I've been a long time fan of the AMD line espeically the Opteron and I could swear by them. Best processor of the AMD line. I recently watched the Keynote address of the latest Apple events and a week ago they introduced the Mac Pro, formerly the Power Mac.

These processors are serious and I've studied the architeture of these and I have to say...looks like it's neck and neck with AMD now.

What are your thoughts on these?

Apple - Mac Pro - Intel Xeon

Intel® Core™ Microarchitecture

With all the excitement...maybe I should invest in either the 24 inch iMac or save some to get the Mac Pro. I DO need a workstation after all...and I almost out of college

The new Macs look amazing. And the fact they you can use Bootcamp to run Windows now makes the choice even easier and less scary in my eyes. I can invest in a nice shiny mac and still have the option of running Windows on it (blasphemy, I know, but still reassuring ).

The Mac Pro is very impressive, but there aren't many (any?) apps that actually take advantage of the architecture. For now I think (for a normal user -- that is, no video rendering or something) an iMac is looking like an awesome option.

I was hoping a new generation of MacBook Pro's would be out today with the newest keynote, but as the rumors flew around about it all being the iPods/iTunes stuff my hopes weren't high. I'm thinking if there's not a new generation by Christmas then I will be getting a 20"/24" iMac.

The Intel Core 2 Duo (Conroe) and Woodcrest unfortunately totally blow the AMD's out of the water. In all benchmarks the E6400 clocks in just below or right at AMD's FX-62 flagship processor (the E6400 is the 2.13GHz Conroe, which in price point is pretty much equivalent to the 4200+ or the 4600+). And with how cool the Conroe's run, you can easily overclock them. I just bought one to replace my AMD, and it runs at around 33 degrees C, about 27 degrees C down from my AMD.

The real advantage comes from Intel using only one die with two cores on it, instead of AMD which has two dies, each with one core. Firstly, this allows one core to use all 2MB of L2 Cache (standard on the Conroe's, some even have 4), whereas AMD only allows you to use whatever cache is on the die (most likely 512KB or 1MB). The two cores per die design also means that information going from one core to the other can now transfer across the die, resulting in less circuitry, better performance, and a cooler chip. Intel is also using 65nm technology, whereas AMD uses 90nm technology.

So not only are Intels chips faster and cooler, but their more technologically advanced than AMDs. While the K8L's may catch AMD back up to Intel, we will likely see Intel as the new dual core chip king until quad core processors come out (Quarter 2 2007). I'll be doing benchmarks on my new system soon, as well as overclocking my E6400 Core 2 Duo, and comparing them with the benchmarks for my old AMD system, so we can see a direct comparison (all the hardware is the same except the motherboard and processor) .


Alex

Originally Posted by adb22791

The Intel Core 2 Duo (Conroe) and Woodcrest unfortunately totally blow the AMD's out of the water. In all benchmarks the E6400 clocks in just below or right at AMD's FX-62 flagship processor (the E6400 is the 2.13GHz Conroe, which in price point is pretty much equivalent to the 4200+ or the 4600+). And with how cool the Conroe's run, you can easily overclock them. I just bought one to replace my AMD, and it runs at around 33 degrees C, about 27 degrees C down from my AMD.

The real advantage comes from Intel using only one die with two cores on it, instead of AMD which has two dies, each with one core. Firstly, this allows one core to use all 2MB of L2 Cache (standard on the Conroe's, some even have 4), whereas AMD only allows you to use whatever cache is on the die (most likely 512KB or 1MB). The two cores per die design also means that information going from one core to the other can now transfer across the die, resulting in less circuitry, better performance, and a cooler chip. Intel is also using 65nm technology, whereas AMD uses 90nm technology.

So not only are Intels chips faster and cooler, but their more technologically advanced than AMDs. While the K8L's may catch AMD back up to Intel, we will likely see Intel as the new dual core chip king until quad core processors come out (Quarter 2 2007). I'll be doing benchmarks on my new system soon, as well as overclocking my E6400 Core 2 Duo, and comparing them with the benchmarks for my old AMD system, so we can see a direct comparison (all the hardware is the same except the motherboard and processor) .


Alex

Some interesting points you pose, Thanks

Originally Posted by Chroder

I was hoping a new generation of MacBook Pro's would be out today with the newest keynote, but as the rumors flew around about it all being the iPods/iTunes stuff my hopes weren't high.

Yup my friends told me about it and I just upgraded my iTunes to the new iTunes 7. Major change as you can now view the album cover on its own pane and can even interactively select your music to listen to @_@

The icon is now a blue music note instead of it being green. You have to see it to believe it. As for the iPods, they released an 80GB Video ipod and the claim is 24 hours of battery life! Same price as the 60GB. So they definitely are fading the "macs are expensive" myth. The 24 inch iMac is the same price when the 20" came out. And for a mighty workstation like the Mac Pro, the starting price of $2500 really isn't that bad if you look at what's inside and the specs.

This is great hype

Also on the iPod note the price of the 30GB and 60GB seems to have dropped from $50-$100.

Back to the MacBook Pro's, I expect we'll see a Core 2 Duo Macbook Pro before the end of the year. Apple is probably trying to fix all the complaints that went around with the first set of MacBook Pro's. The Core 2 Duo (or Conroe) Pro's will be excellent, as the Conroe runs so cool the laptop will probably need less cooling, therefore be quiter and actually run cooler.


Alex

Edit: It appears that the Core 2 Duo's for notebooks launched August 27th, so Apple's Showtime was probably a little bit early to announce a MacBook Pro with a Core 2 Duo. I'm still holding to my before Christmas guess though!