Preparing for Intel Core 2 Duo

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Anthony Fiti
Kurtis
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Jul. 25, 2006

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Introduction

Core 2 Duo is here. Sort of. And unless Apple pulls a fast one next month at WWDC (we'll find out on the morning of August 7th) and releases a Mac for $1500 with a Conroe inside and good upgradeability, it is time to start picking out parts for my new Conroe based system.

We've all seen the benchmarks, and we've even seen some pre-order hype. Even a few websites have started offering Conroe X6800 processors for sale and showing them as in-stock (at one point in time). So I'm here to take you along for the ride. Some might think it's a little early to start picking parts. My opinion is that it is never too early to start thinking about hardware. Plus, as I browse various computer hardware forums around the Internet, I see lots of Conroe questions being asked. So hopefully I can provide some answers.

One final thing I'd like to note is that the prices I estimate here and the ones you see now might be quite different since the processors and motherboards are just arriving on the market, and it's quite possible that retailers will be raising prices to coincide with higher demand and limited stocks. After the initial shakeout, I expect prices to stabilize and have listed that price in this review.

The Benchmark Hullabaloo

OK, I'm going to use this platform to air my thoughts on the Core 2 Duo benchmark arguments. What bothers me the most out of all the initial Conroe reviews that I read is that no one had what I would consider to be a typical rig for this price range - Core 2 Duo X6800 vs. FX-62, two X1900XTX's in Crossfire (can't do SLI because it's on an Intel motherboard) and 2GB of RAM in each system. I searched and searched and wasn't able to find a single review with that configuration. If I had the cash to drop on a system of my dreams, that would be it. I couldn't even find a review with a GF 7950 (that's the SLI-on-a-stick board). I definitely understand comparing an X6600 to an X2 4800 or 5000 with a single graphics card, but not a $1000 processor with a $500 board. If you're going to spend that much, go all out in all areas of your system.

Onto the benchmarks! First, there is absolutely no doubt that the new processor thumps AMD's Athlon X2 in media encoding. Encoding MP3s, running highly optimized SSE applications for rendering, all show overwhelmingly in favor of the Core 2 Duo. I credit this to the vastly improved SSE engine in the chip, along with the gigantic cache (4MB) and that even a single thread can take just about all of the cache and leave a small amount left over for background processes on the other core.

Gaming benchmarks are where the issues seem to arise. Yes, if you run a game so that it becomes CPU limited (say, at 800x600 or even some games at 1024x768 without any AA or AF), Core 2 Duo will whip AMD's Athlon X2 processors. However, do you actually go and play these games at those resolutions and enjoy your 150FPS? Most gamers out there will say hell no, and up the resolution along with AA and AF and to turn on the eye candy to make the game look good, and level off at whatever is suitable in terms of FPS.

The problem with using high resolutions to benchmark means that in today's world, just about every game (except for FEAR and maybe Oblivion) are GPU constrained. No matter how fast your CPU is, your FPS will still depend on the GPU at high resolutions with the image quality turned up.

This has its negative aspects as well - it totally neglects the future enhancements in GPU technology. If you see that an AMD FX-62 and a Core 2 Duo X6800 have just about the same FPS in a given game (with the same graphics card or cards of course), then you may incorrectly come to the conclusion that, in terms of gaming, it doesn't mater which one you get.

That might be true now, but with G80 and R600 from Nvidia and ATI just around the corner, what happens when the GPU is less of a limiting factor? It's all about future proofing your system. Yea, now it might not matter, and it might not matter for 6 months. Personally, I think I'm more inclined to throw a new GPU in my system than a new CPU and motherboard (given Intel's track record with semi-major revisions of CPUs needing new motherboards or chipsets, this isn't as much of a problem with AMD).

This is a decision you have to make. How do you upgrade? How often do you upgrade? If you're like me you upgrade the video card once (or perhaps more) between a new CPU and motherboard, the Core 2 Duo looks like it has the headroom for your future GPU. If you don't upgrade that much, and pretty much upgrade the CPU and GPU together, then your decision between Intel and AMD is tougher. AMD could be a better choice given the impending price cuts (due very soon now), and because their platform tends to be a bit more stable; you might be able to get away with only a BIOS update when you want to throw a new CPU and GPU in your rig, instead of having to spend $150+ on a new motherboard.

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