 series
- ATI Radeon X700 series
- ATI Radeon X600 series
- ATI Radeon X300 series
- ATI Radeon 9800 series
- ATI Radeon 9600 series
- ATI Radeon 9500 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7900 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7800 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 7300 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6500 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6200 series
- NVIDIA GeForce 6100 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5900 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5600 series
- NVIDIA GeForce FX 5500 series

The other question is what is the best card for the money here?

[Navaros]

What I would like to know is what is an equivalent AMD processor as my understanding is that they are more efficient than Intel?

This understanding is obsolete. It was true until the end of this July when Intel released Core 2 Duo.

Now AMD has vastly lackluster products compared to Intel's Core 2 Duo. Read any tech site or tech boards on the net and they will tell you unanimously (excepting a few AMD fanboys who refuse to acknowledge the truth) that Core 2 Duo totally obliterates AM2 or any current AMD processor.

In other words, not buying Core 2 Duo right now would be unwise as you are getting far less bang for your buck and worse technology if you go with AMD.


As for the graphics card question, I would advise none of those if possible, and wait for DX10 to come out early next year since once it does all the cards you listed will be vastly obsolete.

If you have to buy one to tide you over I'd recommend a 7600 or something like that. That's a mid-range card that will play most current games pretty good. You definitely don't wanna spend several hundred dollars on a card that is only a few months away from being obsolete, like all of those ones are.

[Rodion Romanovich]

dual core isn't implemented in most programs yet, and particularly not in many games. Right now, you get faster prestanda with a non-dual core but with more Ghz for that single core. I.e. a dual core 3 GHz is slower than a single core 4GHz. That's bound to change, but it'll probably take at least 1-2 years or more until dual cores prestanda is used by most programs. If you use several programs at the time in Windows, you get a prestanda boost even today, but when running a single program you'll not notice any improvement from dual cores yet.

[Leftenant Moley]

Intel > AMD

but

ATI > Nvidia

so

AMD + ATI = Intel + Nvidia

Is it ture that that ATI on Intel board have some compatibility issues as well as Nvidia on a AMD board? If so how significant is it?

[PwnageBot2000]

Intel > AMD

but

ATI > Nvidia

so

AMD + ATI = Intel + Nvidia

Is it ture that that ATI on Intel board have some compatibility issues as well as Nvidia on a AMD board? If so how significant is it?

lawl. I have an AMD and a nVidia GeForce 7900 GS SLI.
Also I have a question. Why do the more recent intel and amd processors have less clock speed than the older pentium 4?! also, most recommended settings require 3 ghz. My AMD 4200 only has 2.2! Will this effect gameplay adversly? (assuming the 7900 GS SLI is there)

[screwtype]

Also I have a question. Why do the more recent intel and amd processors have less clock speed than the older pentium 4?! also, most recommended settings require 3 ghz. My AMD 4200 only has 2.2! Will this effect gameplay adversly? (assuming the 7900 GS SLI is there)

No it won't. Later model CPU's have much more efficient architecture which more than makes up for lower clock speeds.

As I understand it, higher clock speeds mean more heat, and CPU development has hit something of a wall in that high clock speed CPU's are harder to keep cool. Some late model Pentiums for example have had overheating issues.

It's partly for this reason that CPU manufacturers have stopped concentrating on just cranking up clock speed in favour of more sophisticated solutions, ie better architecture. This way they can keep clock speed, and thus heat production, down, while actually increasing overall performance.

[TosaInu]

dual core isn't implemented in most programs yet, and particularly not in many games.

True, very true. In benches (including running games) C2D will already crush any other processor. And they are cheap and they consume less power and they can be overclocked. Imagine games to support the 2 cores

When you have to buy a PC now, get C2D.

[Husar]

Actually, the fact that a Core 2 Duo using only one Core gives about the same or more speed than a single Core AMD tells me that Core 2 Duo is the way to go. Apart from that, Falcon 4 Allied Force, Gothic 3 are two games I can name that use two cores. For other games I am not sure, but I would guess they are coming.