Thunderbird Benchmarks

[paulcs]

I don't know where he got them:

http://www.hardocp.com/articles/amd/tbirdbenches.html

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Jammrock]

I'll take 4! All on the same motherboard with 4 GB DDR RAM, a G800 64 MB DDR RAM version with a 15,000 RPM fiber channel hard drive, a SB Live! platnium, and a bag of chips.

Jammrock

------------------
Athlon 650, Biostar board, 128 MB PC133 (Crucial), G400 32 MB DH, SB Live! w/ Digital I/O, 10/100 NIC, lots of case fans, etc...

[paulcs]

I'll settle for one, although the aluminum/slot format may be short-lived, and, I've read, the socket/copper format will be introduced sometime in the future.

I would like a Thunderbird-based system, but the upgrade path appears short for the Slot A version.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Jammrock]

All Thunderbirds and Spitfires will be 0.18 micron copper based chips. I guess the Dresden fab is getting enough yields that AMD can produce enough chips out of the one factory.

I would assume that when the final switch to copper is made that the Austin fab will be retooled to match the dresden fab.

As for slot vs socket. The Thunderbird/Spitfire chips are suppose to ship in both flavors sometime in the late Spring, early summer.

Jammrock

[Dyre]

I just hope the current GFD's will work with these new bad boys, as we all know how horriable FSB overclocking has been with athlons so far....

[paulcs]

I swear, I just read yesterday that the first Thunderbirds would be aluminum and Slot A, then Dresden would kick in a short time later with copper.

Anyway, it appears Intel has got another chip shortage on their hands, with parts above 700 MHz to be hit the hardest. All the more reason for AMD to get the Thunderbird out a little early and make Satan look silly again.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[paulcs]

Pictures:

http://www.hardocp.com/news_images/2000/april_2000/thunderbird1a.jpg

http://www.hardocp.com/news_images/2000/april_2000/thunderbird2a.jpg

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[paulcs]

I'm seeing a lot of conflicting information about the Thunderbird's die. I've read in several places that Fab 25 (Austin) will initially produce aluminum dies followed shortly by Fab 30 (Dresden) with copper dies.

I still think we all have to get ready for the transition to socketed CPU's and motherboards. It's going to happen. There is no sound engineering reason to keep the chip on a PCB if L2 cache is on the chip. It then becomes a marketing issue, and the lower manufacturing costs of socket CPU's will eventually win out.

If you upgrade motherboards and CPU's every four to six months, of course, it won't be a problem.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Greebe]

I have got to say I'm not impressed! My Athlon runs proportionally = to it cept that it was run on a KX133 MB. Therefore the mem bandwidth benchmarks beat mine... and that's it!

Sandra 2000 registered
CPU benchmark 2383 mips
1141 mflops

CPU bandwidth 378 MB/s
433 MB/s

MM benchmark 2368 it/s
3959 it/s

Of coure I don't really feel like down grading my CPU to 750mHz (it's currently running at 850 1:3)

[paulcs]

I can only imagine the damage you'll do when you get your hands on one of them.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[DentyCracker]

It may very well be a "crippled" CPU. I was reading what Chris Tom ( www.amdzone.com ) was saying

[Taz]

I've been reading over at JC's, (www.jcnews.com/pc), that theres been a bit of a row between Kyle (HardOCP) and Chris (Amdzone) over the validity of those benchmarks. Probably best to wait for further benchmarks before making any kind of judgement.

[Greebe]

I've spoken with JC personally and we both agree that something is definitely wrong with the results on HOCP.

[paulcs]

I think part of the problem was the accusatory nature of Chris's first post:

"-X-Static let me know that Hard OCP has some supposed 750MHz Thunderbird benchmarks up. My instincts say these are fake."

That's pretty rough. It denotes an intentional fraud, and there isn't a lot of room for interpretation.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Himself]

I can't wait for socket A to get rid of this POS SS7 motherboard. (Hi Gurm! ) Actually, no, my motherboard does everything I ask of it, I just want a faster cpu. Wish there were competition in Athlon mb chips though, instead of just VIA.

[I think slots are the only way to go for SMP, other than that I agree, if you are only going to use one cpu, a socket is just as good, if you can cool it enough.]