Conroe vs. Woocrest vs. Kentsfield vs. Clovertown

Computer Hardware
#1

Conroe E6300 (2 core, Core architecture, also called Allendale): starting from 168,000 Won in SK, around US$180 in the US, cheapest motherboards start from a little under US$100

Dempsey 5030 (2 core, may be used in dual CPU config making 2 threads x 2 cores x 2 processors = 8 threads): starting from 181,000 Won in SK, around US$150 in the US, cheapest motherboards start from about US$300

Woodcrest 5110 (2 core, 4 threads, Core architecture, also supporting dual CPU config): starting from 275,000 Won in SK, around US$230 in the US, motherboard supports nearly same as Dempsey

Kentsfield (2 x 2 core, Core architecture, basically 2 x Conroe in one): will probably cost from US$500 to US$1,000 at the time of release to retail, some motherboards for Conroe already support Kentsfield

Clovertown ( 2 x 2 core, Core architecture, basically 2 x Woodcrest in one, supports dual CPU config): will probably also cost as much as Kentsfield, some motherboards for Woodcrest probably also support Clovertown

Q 1. Why buy an “Extreme” Conroe when you can have more power from dual Woodcrest’s or even ES (engineering sample) Kentsfield or ES Clovertown right now?

Q 2. Would a Kentsfield at 3GHz surpass a moderately overclocked E6600 or E6800?

In South Korea (danawa.co.kr which shows some of the lowest price points in the domestic market), a Conroe E6300 costs less than a Dempsey 5030 while 5030 is cheaper than E6300 in the United States (newegg.com.) I noticed there’s even a US$299 Gigabyte motherboard for Woodcrest at newegg.com.

#2

Are any of the newer CPUs Hyperthreaded? - one article suggests that they are not - logical, actually, since hyperthreading was a bit of a kludge to use leftover resources in Netburst P4’s.

The problem with hyperthreaded multicore / dual-CPU configurations, is that unless the thread scheduler has specific tweaks, it can schedule to hyperthreading on the same core, where the other core is available, with negative impact on loads that could be satisfied without using hypertheading. At full load, using hyperthreading as well makes sense, but scheduling logic needs to be improved in order to treat hyperthreading as an “emergency overflow” when the cores are not fully loaded.

It may be better if they consign hyperthreading to the bin of history, now that dual core is here and quad core is on the way.

#3

Dempsey is a pre-Core processor. Intel still sells Dempsey but it’s awkward to call it one of the “newer” processors because we are in a transition from Netburst to Core. (It’s even more awkward as the Core architecture is originally from Pentium Pro.)

None of the Core-architecture processors support Hyper-Threading as far as I know.

#4

The problem is not all people can get the mighty ES chip.

Q 2. Would a Kentsfield at 3GHz surpass a moderately overclocked E6600 or E6800?
X6800? Depends, but Kentsfield 4 CPU @3.5Ghz is quite impressive here.

#5

Yeah, that was exactly where I found the first test results with Kentsfield. :slight_smile: X6800, right.

As for ES products, since you are also a reviewer, you know the rules. So far, it seemed demand for ES (not just CPU’s) is never greater than supply. :slight_smile: (Buying or getting for free is probably easier here though because of geographical density.)

#6

Clovertown 1.66GHz (1066MHz FSB) for US$359 at newegg.com.

#7

If you can wait till the third quarter of 2007, Intel is introducing some new chips along with some hefty price cuts:

To sum up; The range topping QX6700 Quad will be going for ~$530usd while a 3 GHz Conroe (1333 FSB!) will be going for ~$266usd.

Sources:

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38133

http://www.google.ca/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hkepc.com%2Fbbs%2Fhwdb.php%3Ftid%3D753250%26tp%3DIntel-c2d-e6050%26rid%3D753256&langpair=zh|en&hl=en&ie=UTF8

#8

Correction: the Performance Q6700 will be US$530, not the Extreme QX6700. :wink:

#9

Oops my bad, i’m still confused though, it lists pretty much the same specs as the QX version (same FSB, Clock, Cache). Does the Extreme edition have an unlocked multi?

#10

But you can already have 8 cores for about US$700.

#11

not without spending over $300usd on a motherboard :frowning:

#12

Is that expensive? It’s eight cores vs. Conroe’s two cores and Kentsfield’s four cores. Some people still spend about US$1K on a single Conroe. There are many single-CPU motherboards that cost over US$200.

#13

not to mention the FB-DIMMs are more expensive than regular ddr2 :frowning:

problem with that is $300 gets you a bottom of the barrel dual socket mobo, whereas $200 gets you a high end single socket mobo with lots of features and extras