Nehalem Xeons destroy competition

[Starglider]

Long Anandtech review; to summarise, the impact of these new chips on server applications is even higher than the impact of the Core2 architecture on the desktop. Many of the application benchmarks show 80% performance gains over the previous generation Xeons and 70% over currently available Opterons. The bulk of the performance gain seems to come from hyperthreading; not much help on the desktop, but it looks like Intel really did get it right this time for server applications. However the turbo mode and bandwidth improvements are significant as well. AMD's only hope for anything approaching competition is their near-release 6-core chips - they are also in the process of moving to DDR3 and probably have their own version of 'turbo mode' in the works - but Intel's own 6-core refresh of the Nehalem architecture will be coming out late this year, along with the 8-core version for 4-way (and above) servers.

This is the most significant single product launch in server-side hardware since the Opteron (edging out Intel's X25-E, the first enterprise SSD to really make price-performance sense). I'm eagerly looking forward to running our AI core on these processors; we're going to need at least two new servers this summer for an upcoming application, and they'll probably be dual X5550s or X5560s. With luck we'll be able to replace the main development server with a monster 32-core Nehalem-EX machine at the end of the year.

[White Haven]

That's pretty damned impressive..starting to wonder why AMD's even trying anymore, they haven't been able to pull of anything at all for years now.

[The Kernel]

This was hardly surprising given Nehalem's design, but that doesn't make it any less impressive. These new Xeon's are in a class of their own and in many cases a single or dual is running with QUADS from designs that are still shipping. Damn impressive.

On an interesting footnote to this, I was wondering how the AMD fanboys felt about this given such a clear and decisive victory so I went over to AMD Zone and found the below.

AMD Zone

TALK TO ME ABOUT ANTITRUST AND MONOPOLISTIC ABUSE AND MORONS LIKE THESE FANBOYS SPEWING WHAT THEY HAVE BEEN PROGRAMMED TO SPEW.

I didn't look at any links on this POS.

I have no interest in spintel lies or spintel propaganda or spintel-paid review sites or spintel cherry-picked horse puckky benchMarketing.

TALK TO ME ABOUT ANTITRUST
AND MONOPOLISTIC ABUSE
AND MORONS LIKE THESE FANBOYS
SPEWING WHAT THEY HAVE PROGRAMMED TO SPEW.

oops almost forgot
UNMANDTEK IS SOMETHING I AVOID - SHRIMPBOY IS A PAID IDIOT

At a guess, I'd say they aren't taking it very well.

[Darth Wong]

Why are there CPU fanboys? There's no real cost to switch from one to the other, and so you'd think there would be very little resistance against doing so.

[Dave]

Why are there CPU fanboys? There's no real cost to switch from one to the other, and so you'd think there would be very little resistance against doing so.

As I recall, motherboards tend to be processor specific, and I'm not sure you can just swap processors without having to swap the motherboard as well.

[edit:] I could be completely wrong though.

[Darth Wong]

Why are there CPU fanboys? There's no real cost to switch from one to the other, and so you'd think there would be very little resistance against doing so.

As I recall, motherboards tend to be processor specific, and I'm not sure you can just swap processors without having to swap the motherboard as well.

[edit:] I could be completely wrong though.

Of course you can't swap CPU types without swapping motherboards. But lately, you can't even upgrade in the same processor family without getting a new socket and a new motherboard. Also, motherboards are often less expensive than CPUs. At the high end, they are much cheaper than the CPU. I would think most people have gotten over the conceit of the upgradable motherboard; in reality, you generally upgrade the MB/CPU as a combo, and count yourself lucky if you can reuse the RAM.

[The Kernel]

Why are there CPU fanboys? There's no real cost to switch from one to the other, and so you'd think there would be very little resistance against doing so.

Why are there sports team fanboys? Heck, why are there ANY kind of fanboys? It's just competitive spirit I guess.

But yes, most people have moved over to Intel willingly lately as the Blue team has superior price/performance across a wider range than AMD does. In the K8 heydays before Core 2 was released, Intel products were the laughingstock of the enthusiast community, but Core 2 changed everything and there hasn't been much reason to change back since.

[Netko]

That is a crushing advantage. Bye bye Opteron, been nice knowing you.

I do hope AMD recovers from the current slump simply for competition's sake. Because without a somewhat viable competitor (not, for example, VIA), Intel can easily start sliding prices upwards over time and we all know that even if the antitrust regulators decide to monitor the situation the damage will be done and the remedies will be ineffective.

Ironically, all my personal computers are still AMD, despite being bought in the times since AMD started having problems - each time, the deal offered was simply too good to pass up (low to mid market) compared to Intel solutions offering the same features.

[The Kernel]

Ironically, all my personal computers are still AMD, despite being bought in the times since AMD started having problems - each time, the deal offered was simply too good to pass up (low to mid market) compared to Intel solutions offering the same features.

That's not surprising, AMD has offered some surprisingly good deals in the past couple of years. The problem I've always had is that I tend to spend a little bit more on my processor ($200-$300 range) and AMD hasn't been competitive in that space in a long time.

