[HardwareHaven] New Review shows FX-8150 beating i7 2600k at gaming

[apoppin]

So all twenty games are GPU limited?

i think not

Mine are TWENTY games played at 1920x1200 and 2560x1600 with max details and some level of AA - not two games at 16x10 - and in each case, the Phenom and Core i7 were overclocked.

Bulldozer does fine in gaming; As you said, it can run the games alright .. what more do you want?

 

[Hypertag]

So all twenty games are GPU limited?

i think not

Mine are TWENTY games played at 1920x1200 and 2560x1600 with max details and some level of AA - not two games at 16x10 - and in each case, the Phenom and Core i7 were overclocked.

Bulldozer does fine in gaming; As you said, it can run the games alright .. what more do you want?

You are right, it is a bargain. It is such a bargain that AMD should double the price of it in order to maintain the gross profit margins that intel does. Everyone else is just an Intel plant receiving an Intel paycheck to spread lies on every forum on the internet.

 

[RiDE]

you are right, it is a bargain. It is such a bargain that amd should double the price of it in order to maintain the gross profit margins that intel does. Everyone else is just an intel plant receiving an intel paycheck to spread lies on every forum on the internet.

wwybywb?

 

[Maximilian]

So all twenty games are GPU limited?

i think not

Mine are TWENTY games played at 1920x1200 and 2560x1600 with max details and some level of AA - not two games at 16x10 - and in each case, the Phenom and Core i7 were overclocked.

Bulldozer does fine in gaming; As you said, it can run the games alright .. what more do you want?

Yeah they're all GPU limited at that res, its why the FPS is similar across the board.

Its not a big deal now, yeah it can run the games but someone with a bulldozer will hit a CPU bottleneck far sooner than someone with a nehalem or sandy bridge when they release the new 28nm GPU's next year.

 

[happy medium]

I have been reading Hardware Heaven for a good while and I like thier site.

They are certainly not a biased site.

With that said, I think BD sucks and to me seems like another Phenom I.

 

[happy medium]

Yeah they're all GPU limited at that res, its why the FPS is similar across the board.

Its not a big deal now, yeah it can run the games but someone with a bulldozer will hit a CPU bottleneck far sooner than someone with a nehalem or sandy bridge when they release the new 28nm GPU's next year.

Crossfired 6970's are not gpu limited. Look at the entire chart.

 

[MegaWorks]

Excellent work once again apoppin, love reading your articles.

 

[OCGuy]

AMD fans just arent going to give this one up, are they?

 

[Maximilian]

Crossfired 6970's are not gpu limited. Look at the entire chart.

Only the bulldozer got paired with 6970 CF, for some reason the i7 920 got stuck with 6870 CF... useless for a direct comparison. Even then with the gimped GPU setup the 920 still beats bulldozer in a few games, poor showing.

Its all over the review sites, bulldozer is terrible for a gamer where IPC is king, take it or leave it.

 

[RussianSensation]

FX-8150 does do well in games. At stock it smokes my i7-920 at 3.8GHz and the Phenom II 980BE at 4.3GHz.

Did you look at your own charts? There is only 1 game that shows a significant deviation with 1 GPU and that is World in Conflict, where the i7-920 beats BD. All the other games show 1-2 fps difference. I am not sure how 1-2 fps difference is "smoking" anything, esp. since some of these are 60-100 fps benches.

1. i7-920 cost $284 in November 2008. Last time I checked, it's been 3 years since that CPU launched. Also, for games i5-750/760 delivered same performance for a lot less $$$ 2 years ago.

2. Take a look at your numbers once you add a 2nd graphics card, shifting the load onto the CPU - an overclocked i7-920 destroys both the Phenom II and Bulldozer. Clearly pulls away in the majority of benchmarks with HD6870 CF, which bodes well for Nehalem/Lynnfield for 28nm GPUs.

3. 2500k is $220 and is missing from the charts, most likely the most relevant comparison. Put that in at 4.5ghz and see what happens.

P.S. Your FX-8150 is showing HD6970 CF, not HD6870 CF. Prob a mistake?

