Deneb does 4.3GHz on air, launch approaching

[Andreas G]

Many readers have been getting back to us regarding the unusually positive reports about AMD lately. I guess we became colored a bit by our love for the Radeon HD 2900 XT cards when no one really cared for them, but then again our favorite games are of the 3DMark series and not of the interactive type, and there the Radeon 2900 XT was a lot of fun. However, we always used Intel's processors together with the card(s), and even though we don't see a change in that anytime soon, the everyday overclockers may get a change of heart with the new AMD models based on the Deneb core.

A while back we reported on a recent interview with AMD General Manager of AMD's Server and Workstation chip business, Pat Patla, where he claimed that Shanghai is much more than a mere die-shrink and that it is 20% faster than Barcelona clock per clock. We've been told by a second source that 20% may be a bit much, but that there is an IPC boost to expect, but closer to 15% than 20. In either case it's just a nice boost. This is applies for Deneb as well we've been told.

The source even indicates that since Nehalem isn't that much of a desktop upgrade, but server mostly, Deneb will become the gaming processor to get. We have no secondary confirmation at this time, but we wanted to forward the information. In fact, source also says that Deneb was able to do 4.3GHz under a Scythe Mine cooler, stable of course. It's very important to use the right motherboard though, you will need the SB750 southbridge to begin with.

Most people should be able to hit 3.6GHz with a decent cooler, source says. The most amazing is that the processor should still run fairly cool and consume less power than Intel equivalents. Comparing Intel's new processors to AMD's new, Intel is gaining on the server market, while AMD will be trying to get back the retail market. We will not have to wait long for it to happen either, mass production is well under way and launch is approaching.

[KTE]

Hmm... 3.6G I believe is certainly on but 4.3G air, I reckon they're talking about the FX range. I know the launch step clocks good with power but sub-4G on air stable mainly. Thanks for the report, interesting news

[fackamato]

Cool!

If it's 15% faster than Barcelona clock for clock, then how would this Deneb @ 3GHz compare to a 3GHz Intel equivalent?
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Open Source > *

[Delph1]

[Mean Machine]

Looking forward to this!
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Grandis spiritus, sanctus diavolos

[Delph1]

Well this one certainly spread fast. I guess many are really hoping that AMD makes a return.

I do see why people question the state of Deneb, but you have to realize that this is not a big jump, on the contrary.

Phenom does 3.5GHz on air with SB750. That's quite easy with the later steppings.

Phenom has been close to 4GHz on extreme cold.

AMD's processors rarely perform much better under low termperatures so going from nearly 4GHz to 4.3GHz with a good air cooler is not that much when you think about it. It's just that Agena has been receiving so much bad publicity because of its poor performance at the start, but it has grown better since then.

//Andreas
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"I'm sort of a postmodern vegetarian, I eat meat ironically"
"You are our Swedish superhero "

Forget everything, knowledge is your enemy, it's only going to make you second-guess yourself."

[KTE]

True that.. too many have to back up their "guesstimates" (of AMD failing/losing/liquidation/so on by now) so they'll be eager to watch any reports which nullifies their long held beliefs heh

The thing with speeds is.. Intel archs were, since 2003 at least, reaching plus 4G speeds on air. Even with a poor arch+leakage the speeds were always there. AMDs weren't, ever. Even with the best of K8s. K10 2nd step actually improved very quick compared to AMDs past record, inside 6 months and took oc to better than K8 levels on the same process. They still have the leakage Intel first suffered, however still no where close to clocks any of Intels archs since 6 years have been hitting. Thats what makes people doubt stability claims above 3.2G on AMD chips.

Secondly, a belief that AMD can't hit more than 3G due to SOI. Its a common one I see thrown around.

I haven't come across a single person out of dozens of high rank professors in this field who know why Intel/AMD processor archs clock differently and with such wide gaps. The best they could offer me is a guess as to maybe but advise even that could be wildly off hence I don't even try to dabble into it.

I'm sure 4G is possible on them on air but which ones or how consistently, is something that we're after and we don't know

Yeah, DICE/chilled water is all you need to get plus 3.8G clocks on a good K10 chip. LN2 is overkill for it by far.

[Delph1]

Well, it's easy to blame SOI, and I have, but to be honest I can't offer any specific explanation as to why there is such a big difference between the two.

//Andreas
_________________
"I'm sort of a postmodern vegetarian, I eat meat ironically"
"You are our Swedish superhero "

Forget everything, knowledge is your enemy, it's only going to make you second-guess yourself."

[KTE]

Yeah I saw AMD clarified that clock-for-clock Shanghai is 20% better than Barcelona, on average: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081001-amd-were-well-on-our-way-to-shanghai-45nm-cpus.html

Which means 5-15% max for Deneb over Phenom IMO and thats inline with the C0 preview we've seen. AMD always does better in Server on launches due to the applications requirements there (HT/IMC/Cache). So the only thing to really know is clocking/power/price now.

Will be an interesting few weeks.. I bet both camps will pump up the PR raids this time round

[Delph1]

Yepp, I saw that one too, but since I had written 15%, and hoped that most would realize best case scenario, I didn't want to do any stealth updates to this one

//Andreas
_________________
"I'm sort of a postmodern vegetarian, I eat meat ironically"
"You are our Swedish superhero "

Forget everything, knowledge is your enemy, it's only going to make you second-guess yourself."

[KTE]

I agree with you, your estimate would seem about right for DT. Its just I'm not sure where the max and minimum gains are.. I suppose thats what mainly matters with upgrades.

Price and MB support would also be something crucial.

2nd day now, looks like your site was getting huge hit rates.. took over 5mins each go to load a page, ads.nordichardware.com... took the longest by far

You can expect that with such heavily fought over topics. Lost a good few posts with the timeouts

[Delph1]

The hits have been quite nice, but the reason it took so long to load was because the ad server stopped respondning (unrlated), and not because of the load of visistors

I have some information on the price, but they are not specific enough for me to release. Expect prices in the low-Core i7 range.

//Andreas
_________________
"I'm sort of a postmodern vegetarian, I eat meat ironically"
"You are our Swedish superhero "

Forget everything, knowledge is your enemy, it's only going to make you second-guess yourself."