AMD's Athlon II X3 435 & New Energy Efficient CPUs: Killing Intel Below $90
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 20, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Final Words
We'll start with the good news first. The Athlon II X3 435, priced at $87, is a better buy than any of the similarly priced Intel dual-core processors. In heavily threaded applications it's even faster than the more expensive Core 2 Duo E7500. Compared to Intel, the X3 435 is a clear value leader.
The problem is compared to AMD, the Athlon II X3 435 isn't that impressive. The Athlon II X4 620 is faster in nearly every multithreaded benchmark, and it's only costs $12 more. It's only in games and other lightly threaded applications where the 435's higher default clock speed makes up for its lack of a fourth core.
The Athlon II X3 435 is about $15 more expensive than it should be to make sense in AMD's lineup. It's a great step between the dual and quad-core options, but if you need the performance you're probably better off with the 620.
You do get better overclocking potential (thanks to lower thermal output of only three cores), but bring overclocking into the mix and you can narrow the clock speed gap with an overclocked 620.
Compared to Intel, I like the Athlon II X3 435. Compared to AMD, I'd take a quad-core 620.
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maddoctor - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - link
No, it will never. You can get a decent performance Intel rig with less than 500 dollar. Intel products will become cheaper and cheaper. Consumer will be more happy with cheap Intel products and they can choose it only from the most trusted brand for processor, Intel.fsdetained - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - link
You can buy A intel rig for $500, yes. But, it will not be as powerful as the AMD $500 build. Taking into account you spend just as much money on the intel processor as you do the AMD processor. Or you'll likely spend more on the amd processor as there are many ways to cut corners and still have 95% of the performance of the other parts and get a better processor.doomedtofrag - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - link
Yeah, your name says it all. You so badly wanted Hitler's thing in you, but since that no longer is a possibility, you are after Intel now???LSnK - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - link
So how much do Intel pay you? Haha.fitten - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - link
5) If Intel owns the Chipset/CPU/Graphics markets 100% that would be -bad- no competition to keep prices low, remember when a decent computer would cost over 3 thousand bucks?Kind of like Apple does now, then. ;)
maddoctor - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - link
Intel will not jacks up the prices at random. Intel is a good company with many OEM's respect to Intel. Intel did not do anything wrong, with its dominant power. This is AMD's own fault that it did not has manufacturing capacities for its processors production. This is the fate of Intel that Intel will own all.bsensible - Tuesday, March 23, 2010 - link
Get real! Are you an Intel Sales rep? Without AMD most of us can ill afford a computer. The slowest one would cost over $1000. Business is business. There is no such thing as a good or moral company. They answer to their share holders, not to you or me. If you are only joking. It is not funny at all.fsdetained - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - link
Yeah intel is a great company, other than all of the bribing, overpricing, trying to monopolize. Other than that they are a good company and make good processors/ssd's/everything else. IGP's blow so far though.dragunover - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - link
You nailed that one on the head.blowfish - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - link
not worth responding to such a troll! At least maddoctor seems very appropriate. Could do with brushing up on his written English, but then who knows what backwater he inhabits.