AMD Phenom X4 945 and 955BE processor review|test -
Phenom II processors and a Dragon
Behold the "Dragon" platform.
Oh no, no, no ... we are not puffing the magic dragon, nor are we chasing the Dragon. But a name you have heard in our reviews before is "Dragon". When AMD launched the initial Phenom processors, they did so under codename "Spider". Spider entailed the AMD 780 chipset, Radeon series 3000/4000 and obviously the B3 generation Phenom processors.
Spiders in the end get squashed or tangled in their own webs, and today we'll see if that will happen, making the Spider platform obsolete that is. The Dragon platform is the infrastructure that is the AMD 790GX/FX chipset, Radeon 4000 series graphics cards and thus the new Phenom II series processors.
MSI 790FX motherboard with a Phenom II X4 955BE processor seated
The Phenom II processors
Today is all about two Phenom II (AM3 package) processors being released. As you likely know AMD's most high-end processors were the Phenom II X4 920 and 940. These are now being updated and transitioned to the AM3 platform.
But let's talk architecture.
Recently AMD made a move to their 45nm node to manufacture the newer model Phenom II processors. What does that mean? Well, explaining Phenom II can be best done by telling what the first generation Phenom really was.
First up was the transition from 65nm towards 45nm, if you look at this from a distance it pretty much means that they were able to make this processor smaller compared to the last generation Phenom (I) products. And that has advantages, often to be found in lower voltages and higher clock frequencies. Next to that, with technology updates like these they also fix the smaller bugs the last-gen products had. ANY processors has small bug, including Intel's.
To understand Phenom II, let's look at a last-gen Phenom processor. For example, take a pick out of the original Phenom X4 processor family like Phenom X4: 9550, 9650, 9750, 9850 and 9950 (Black Editions).
The leading Phenom (I) flagship processor was the Phenom X4 9950 BE which runs at a 2.6 GHz clock frequency at a full 2.0 GHz HT 3.0 speed with a 1.2-1.3V voltage and 140W TDP.
That part is based on AMD's 65nm Silicon on Insulator process technology. The voltage on the Phenom X4 9950 is listed as 1.05-1.30 Volts, and the lower specced Phenom X4 9850 and slower CPUa were at 1.2-1.3 Volts. Phenom X4 9950 features a total 2MB L2 cache; 512KB per core. Phenom (I) could address 2MB L3 cache as buffer where it can also exchange data in-between the cores.
So that gave the four cores a total of 4MB of cache (that's excluding a little L1 cache). The die size of that CPU is 285 mm² and for whatever reason we always like to know the CPU has 450 million transistors.
We test three AMD processors today, the Phenom II X6 1075T, Phenom II X4 970BE and Athlon II X4 645. They are part of the AMD Q4 processor product line update, arming their processor lineup with more value and higher performing CPUs.
AMD Phenom X4 945 and 955BE processor review|test
Today AMD is releasing two processors in the Phenom II line-up, the Phenom II 955BE and the Phenom II X4 945 processor. Both processors can be considered and positioned in AMDs high-end segment, yet will be priced friendly. Yields are good, clock frequencies go up, performance goes up. And that's nice as the Phenom II series processors offer great performance for the money you have to lay down on the table. AMD Phenom series processors are slowly ripening, and are aging like fine wine (they get even better over time). Guru3D brings you an in-depth performance review and architectural overview on both these processors. Oh yea .. and we'll overclock the living daylights out of it as well.
AMD Phenom II X4 810 and X3 720BE review (AM3)
A test on AMD Phenom II X4 810 and X3 720BE review socket AM3 processors. Socket AM3 Phenom II processors. Processors that are pretty much the same as the Socket AM2+ processors yet now with a DDR3 memory controller. DDR3 memory will allow the overall performance of the platform (your PC) to gain again a little in speed. Over the next few pages we'll tell you all about these new processors, their specifications and of course will check out performance.
AMD Phenom II X4 920 and 940 review test
AMD Phenom II 940 and 920 test. AMD releases the new Phenom II processors. Now manufactured at a much smaller fabrication processes, 45 nanometer, and has different amounts of cache. The result... their processors can now run at 3.0 GHz fairly easy, run cool and still have enough headroom for a nice tweak or two. Pretty significant, pretty interesting.