by Ilya Gavrichenkov
03/22/2006 | 08:01 AM
The new Presler core for dual-core Intel Pentium D processors has already been reviewed in great detail on our site before. You can check out our article devoted to the top processor model from this family, Pentium Extreme Edition 955, alongside with the review of the youngest processor models, such as Pentium D 920 and Pentium D 930. Therefore, it would be really hard to write another article on Presler that would share anything new. Nevertheless, the severe circumstances driven by Intel’s policy force us to take our chances and do it. So, today we are going to introduce to you another dual-core Intel processor based on the 65nm Presler core. This time it is going to be the new Pentium Extreme Edition CPU that comes to replace the processor running at 3.46GHz that was introduced in the end of last year.
Even though Intel has clearly defined its future plans regarding the desktop processors without the NetBurst architecture, Presler remains the most up-to-date and technologically advanced company active as of today. The CPUs with principally new Conroe architecture will hit the market closer to the fall, so Intel has to maintain its desktop processor line-up on a competitive level until then mostly with Presler’s help. Especially since the frequency potential of this core is quite impressive, as we have shown in our previous articles, so we cannot claim that the frequency growth of the Pentium D family has stalled because of the core limitations.
In fact this article today is devoted to another case of frequency increase like that. Today, on March 22, Intel officially launched the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 working at 3.73GHz clock speed.
In fact there is nothing extremely interesting about the core clock speed increase of the Presler based processor. Especially, since we have already tested a Pentium Extreme Edition 955 overclocked to 4.26GHz. However, there is one small detail that makes us very interested in taking a closer look at the newcomer. The thing is that Pentium Extreme Edition 965 is the first CPU out there based on the new C1 Presler core stepping. So, looks like there will be some new announcements today.
As you know, the first Pentium D processors based on the new 65nm core were built on Presler B1 core stepping. Compared with the previous 90nm Smithfield core that was used in older Pentium D models, the new Presler has a lot of advantages. Among them we should first of all mention higher performance due to larger overall L2 cache memory that has been increased to 4MB (2MB for each core) and lower heat dissipation that has been reduced due to finer and more advanced manufacturing process. However, the first Presler based CPU owners revealed a few noticeable drawbacks. Presler B1 core stepping processors turned out to have no Demand Based Switching support, a set of technologies that proved to be very efficient in the older Intel processors. It means that Pentium D and Pentium Extreme Edition that belong to the 900-series do not support Enhanced HALT State and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology. This is exactly why Intel was in such a hurry to convince the users that this drawback would be eliminated very soon: the new core stepping supporting all the above listed technologies was promised to come out in January a month after the first Presler processors came out.
The new Presler core stepping – C1 – first of all resolved the issue with power saving and power consumption technologies. Enhanced HALT State and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology have been implemented in this core stepping and work without any trouble. However, these were far not the only improvements that the new core stepping has acquired.
The CPUs with the new core stepping received another great improvement. The new core stepping allowed Intel to reduce the heat dissipation of its dual-core processors. This was a very impressive reduction that allowed Intel to move its new C1 Presler processors into a completely different thermal category. The power envelope of the new Pentium D CPUs rated from 930 to 950 will be determined by the 2005 Mainstream FMB requirements (typical heat dissipation – 95W). For your information, the previous modification of the Presler core belonged to the 2005 Performance FMB thermal envelope (typical heat dissipation – 130W).
Of course, the top Presler models from the Pentium Extreme Edition family will still beloong to CPUs with 130W thermal envelope. However, it is important to understand that the “typical heat dissipation” parameter doesn’t have any direct relation to the practical heat dissipation. This parameter serves to define the requirements the processor sets for the mainboard voltage regulator circuitry and cooling system. In other words, the heat dissipation of the Pentium Extreme Edition on the C1 core stepping will also get lower, but not greatly enough for this processor to get into the pretty numerous 2005 Mainstream FMB category.
It is important to point out that the introduction of the new Presler core stepping should not cause any compatibility issues. Presler processors with C1 core stepping are fully pin-compatible with the previous core stepping CPUs. The maximum a user may need when shifting to a CPU with the new C1 core stepping is to reflash the mainboard BIOS.
Unfortunately, it is still too early to pronounce the mass availability of the CPUs with the new Presler core stepping. Pentium Extreme Edition 965 supporting Demand Based Switching will arrive into the market on April 1, and the improved Pentium D from the 900-series should hit the shop shelves no sooner than by the end of next month.
