Core Duo - Intel's Best CPU?

Bender writes "How good is Intel's Core Duo mobile processor? Good enough that Apple chose to put it in the iMac, and good enough that Intel chose to base its next generation microprocessor architecture on it. But is it already Intel's best CPU? The Tech Report has managed to snag a micro-ATX motherboard for this processor and compared the Core Duo directly to a range of mobile and desktop CPUs from AMD and Intel, including the Athlon 64 X2 and the Pentium Extreme Edition. The results are surprising. Not only is the Core Duo's performance per watt better than the rest, but they conclude that its 'outright performance is easily superior to Intel's supposed flagship desktop processor, the Pentium Extreme Edition 965.'"

CoreDuo != Core Microarchitecture

[BobPaul]

It's not obvious from the article, but you can find it elsewhere on the internet (such as Intel's comment that the Core microarchitecture will provide 20% boost over CoreDuo). It is hinted at in the article with the following quote (emphasis mine).

If you've been hanging around here for a while, you may have heard us referring to Core Duo by its code name, Yonah, long before Intel decided to give it a somewhat confusing official name. ... In the case of the Core Duo, those CPU cores are massaged and tweaked versions of the Pentium M processor, familiar as part of Intel's Centrino mobile platform.

The new core microarchitecture, if you read the Ars Technica article in the previousl /. posting linked, was designed from the ground up and is similar to PentiumM in many respects, but is much more different than the CoreSolo and CoreDuo are.

Hotter the Better

[dueyfinster]

You're forgetting all those students with Laptops, one I know said his laptop was so hot, he'd leave it on his bed before going to sleep, as the accommodation had substandard heating (the norm for all student places, no?)

2.0 iMac versus 2.8 P4

[boxlight]

I just got a new 2.0 Core Duo iMac and it feels a lot more powerful than my old P4 2.8 GHz Sony PC.

I know it's subjective, and I'm now running OS X instead of Windows, but still -- I definately *feels* more powerful.

boxlight

Maybe per watt performance is the best but...

[danpsmith]

Looks like AMD still has them beat. From my take on this, on pure performance, the 3800+ X2 is going toe-to-toe and the 4800+ X2 is beating it every single time. So again, not that impressive. Now the per watt performance is important in some applications, so I can see why it would be a better, say, mobile platform than the AMD chips. But let's not pretend that Intel is winning the benchmarks with this quite yet.

Re:Depends

[Anonymous Coward]

I wrote micro interpreters at Infocom. My 1MHz Apple II 6502 interpreter was 80% fast as the 6MHz PC AT 80286 interpreter.

drewk

Practical experiance

[weiserfireman]

Just this week, I received a brand new HP nx9420 laptop with a 1.83Ghz Duo processor. I use this laptop for 3D Solid CAD/CAM applications. For my application, it is definately faster. The CAM rendering is faster, the part rotation is smoother. Overall very efficient. I have done some stress testing by doing some long database queries at the same time I am rendering a part. My old computers would have joked. There is a noticable hit on rendering performance, but it is still able to complete both tasks in a reasonable manner. We have the same CAD/CAM software on a 1.6Ghz PentiumM Laptop and two 2.8GHz Pentium-4 desktop machines. All the machines have 1024MB of RAM, and the two Desktops have 256MB video cards. I have not noticed that heat issues that other folks have mentioned, but I don't hold it in my lap either. So far I am very impressed.

Battery life in the MacBooks?

[delire]

Not only is the Core Duo's performance per watt better than the rest [...]

Why then is the battery life in the MacBooks so miserly?

What is AMD going to do?

[mcbridematt]

I think its extreme pricewhore time for AMD, apart from a new Socket with DDR2 - which solves a problem which has never really existed at AMD* (I still enjoy my Opterons NUMA as much as the next person though :) ), although DDR2 still brings some benefits none the less.

* Apart from the Athlon MP, whose usefullness apart from a low low cost SMP server platform disappeared when stuff started to demand more bandwidth. A Uniprocessor Duron on an nForce2 owns it on anything where AGP and memory bandwidth comes into play!

Re:What?

[Mark Gillespie]

Who wants a EMT64/AMD64 in a mobile processor? it serves no purpose. I think the AMD fanboys are realising that the sleeping giant is waking up...

Re:Load of Crap

[wvitXpert]

I wish there was a mod option for 'Blatantly Incorrect'.

Keep in mind that

[sgent]

Intel's lead is mostly a manufactoring one -- 65nm process. AMD still uses 90nm. Not to discount Intel's advantage, but AMD doesn't need a new core design to continue their dominance -- merely a new manufactoring facility (which is hard, but not as hard as the design).

Re:Having used a Intel Dual Core for awhile ...

[rekoil]

Let me interject here - I own a dual 1.8GHz G5 tower. Anyone who's looked inside one of these things has the same initial reaction - "god, those heatsinks are HUGE!". And while it's very quiet while idling, it does get noisy when it's under load. And you can feel the heat coming out the back if you put your hand back there. It's almost as bad as the dual Athlon XP system I used to have that would literally heat the room.

By contrast, I just got an IBM ThinkCentre desktop system at work, featuring a dual-core 2.8GHz Pentium D running Linux. The heatsink is a reasonable size, and the CPU fan is actually on the front of the tower chassis with a duct guiding the air over the CPU's heatsink. This thing is practically silent, and even when compiling a kernel with-j4 set you can't feel much hot air coming out the back.

The moral of the story is that IBM was waay behind Intel on the performance-per-watt game and had no signs of being able to catch up. People knew this well before the Intel switch was announced and so far there's no sign of Apple being proved wrong.

That said, anyone have any info on the heat dissipation on the dual-core G5s vs. the single core CPUs?

Re:Having used a Intel Dual Core for awhile ...

[planetmn]

Dell Inspiron E1505
CoreDuo 1.83GHz, Windows Media Center (with recovery CD), 1GB RAM (vs. 512MB), 15.4" 1680x1050 widescreen SXGA+ (vs. 1440x900), 80GB SATA, DVD+/-RW, 802.11, 128MB ATI X1300 (vs. 128MB X1600), 85WHr battery (vs. 60WHr), 1 year warranty for $1342 (vs. $1999 so 33% less). Dimensions are close (same width, Dell is 0.5" taller, about an inch deeper, and 0.5lbs heavier). Pretty close comparison. Is it twice as much, no, is it a substantial increase, yes. I'm sure somebody will post "but what about iLife, etc.?" Sure, there are difference, and there are reasons why the cost is more for the Mac, but it's not "free" software if you are paying more to get it included. Personally, I think Macs cost quite a bit more than PCs, but if it's worth it to you, then buy it, if not, don't.

Inspiron 6400 with same specs as above (but only 512MB RAM) is $1292 (35% off of the Mac price). The price differences get even higher when comparing to the $2500 MacBook Pro.

BTW, upgrade to 256MB X1400 for $80.

-dave

Re:Maybe per watt performance is the best but...

[Senjutsu]

So what would you do if you wanted a dual core 64 bit laptop?

Realize that there isn't a laptop on the planet that can make use of a 64 bit address space, and come to my senses?