 

[apoppin]

Yeah they're all GPU limited at that res, its why the FPS is similar across the board.

Its not a big deal now, yeah it can run the games but someone with a bulldozer will hit a CPU bottleneck far sooner than someone with a nehalem or sandy bridge when they release the new 28nm GPU's next year.

What a LOAD of nonsense.

FX 8150 at stock is faster than my Turboed-to-4GHz i7-920 and i will use Bulldozer when i want to test my fastest graphics including GTX 580 SLI and HD 6970-X3 TriFire

As i understand it, a gamer would want to buy Bulldozer - or i7 - to play at 1920x1200 or 2560x1600 with a HD 6970 class of card or with HD 6970 CF.

 

[toyota]

appopin, is that supposed to be 6970 cf instead of 6870? and why do you have the 8150 at stock but the i7 and Phenom oced in the crossfire review?

 

[RussianSensation]

FX 8150 at stock is faster than my Turboed-to-4GHz i7-920 and i will use Bulldozer when i want to test my fastest graphics including GTX 580 SLI and HD 6970-X3 TriFire

LOL did you even bother looking at your own graphs, esp. the first set. i7-920 with HD6870 CF smoked both AMD CPUs with HD6870 in CF.

You may want to glance again, esp. at 1920x1080 AA #s. The beating an i7-920 @ 3.8/4.0ghz gives to BD in at least 6-7 games is ridiculous, and that's with i7 having 2x HD6870s not 6970s?

 

[apoppin]

Did you look at your own charts? There is only 1 game that shows a significant deviation with 1 GPU and that is World in Conflict, where the i7-920 beats BD. All the other games show 1-2 fps difference. I am not sure how 1-2 fps difference is "smoking" anything, esp. since some of these are 60-100 fps benches.

1. i7-920 cost $284 in November 2008. Last time I checked, it's been 3 years since that CPU launched. Also, for games i5-750/760 delivered same performance for a lot less $$$ 2 years ago.

2. Take a look at your numbers once you add a 2nd graphics card, shifting the load onto the CPU - an overclocked i7-920 destroys both the Phenom II and Bulldozer. Clearly pulls away in the majority of benchmarks with HD6870 CF, which bodes well for Nehalem/Lynnfield for 28nm GPUs.

3. 2500k is $220 and is missing from the charts, most likely the most relevant comparison. Put that in at 4.5ghz and see what happens.

P.S. Your FX-8150 is showing HD6970 CF, not HD6870 CF. Prob a mistake?

My i7-920 is at 3.8GHz with turbo - you cannot buy a LGA 1366 stock i7 today that is any faster

Yes, it is HD 6970 CF across the board. Typo. There were definite scaling issues with all but 7 games and the motherboard - look at the same games scale with Phenom II in the same PC. Unfortunately, you just see the chart; you will have to read the article.
-- And that would be driver issues with CrossFire

Bulldozer just overclocked to 4.4GHz wins across the board and in CrossFire also (when it scales)

my review isn't done. AMD sent me a defective AM3+ MB that took two days to replace. i should have the entire article up in the morning. i only had 4 days to benchmark and write the article. i am also going to include SLI results since CF scaling is in the toilet for the AM3+ platform.
:'(

Did anyone else do Crossfire testing with AM3+??

 

[Maximilian]

What a LOAD of nonsense.

FX 8150 at stock is faster than my Turboed-to-4GHz i7-920 and i will use Bulldozer when i want to test my fastest graphics including GTX 580 SLI and HD 6970-X3 TriFire

As i understand it, a gamer would want to buy Bulldozer - or i7 - to play at 1920x1200 or 2560x1600 with a HD 6970 class of card or with HD 6970 CF.

Loses in gaming:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/fx-8150-zambezi-bulldozer-990fx,review-32295-20.html

Loses in gaming:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/434?vs=47

Absolutely destroyed in gaming:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/amd-fx-8150_10.html#sect0

This list shows pretty much the same thing with every review:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2197909

 

[RussianSensation]

my review isn't done. AMD sent me a defective AM3+ MB that took two days to replace. i should have the entire article up in the morning. i only had 4 days to benchmark and write the article
:'(

We all appreciate your hard work. :thumbsup:

If tomorrow or whenever, your benchmarks change (due to drivers/mobo issues) and BD whoops the i7, no problem. But based on the 2 charts you currently linked, the winning CPU in CF combination is the Blue column.