It shouldn’t be too difficult to distinguish between the new Pentium D processors with lower heat dissipation and their older brothers thanks to a slight change that has been made to the CPU marking. Presler processors with C1 core stepping will carry the info about the 2005 Mainstream FMB category they belong to on the processor casing top: 05A.
Since the higher clock frequency is basically the major innovation in the Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processors compared with the predecessors, we would like to list all the technical specs right away:
Pentium Extreme Edition 965 | |
Frequency | 3.73 GHz |
Packaging | 775-pin PLGA |
Vcore | 1.25-1.4 V |
Bus frequency | 1066 MHz |
Typical heat dissipation | 130 W |
Core stepping | C1 |
Maximum typical case temperature | |
L2 cache | 2 MB + 2 MB |
Production process | 65 nm |
Hyper-Threading Technology | Yes |
EM64T (Enhanced Memory 64 Technology) | Yes |
EIST (Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology) | No |
VT (Virtualization Technology) | Yes |
Just like the Pentium Extreme Edition 955, the newcomer requires the FSB frequency to be set at 266MHz. On the one hand it means that the nominal frequency multiplier of the Pentium Extreme Edition 965 equals 14x, but on the other it indicates that this processor sets the same requirements for the mainboards as the predecessor. As a result, the processor is guaranteed to be fully compatible only with the i975X based platforms. At the same time, there are quite a few mainboards in the market based on the earlier chipsets, such as i955/i945, that can unofficially support Pentium Extreme Edition 965.
Note that besides higher bus frequency, Pentium Extreme Edition 965 boasts one more very important feature that distinguishes it from the Pentium D CPUs. Namely, it supports Hyper-Threading technology. So, since Pentium Extreme Edition 965 is a dual-core processor, the system will see it as four logical CPUs.
Since this solution is based on C1 core stepping and supports Enhanced HALT State Technology, it can drop the working clock speed down if the processor is idle. The minimum clock frequency multiplier for Presler core is 12x, so the frequency of Pentium Extreme Edition 965 can drop down to 3.2GHz. Since Pentium Extreme Edition is targeted for computer enthusiasts, Intel decided not to activate Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology in it. However, this is only true for this particular model, and other Presler processors on C1 core stepping will support Demand Based Switching technologies set.
The current version of the diagnostic CPU-Z utility doesn’t yet know the Presler CPUs on C1 core stepping well enough.
Although this tool doesn’t recognize the new core stepping, you can still get it from the CPUID parameter that used to be F62 by the previous B1 cores stepping.
Note that the Pentium Extreme Edition engineering sample we had at our disposal had an unlocked clock frequency multiplier. This shouldn’t surprise you, as all other processors from this extreme family boast the same feature.
As we have already mentioned above, one of the key features of the new core stepping should be the reduced heat dissipation and power consumption. Of course, we need to double-check this. For the corresponding experiments we decided to compare the power consumption of the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 against the power consumption of the older Pentium Extreme Edition 955 processor based on the B1 core stepping. In order to obtain correct results that could later be used for fair comparison, we overclocked Pentium Extreme Edition 955 up to 3.73GHz by raising its clock frequency multiplier. The Vcore remained unchanged in this case. This approach allowed us to compare the power consumption (and heat dissipation) of two Presler processors with different core steppings working in identical conditions. Note that Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processor worked with the Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology disabled.
As always, we used a special S&M utility to measure the maximum power consumption (you can download this utility here ). We measured the current that goes through the CPU power circuitry. So, the numbers given below do not take into account the efficiency of the CPU voltage regulator laid out on the mainboard.
Here are the results:
Power Consumption | Power Consumption | |
Presler 3.73 GHz | 82.5 W | 162.0 W |
Presler 3.73 GHz | 59.0 W | 132.0 W |
These numbers are quite logical. Intel promised to reduce heat dissipation in the new core stepping and they did. Thus, Presler has become about 18% more economical in Burn mode, and got the power consumption reduced by about 30% in Idle mode when Enhanced HALT State technology kicks in. However, even though C1 core stepping has become much more economical, Intel’s dual-core processors will still not be able to compete against AMD’s rivals here. The maximum heat dissipation of the dual-core AMD Athlon 64 X2 processors doesn’t exceed 100W, which remains an unattainable bar for Presler.
