Originally posted by Mini D
Tom has always rushed into things in an attempt to be first without taking the time necessary to get it right since I can remember. I'm a bit suprised to see him called an "Intel Fanboi". Seems to me he used to have the exact opposite label. I wonder why that changed.
Addressing a couple of points from above:
1) I believe I read at Anandtech that the initial EE chips (840 is not a xeon) would have HT enabled until they released the single chip dual core version. They are not comparing a server chip to a non-server chip.
2) Is there ever going to be a time when someone (namely those who've already posted in this thread) acknowledge that hyperthreading is actually has some advantages. Seriously. I can't believe someone is *****ing about bias because Tom is running 4 apps instead of 2 as if it were unfair. Stop and think about that for just one minute.
3) I'll stick with a dual processor system over a multi-core any day. Too many people are getting caught up in the hype and completley overlooking the disadvantages.
4) Eagl, dual core will help a bit with Virus Scan in the background, but HD access will be your primary killer there. Dual processors do nothing to resolve that. Just saying.
1) I didn't say that, so won't comment on it.
2) Hyperhtreading is useful if only to overcome the woeful Windows task scheduler. It just never really seen widespread use by software. Hopefully will change now that Intel and AMD have dual cores available. Not a question of unfair, if they had actually changed the priority of the encoding app it would have been more meaningful.
3) Of course there's disadvantages, but most people aren't willing to pay the cost of setting up a true dually board.
4) Agreed
Overall the stresstest has become meaningless because of the idiots at Tomshardware.
All in all considering its a P840 with 2 physical cores each with hyperthreading @ 3.2 Ghz up against a dual core X2 at 2.4 GHz I think the X2 is giving a fair showing.
But as I said earlier if I was to spend $1000+ on a CPU the P840 looks like the better deal, once you can get it stable.
Think AMD shot themselves in the foot with the pricing of the 4800, it needed to be a lot cheaper that the P840 to be a worthwhile buy.