Benchmarks: AMD's Phenom II
Published: 30 Jan 2009
Test models and platforms
For all the tests of AMD's new processors, we used the MSI DKA790GX Platinum motherboard with an AMD 790GX chipset. The Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 and Core 2 Quad Q9550 processors operated on a Gigabyte GA-X38T-DQ6 motherboard, while the Nehalem Core i7 920 chip used a Gigabyte EX58-DS4 board.
For main memory, the AMD systems used two 1,066MHz OCZ 2GB DDR2 modules. These chips do not adjust themselves automatically in the BIOS to the frequency specified by the manufacturer, but have to be manually set to run at the higher speed. We also had to increase the voltage to 2.2V.
The Intel systems with Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad CPUs used two 2GB Aeneon DDR3 modules running at 1,333MHz, while the Nehalem system used three 2GB Aeneon modules running at Intel's recommended DDR3 speed of 1,066MHz. For comparative purposes, the differing main memory sizes of 4GB for the Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad and Phenom II systems against the Core i7 920 with 6GB had no bearing on the test results.
We used an ATI Radeon HP 4870 graphics card with the 8-561-3-081217a-73402 driver and a Raid-0 array of two 250GB Western Digital disks for storage. The systems ran Windows Vista 64 SP1.


