In addition to the picture we have just described, I would like to mention the processor temperature measurements taken with the regular boxed cooling installed:
Temperature | Temperature | |
Presler 3.73 GHz B1 core stepping | 66o C | 83o C |
Presler 3.73 GHz C1 core stepping | 56o C | 75o C |
Well, I don’t think any comments are necessary here. You can clearly see that the boxed cooler can hardly cope with cooling down the older Presler revision overclocked to 3.73GHz. As for the Presler C1 core stepping, things look a way better here…
The impressive results of the previous test demonstrated that the new core of the Pentium D processors became “cooler”. This gives us some hope that the frequency potential revealed during overclocking will also get better. However, we couldn’t complain about the B1 Presler core stepping. During our tests of the Pentium Extreme Edition 955 we managed to overclock this CPU up to 4.26GHz with the regular air cooling only. This result was 25% higher than the nominal clock frequency of this CPU, which is a pretty impressive result for the top model in the family. But will the new C1 core stepping allow improving this result even more? Let’s find out now.
Before we pass over to the detailed description of our overclocking experiments, we have to point out that the dual-core Pentium Extreme Edition processors remain quite overclocking-friendly solutions. Intel doesn’t lock their clock frequency multiplier that is why we can overclock these processors not only by raising their bus frequency, but also by increasing their clock multiplier. This not only makes overclocking a lot easier, but also partially justifies for the higher price of these products.
The test platform we assembled for our overclocking session was built around ASUS P5WD2-E Premium mainboard based on i975X chipset. The memory subsystem consisted of two Corsair CM2X1024-6400PRO memory modules. Besides that, the platform featured NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT graphics card and Western Digital WD740GD HDD.
Note that we didn’t aim at any extreme overclocking results. Therefore, we used a mass air cooler that is available at stores today - Zalman CNPS9500 LED. So, you should keep in mind that more advanced cooling systems may allow you to reach much higher overclocking results.
Our Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processor worked just fine at the frequencies up to 4GHz without any additional Vcore increase.
If we continue our overclocking experiments with the Vcore increase, the results will be even better. We have already said a few times that Presler based processors overclock very well by raising the core voltage. Therefore, we continued our overclocking experiments with higher Vcore settings of 1.375V. In this case we managed to increase the clock multiplier to 16x and achieve the 4.26GHz frequency. Note that the processor was absolutely stable and didn’t switch to thermal throttling.
Further multiplier increase caused the complete loss of system stability. The same effect resulted from the FSB frequency increase over 270MHz. when the FSB speed was set between 267MHz and 270MHz, the system could still work fine, however, the “hardest” SnM and Prime95 tests would still cause some problems. So, we regard the 4.26GHz value as our final and maximum overclocking achievement.
Is it high or not? On the one hand, this frequency is 15% higher than the nominal frequency of the Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processor, and it indicates that this processor family hasn’t yet exhausted its frequency potential. However on the other hand, we have already reached 4.26GHz when we experimented with Presler B1 core stepping processors before. And it means that despite all the enhancements of the C1 core stepping, such as lower heat dissipation, the frequency potential didn’t grow any bigger. In other words, overclocker’s shouldn’t really hope for any breakthroughs to come with the new Intel CPUs on Presler C1 core stepping.
Since Pentium Extreme Edition 965 has now become the newest Intel product for hardware enthusiasts with unlimited budget, our goal today would be to compare its performance against its primary direct competitor. From the price prospective, this rival is none other but AMD Athlon 64 FX-60. So, we are going to pay special attention to this battle of the giants. And to make this test session even more exciting, we will also include the previous Pentium Extreme Edition 955 processor model and the top Pentium D processor model with 950 rating.
So, we assembled a few test platforms from the following components:
The tests were run with the BIOS settings adjusted for the maximum performance.
First of all we decided to test the performance of our processors in popular synthetic benchmarks.
The popular PCMark05 benchmark demonstrates a slight advantage of the Intel’s newcomer over the AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 competitor. Here I would like to point out that the launch of Pentium Extreme Edition 965 changed the picture in this benchmark, as the AMD’s processor for enthusiasts used to hit the highest score in PCMark05.
3DMark06 results are very similar to what we have just seen on the previous diagram. The highest score again belongs to Pentium Extreme Edition 965, which outperforms Athlon 64 FX-60 in this test.