Also, I find it ironic that people criticized a 6-months late GTX480, despite it being about 10-15% faster than AMD's 5870 card, having higher overclocking room, FAR superior DX11/Tessellation performance, game bundles, it was still deemed a failure. Btw, the "furnace" GTX480 only consumed about 85-100W more power in games than the HD5870. The HD6970 is almost as bad as the furnace that GTX480 was made out to be......

An FX-8150 @ 4.7-4.8ghz uses up 200-250W of more power than an overclocked 2500k system. That's just ridiculous. There is no way I could run an FX-8150 @ 4.8ghz + HD6970 on my 520W power supply if I intended to load both with distributed computing projects/games.

Also, I am having doubts that a lower end $120-130 board will survive after 2-3 years of such severe power consumption/heat demands. You'd likely need an extremely well made motherboard with very robust VRAM cooling.

I think you have to ask the question: If you are just building a system for games, why pay as much or more for the FX-8120/8150 over a 2500k and then have worries about your board failing from excessive heat, pretty much being forced to buy a very expensive air cooler (or enclosed water system), having all this heat being dumped for worse gaming performance than a 2500k?

Your charts also omitted Blizzard games. SC2, WOW and Diablo 3 are/will be huge for years to come. SC2 will have 2 more expansions!

 

[Patrick Wolf]

What a LOAD of nonsense.

FX 8150 at stock is faster than my Turboed-to-4GHz i7-920 and i will use Bulldozer when i want to test my fastest graphics including GTX 580 SLI and HD 6970-X3 TriFire

As i understand it, a gamer would want to buy Bulldozer - or i7 - to play at 1920x1200 or 2560x1600 with a HD 6970 class of card or with HD 6970 CF.

Even if not GPU limited (which you probably are in some games) you don't have GTX580 + SLI results as well. Seeing as some games play better with NV and some AMD it seems premature to conclude the 8150 is the superior choice.

 

[apoppin]

Even if not GPU limited (which you probably are in some games) you don't have GTX580 + SLI results as well. Seeing as some games play better with NV and some AMD it seems premature to conclude the 8150 is the superior choice.

i didn't conclude that - yet. AMD rushed the hell out of the reviewers giving us only about 6 days from receipt of HW to NDA's end - and we all got our watercooling units on Tuesday.

i still have to put up the article with BIG DISCLAIMERS about CF. Then i bench all over again - a different MB BIOS; and a clean Win 7 install where i am not rushed. And i will set up Nvidia drivers on another HDD and test GTX 580 and GTX 580 SLI

Also, I find it ironic that people criticized a 6-months late GTX480

Not me. i liked it while recognizing its faults - and also its potential. i was one of the few who also correctly predicted the GTX 580
:whiste:

I really think that the FAILURE is AMD's PR - on the HW side, they failed to hit 4.5GHz with a Turbo core to 5.0GHz - if FX 8170 launched at 4.5GHz there would be a different picture of it right now
Then you will have your conclusion .. for now - from testing with a single HD 6970, Bulldozer performance is *promising*.

If tomorrow or whenever, your benchmarks change (due to drivers/mobo issues) and BD whoops the i7, no problem. But based on the 2 charts you currently linked, the winning CPU in CF combination is the Blue column.

Have you ever seen CF scale SO badly? See my response above to see how i plan to continue benching.

And thanks for the compliments! i better get back to work!

 

[piesquared]

Not a bad CPU actually. Certainly has it's strengths depending on workload and review site, and will only get stronger in the near and long term. Of course, as expected the intel shills, puppets and investors are hard at work trying to convince folks why they shouldn't like it.