[Netko]

Generally, it isn't the actual processor which is the (price-related) problem. On the desktop, Intel motherboards are ridiculously more expensive, while in the mobile space Intel is simply astonishingly annoying with its shoddy integrated graphics and the necessity to spend a lot (comparatively) to get away from them compared to AMD's ATI solutions.

[Starglider]

Even if AMD had executed the Barcelona launch properly and was in a position to offer 3.2 GHz Opterons by now, it wouldn't make much difference (in the server space; it would help a lot on the desktop). However things might have been different if they'd started developing MCM Opterons earlier; an eight-core Opteron with four channels of DDR2-800 would probably be competitive in performance (though profit margins would be slim). As it is there's supposed to be a 12-core MCM DDR3 Opteron launched in mid-2010, which might be competitive with Nehalem-EX, but only AMD can do a good job scaling clock speed between now and then.

[phongn]

Long Anandtech review; to summarise, the impact of these new chips on server applications is even higher than the impact of the Core2 architecture on the desktop. Many of the application benchmarks show 80% performance gains over the previous generation Xeons and 70% over currently available Opterons. The bulk of the performance gain seems to come from hyperthreading; not much help on the desktop, but it looks like Intel really did get it right this time for server applications.

Well, SMT on NetBurst had issues with its hugely long pipeline and the replay engine (needed for its aggressive speculative execution). Nehalem doesn't suffer from that.

That is a crushing advantage. Bye bye Opteron, been nice knowing you.

AMD just hasn't been able to replicate the magic of the initial K8 design, alas. Rumours abound of the failure of K9.

I do hope AMD recovers from the current slump simply for competition's sake. Because without a somewhat viable competitor (not, for example, VIA), Intel can easily start sliding prices upwards over time and we all know that even if the antitrust regulators decide to monitor the situation the damage will be done and the remedies will be ineffective.

They are not in good condition to do so; they spent far too much on ATI, Intel dominates high-profit premium parts and now they've spun off their fabs. I don't know how well AMD can perform without the close coupling between fab and design they previously enjoy - and arguably much of Intel's success is that coupling. That said, unlike in before, Intel's biggest competitor is now itself: we have enough CPU power for the majority of tasks at hand, even home-media. Witness the sudden popularity of netbooks with (by modern standards) anemic processors. How do you convince people to pay for new computers when the perception of performance increases is not there anymore?

Ironically, all my personal computers are still AMD, despite being bought in the times since AMD started having problems - each time, the deal offered was simply too good to pass up (low to mid market) compared to Intel solutions offering the same features.

How is that ironic?

Generally, it isn't the actual processor which is the (price-related) problem. On the desktop, Intel motherboards are ridiculously more expensive, while in the mobile space Intel is simply astonishingly annoying with its shoddy integrated graphics and the necessity to spend a lot (comparatively) to get away from them compared to AMD's ATI solutions.

At least in the US, motherboards tends to be comparably priced - or at least not much more of a premium. Intel chipsets also tend to be much more solid than their AMD/ATI counterparts (nevermind nVidia).

For the mobile space, the integrated graphics are good enough for the vast majority of laptop use and those that need greater graphics performance can pay the price.

That's not surprising, AMD has offered some surprisingly good deals in the past couple of years. The problem I've always had is that I tend to spend a little bit more on my processor ($200-$300 range) and AMD hasn't been competitive in that space in a long time.

AMD still has good deals out (the extreme price pressure Intel is putting on them can't help, though). The Phenom II X3 720 is a fine desktop processor (assuming one's software doesn't spaz out at seeing three cores).

Why are there CPU fanboys? There's no real cost to switch from one to the other, and so you'd think there would be very little resistance against doing so.

As I recall, motherboards tend to be processor specific, and I'm not sure you can just swap processors without having to swap the motherboard as well.

I think Mike is referring to the fact that if you need a new server or workstation you can switch from AMD to Intel (or to VIA or whoever else makes x86 processors) trivially.

[The Kernel]

AMD still has good deals out (the extreme price pressure Intel is putting on them can't help, though). The Phenom II X3 720 is a fine desktop processor (assuming one's software doesn't spaz out at seeing three cores).

Only if you are on a shoestring budget. I managed to upgrade to a Core i7 920 system for $225 for the proc and $190 for the Gigabyte x58 UD3 motherboard. That was a hell of a deal and although the X3 720 is cheaper, it isn't cheap enough to offset the huge performance delta.

[phongn]

Only if you are on a shoestring budget. I managed to upgrade to a Core i7 920 system for $225 for the proc and $190 for the Gigabyte x58 UD3 motherboard. That was a hell of a deal and although the X3 720 is cheaper, it isn't cheap enough to offset the huge performance delta.

It also depends on the workload - Nehalem does best at heavily-threaded bandwidth-intensive applications, and many (most?) consumer applications don't really apply there. Adding up the price delta between CPU, motherboard and RAM ends up being nontrivial.

Also, boo to the UD3 and its four slots

[phongn]

Also - TechReport did some of their own benchmarks of a different nature with similar conclusions: for parallelizable work, Nehalem is crushing the competition. TR's benchmarks include proteomics, CFD, rendering and encoding.