The 3DMark06 total score depends a lot on the processor performance index that can be calculated from the processor speeds measured during game physics and AI calculations. So, there is nothing surprising about the leadership of the new Pentium Extreme Edition965 processor: its victory results from the highest score in the CPU test.
The competitor solutions based on K8 architecture are definitely faster than the rivals in scientific computational tasks. According to ScienceMark 2.0, the performance of Athlon 64 FX-60 leaves Intel’s competitors far behind.
We tested the general performance in office and digital content creation applications with the help of SYSMark 2004 SE benchmarking suite, which also uses multi-threading very actively.
During digital content creation the top dual-core AMD processor shows its best. It outperforms the new CPU from Intel, Pentium Extreme Edition 965, by about 4%.
However, in the office tasks the situation is completely different. Pentium Extreme Edition 965 working at 3.73GHz clock rate proves about 2.5% faster than Athlon 64 FX-60 working at 2.6GHz.
The results obtained during video and audio encoding are pretty curious. When we use a DivX codec, that has recently acquired multi-threading support, Pentium Extreme Edition 965 shows faster encoding speed. Thanks to the Hyper-Threading technology support that allows processing four computational threads simultaneously, it gets significantly ahead of the Athlon 64 FX-60. However, the results obtained from other codecs are not so inspiring for the Intel’s newcomer. For example, H.264 format is getting more and more popular these days. So when we encode video into this format with Apple Quicktime, Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processor manages only to get even with Athlon 64 FX-60. And the translation of the sound files into mp3 format with Apple iTunes even gives the victory to the AMD CPU. So, we cannot state that any of the competing architectures - K8 or NetBurst – is more efficient for digital media content encoding tasks. Everything depends on the codec type and optimization.
The results in Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Premiere make pretty much the same picture as in the previous case: the results are not in AMD’s favor. If we compare the results of Pentium Extreme Edition with those obtained from Pentium D 950, we will be able to conclude that Intel’s solution for hardware enthusiasts can strengthen its positions here quite tangibly sue to Hyper-Threading support that is very important for these tasks. As a result, AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 cannot compete against the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 here.
In 3ds max viewports the winner’s laurels go to AMD Athlon 64 FX-60. It is about 14% faster than Pentium Extreme Edition 965. However, when it comes to final rendering, the picture changes to just the opposite: Intel’s top-of-the-line processor takes revenge and demonstrates higher results.
Frankly speaking, we didn’t even hope that the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 processor would win here. K8 architecture proves much more efficient in tasks of this kind than Intel’s NetBurst. As a result, even the higher clock speed of the new Presler based CPU failed to change the situation, that has been repeating from one test session to another. Note that despite this fact, Intel positions its Pentium Extreme Edition as a solution for extreme gaming fans. However, as we have just seen from the benchmark results, even the Pentium Extreme Edition 965 doesn’t cope with the task well enough.
First of all I would like to stress that Pentium Extreme Edition and Pentium D processors will very soon all move to the new C1 core stepping. This will ensure some improvement of their features. Although the new core cannot boast higher overclocking potential, it still boasts two indisputable advantages: slightly lower heat dissipation and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology support. Pentium Extreme Edition 965 is the first CPU based on the new core in our lab.
However, I don’t think you discovered anything new and surprising about the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 we have just reviewed, which is positioned at the top of the price list. The Presler core used in this processor simply got overclocked by another 266MHz, so that the new Pentium Extreme Edition 965 CPU features 3.73GHz nominal clock speed. This frequency alongside with the enabled Hyper-Threading Technology support helped the Intel’s dual-core newcomer to improve its performance in many tests. At least now Pentium Extreme Edition 965 wins in a much greater number of benchmarks. However, all these are the tasks dealing with image and video processing as well as final rendering, and are nothing like games. So, even though Pentium Extreme Edition 965 is positioned as an extreme gaming solution, it is very unlikely to win a lot of market here. Especially, since its performance-per-watt ratio is considerably worse than what the AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 has to offer. And this parameter has been turned into a primary CPU quality indicator lately.
So, Pentium Extreme Edition 965 will hardly affect the situation in the today’s processor market. Everyone is already waiting impatiently on the new Intel CPUs aka Conroe that are due to the market in late summer. As a result, the launch of Pentium Extreme Edition 965 will hardly create any significant stir in the gaming enthusiast community.