CPU/Mobo AMD Bulldozer Discussion Thread


Asus' Sabertooth 990FX (AM3+) motherboard gets an early photo shoot

The Sabertooth 990FX packs four DDR3-2000 memory slots, eight SATA ports (six of them are 'confirmed' 6.0 Gbps), four PCI-Express x16 slots (for SLI or CrossFireX setups), four USB 3.0 connectors (two on the backplate, two via a header), one FireWire and two eSATA ports, 7.1 channel audio, and Gigabit Ethernet. Also equipped with a two-piece CeraM!X (ceramics-coated) cooling system.
This and other Asus AM3+ boards should be available next month.
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Further reading and more pics here

P.S. Didn't want to create a separate thread just for this, so posting it here.
 
^^Good that Asus didn't use that f****** jacket this time... :p

@Dreamcatcher

Yes you can post news related to bulldozer in this thread... This thread has been created by me to share news about bulldozer with everyone so yes anyone can do the same by posting in this thread... :)
 
^^ Here is what Guru3d's reviewer said about that shield

Guru3D said:
Now on the topic of looks and aesthetics, well ... we stated it a couple of time already, you either love or hate that plastic shield. Admittedly I really had to get used to it and I still doubt its functionality. Rather than creating proper airflow I really think it could potentially trap heat coming from motherboards components. The results however show very little difference and if you have decent airflow in your PC, like anyone should have anno 2011, then I don't see a problem there. So the tactical shield is subject to your aesthetic preference and nothing more than that. Try to imagine it in a nice clean cable managed PC with black innards, it really could make the PC stand out.
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Are there any non engineering sample benchmarks out there ? Is this usual for a new proc in market to have benchmarks under wraps up to release ?
 
Normally Benchmarks and performance data tends to leak, but it has been pretty quiet with the Bulldozer. I have a feeling that the FX series will not be able to beat the 2nd gen sandy bridges (on single thread/gamin performance) because if they have a winner, I feel AMD would have sneakily leaked the performance data to stop people going to intel until launch. The fact that they are keeping it so tight makes me think it is not going to be so great after all.
 
vpraveenis said:
Normally Benchmarks and performance data tends to leak, but it has been pretty quiet with the Bulldozer. I have a feeling that the FX series will not be able to beat the 2nd gen sandy bridges (on single thread/gamin performance) because if they have a winner, I feel AMD would have sneakily leaked the performance data to stop people going to intel until launch. The fact that they are keeping it so tight makes me think it is not going to be so great after all.
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Yes, that's what I am beginning to think too. If they were beating SB, they would have managed to leak the reviews for sure. Now, the only hope for consumers is that they release it at a competitive price.
 
lol, after many years AMD will actually sell a processor for more than 300$

Although I have a big problem paying 190$ for a quad core Bulldozer, considering the 8 core one competes with i7 2600k only.
 
AMD Bulldozer (Zambezi-FX) CPU Performance Exposed, Beats i7 2600K in CineBench Benchmark

Take this news bit with a grain of salt, but it doesn't hurt to be optimistic.

A recent post from a Chinese Blog site has exposed the performance of AMD’s Upcoming Bulldozer Based Zambezi-FX Processors. Although the Blog has been deleted but Zol.com.cn which is another Chinese Forum managed to get the screenshots from the blog post.

The AMD Processors being used is hidden but its confirmed by users that it was a 6/8 Core Zambezi-FX Processor and the benchmarks used for testing included CineBench R11.5 (x64) and R17 (x64). Both benchmarks evaluate the CPU performance capabilities. The AMD CPU scored 7.37 in Multi-Core rendering (CineBench R11.5) against the Intel i7 2600K’s 6.23 and i7 990x’s 8.42. A single digit score improvement in this benchmark means that Intel’s top line Sandy bridge will finally get some tough competition from the Zambezi-FX CPU’s.

CinBench R10 reports a score of 28,074 however no CPU comparisons was mentioned but i can tell you this much that my i7 920 score a max of 19,500 score on stock clocks, Considering this, The bulldozer CPU’s hold quite some punch. We also reported some benchmarks of an Engineering Sample of AMD bulldozer CPU but the results were not as satisfying at these, You can check them out here.

A recent pricing chart which got leaked here also shows that Bulldozer’s top of the line Zambezi-FX cost around 240-320$ for 6/8 Core models, The price ain’t bad at all for the CPU’s considering the performance increase they offer.

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^^That might be the case for Phenom II CPUS. But given that AMD will be releasing 3 module and 2 module Cpu's, it is quite possible to have a full 4Module / 8 Thread CPU from a lower counterpart ;)
 
AMD FX-Series Top-of-the-Range Microprocessor to Cost $320 - Report - X-bit labs

More information on pricing.

Its just a gut feeling I have here although a very strong one that AMD's Bulldozer won't match up to Intel's Sandybridge when it comes to pure performance. The hint lies in the pricing. When you have a part which performs extremely well you will price it at a premium. AMD did it with their FX-64 monsters of yore which were extremely expensive. The very fact that their high end cpus are priced cheap now does show that AMD still aren't able to beat Intel or else they would have priced their flagship cpu higher than what it is currently expected to sell for. Although I would wait for benchmarks to comment anymore.
 
^^ I agree. I don't think Bulldozer is going to blow away the competition, but it may just be competitive with the current crop of Intel cpus. However, since this is going to be AMD's architecture for the next few years, they better have enough tricks up their sleeves to keep it competitive, otherwise they'll just have to keep serving the low end and hope there actually is gpgpu market out there.
However, if they are really frugal on the power front, their next fusion cpu's, the ones with a bulldozer core, may help amd win a bigger pie of the laptop market.
 
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