Couple more here. It's not anywhere near the failure certain folks are trying to attach to it.

http://www.techspot.com/review/452-amd-bulldozer-fx-cpus/

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/1/

http://www.rage3d.com/reviews/cpu/amd_fx_8150/

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

We all appreciate your hard work. :thumbsup:

If tomorrow or whenever, your benchmarks change (due to drivers/mobo issues) and BD whoops the i7, no problem. But based on the 2 charts you currently linked, the winning CPU in CF combination is the Blue column.

Also, I find it ironic that people criticized a 6-months late GTX480, despite it being about 10-15% faster than AMD's 5870 card, having higher overclocking room, FAR superior DX11/Tessellation performance, game bundles, it was still deemed a failure. Btw, the "furnace" GTX480 only consumed about 85-100W more power in games than the HD5870. The HD6970 is almost as bad as the furnace that GTX480 was made out to be......

Both had pretty abysmal overclocking headroom, but the 5870 had much better efficiency, a much better price, consumed a considerable amount less power, and therefore also generated less heat. "Only" 100W more power at full load when we get to this level is simply criminal. The 5870 was also a lot quieter. Tessellation is a marketing bullet NVIDIA loves to pull out, but the reality is it's made little to no difference in most modern games, and most games won't use extreme tessellation anyway. Ultimately, yes, the GTX 480 was a failure. Obviously not comparable to the failure that Bulldozer is, but still a failure.

BTW, game bundles? Really? That's up to sub-vendors to include it and it's typically only for a limited time. Don't even know why you bother to bring it up.

 

[apoppin]

Loses in gaming:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/fx-8150-zambezi-bulldozer-990fx,review-32295-20.html

Loses in gaming:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/434?vs=47

Absolutely destroyed in gaming:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/amd-fx-8150_10.html#sect0

This list shows pretty much the same thing with every review:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2197909

RIDICULOUS

Who is going to buy a nice CPU and MB, get themselves a nice video card and then play at 16x10 with No AA?

And in NONE of the games you link to is there any practical difference to the playing experience - either way. Especially WoW at 2560x1600 where ALL of the CPUs run within a few fps of each other.

 

[mb103051]

the 920 looks as fast as the new stuff in those charts...im happy with mine...

 

[Maximilian]

RIDICULOUS

Who is going to buy a nice CPU and MB, get themselves a nice video card and then play at 16x10 with No AA?

And in NONE of the games you link to is there any practical difference to the playing experience - either way. Especially WoW at 2560x1600 where ALL of the CPUs run within a few fps of each other.

I cant understand why you refuse to acknowledge the uselessness of benching a CPU at high res with full settings, it proves nothing.

When 28nm cards hit next year people with a bulldozer may well find it bottlenecking their new card and therefore not getting as high an FPS as those with sandy bridge setups. That is what the linked benches prove, bulldozer is weak in gaming, CPU's with a low IPC fare poorly in gaming. Fact.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Not a bad CPU actually. Certainly has it's strengths depending on workload and review site, and will only get stronger in the near and long term. Of course, as expected the intel shills, puppets and investors are hard at work trying to convince folks why they shouldn't like it.

Couple more here. It's not anywhere near the failure certain folks are trying to attach to it.

http://www.techspot.com/review/452-amd-bulldozer-fx-cpus/

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/1/

http://www.rage3d.com/reviews/cpu/amd_fx_8150/

You're right. It's not bad; in fact, it's pretty horrible. The FX-8120 is the one that competes with the i5-2500K directly, and it only matches the 2500K in multi-threaded and gets its ass handed to it when it comes to any other workload. It also consumes a lot of power, too much in fact. Bulldozer has lower IPC than Phenom II, an architecture already at a significant disadvantage in comparison to Sandy Bridge in that metric. It also has horrible performance/watt, and overclocking isn't any better than Sandy Bridge.

What you're basically left with is a CPU that's barely faster than the Phenom II X6 it's supposed to replace that also consumes more power while being overall slower than its main competition. Bravo!

 

[qliveur]

I disagree. What this thread needs is more posts like this, this and this. Ya know, just to make sure no one misses it.

LOL, looks like someone's desperately trying to rationalize their bonehead purchase.