Dual core vs Triple core.

[Dane]

I had someone try telling me that an Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.8ghz will out perform an AMD Triple core a 1.8ghz.

Is this true?

[FrancoisC]

I saw something about this not too long ago, in short, they where comparing in performance like a tricycle (AMD) vs a Motorcycle (Intel). Which one would you rather have?

[Hupp]

this link may help you out, it has the comparisons of benchmarks

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/hands_on_...new_x3_tri_core

[Yusuf M. Veteran]

That person is correct. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of multi-threaded applications out there that takes advantage of multiple cores. Performance is more-so affected by operations per second. And since the Core2Duo is clocked higher, it performs more operations per second than the AMD CPU.

[Elliot B.]

  Hupp said:

this link may help you out, it has the comparisons of benchmarks

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/hands_on_...new_x3_tri_core

lol ouch - the X3 seems poor! Then again, the X4 does, too...

[MightyJordan]

  Dane said:

I had someone try telling me that an Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.8ghz will out perform an AMD Triple core a 1.8ghz.

Is this true?

In one word, yes. In that benchmark linked by Hupp, one of the high-end Core 2 Duos outperforms even an AMD Phenom, which is a quad-core.

When it comes to multicore processors, Intel seems to outperform AMD almost all the time. Back in the single core days, it was the other way round.

[Yusuf M. Veteran]

It isn't entirely due to technological differences between AMD CPUs and Intel CPUs. It's more-so the fact that there are far more single-threaded applications than multi-threaded applications (and by applications, I also mean games). Even with Intel, their higher clocked Core2Duos seemingly outperform their Core2Quads (at lower frequencies). For example, a dual-core processor at 3.0 GHz will outperform a quad-core processor at 2.4 GHz. The only time the quad-core will win is in multi-threaded applications which will make use of the two additional cores.

[Dane]

Thanks for that link!

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

personally, i'd still rather have the Core2 even IF the X3 were faster :p

sorry, not helping the situation.

im not so convinced that a X3 would be faster...

[+PeterUK MVC]

  Dane said:

I had someone try telling me that an Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.8ghz will out perform an AMD Triple core a 1.8ghz.

I'm guessing thats a mistake AMD don't do Triple core CPU's @1.8ghz .

[Eevo]

  Franky601 said:

I saw something about this not too long ago, in short, they where comparing in performance like a tricycle (AMD) vs a Motorcycle (Intel). Which one would you rather have?

unicycle, much more fun

[Dane]

  PeterUK said:

I'm guessing thats a mistake AMD don't do Triple core CPU's @1.8ghz .

Yeah I found that out alittle bit ago.

So it would be that C2D @ 2.8ghz, vs an AMD X4 at 1.8. but from the link that was posted, that C2D might out perform the X4

[gkl]

I can say anything about dual vs triple core CPUs but the date of that article is 04/22/08 and they use Phenom I...

[Brodel]

There is a pretty good review of the Q6600, E7500 and X3 720 here: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2009...-ii-x3-720-be/1

[Argote]

In that case I'd go with the 2.8 Ghz Dual core. The other processor may have 4 cores instead of 2 but the clock difference is so massive that it won't make up for it in MOST situations.

Also, be careful since some benchmarks tend to favor AMDs architecture and other tend to favor Intel's.

This is a much better processor comparison:

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/

BTW, is that X4 a Phenom or a PhenomII? What are the exact model numbers for those processors?

[notuptome2004]

those benchmarks that hupp showed are from the original Phenom 1 chips not the 2nd generationg ones so they should not count as most of us know that the phenom 1 had some performance issues.

[Vice]

Within the same Processor Series using the same basic Architecture at the same Clock Speeds and Cache Sizes a Triple Core will always be better then a Dual Core.

However when comparing a Processor from one Series, Architecture or Clock Speed with another from a different Series, Architecture or Clock Speed the Extra core is not the only variable that decides which processor is faster. The efficiency of the design, the amount of cycles per clock, the speed and capacity of the on-die cache, the Memory Controllers capability all become extra points of contention.

So when comparing a Dual Core Intel Processor to an AMD X3 (Tri-Core) you need to look past just the extra Core of the AMD CPU and instead examine the overall specifications of both processors. The best way to do this is to simply look at some Benchmarks such as the ones avalible on Toms Hardware and now Anandtech.