The Kaveri Refresh 'Godavari' Review: Testing AMD's A10-7870K
by Ian Cutress on June 1, 2015 11:59 AM ESTProfessional Performance: Linux
Built around several freely available benchmarks for Linux, Linux-Bench is a project spearheaded by Patrick at ServeTheHome to streamline about a dozen of these tests in a single neat package run via a set of three commands using an Ubuntu 11.04 LiveCD. These tests include fluid dynamics used by NASA, ray-tracing, OpenSSL, molecular modeling, and a scalable data structure server for web deployments. We run Linux-Bench and have chosen to report a select few of the tests that rely on CPU and DRAM speed.
C-Ray: link
C-Ray is a simple ray-tracing program that focuses almost exclusively on processor performance rather than DRAM access. The test in Linux-Bench renders a heavy complex scene offering a large scalable scenario.
NAMD, Scalable Molecular Dynamics: link
Developed by the Theoretical and Computational Biophysics Group at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, NAMD is a set of parallel molecular dynamics codes for extreme parallelization up to and beyond 200,000 cores. The reference paper detailing NAMD has over 4000 citations, and our testing runs a small simulation where the calculation steps per unit time is the output vector.
NPB, Fluid Dynamics: link
Aside from LINPACK, there are many other ways to benchmark supercomputers in terms of how effective they are for various types of mathematical processes. The NAS Parallel Benchmarks (NPB) are a set of small programs originally designed for NASA to test their supercomputers in terms of fluid dynamics simulations, useful for airflow reactions and design.
Redis: link
Many of the online applications rely on key-value caches and data structure servers to operate. Redis is an open-source, scalable web technology with a strong developer base, but also relies heavily on memory bandwidth as well as CPU performance.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
140 Comments
View All Comments
nathanddrews - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
I'm not sure it's a good idea for anyone to buy a dual-core CPU nowadays. You're better off spending the extra $20-40 on an i3. The boost to minimum frame rates and basically everything else you do outside of gaming seems well worth it IMO. Generally speaking, that is. Without knowing everything his brother needs/wants to do, it's hard to say.nikaldro - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
20-40$An i3 costs TWICE as much as a pentium.
i3s offer horrible value, considering that i5s go for as low as 160$.
nathanddrews - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
Twice the cost depends on the pricing on the given day/week. As of TODAY, Microcenter charges $50 ($70 Amazon/Newegg) for the G3258 - arguably the only Pentium worth buying. However, you'd have to buy a more expensive motherboard to get the OC option you need. They charge $100 for the i3-4370, $160 i5-4590, and $200 for the i5-4690K. So as of TODAY, it's twice the price for the CPU alone, but $50 is a small price to pay for the added power. The second you start doing anything multithreaded, the Pentium falls short. Likewise, the minimum framerates on that G3258 are up to 50% lower than an i3. A cheaper Pentium would be even worse. The only way it makes sense is if you only work/play in a single-threaded world.nikaldro - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
You don't need an expensive mobo at all.You can easily take the G3258 to 4.2Ghz on an H81M-P33 with the stock cooler.
If you even only consider buying the pentium, that means you are on a tight budget. 50$ on a tight budget can be as much as 15% of the whole budget.
Of course, if you even have "just" a 600$ budget, then you can very well fit an i5 and a good GPU in there, but it seems to me that this is not the case.
artk2219 - Tuesday, June 2, 2015 - link
If you really wanted to bring Microcenter into this they have 100 dollar FX 6300 bundles that come with a cheap board, or for 10 bucks more you can move up to a 970 chipset based board. For 120 you can get an FX 8320E with a 970 chipset based board or pay 170 to move up to a 990FX based Gigabyte board. For 110 you can get an a10 7850K with a cheap board or pay 135 to move up to an A88 based board. Basically all around the I3, intro I5, and even pentium dual core price range there are great AMD bundles that you can get from Microcenter. The only problem is they aren't everywhere so it can be difficult to get those deals. They also do have intel bundles like you said, but frankly they kind of suck in comparison.http://www.microcenter.com/site/products/amd_bundl...
http://www.microcenter.com/site/brands/intel-proce...
tabascosauz - Tuesday, June 2, 2015 - link
Horrible value? Son, you might want to check your facts.The 4M L3 i3s offer little value because one can buy an i5. It's the 3M i3s that make the G3258 look like, well, not a very appealing option.
Overclocking? Sure, it's locked, but tell me, exactly how many more frames is that 4.5GHz Pentium going to net you compared to an i3-4130? About 5 fps? I thought so. On the other hand, what is going to happen to the G3258 in the games are completely unoptimized for it? While the i3-4130 is merrily playing whatever game is at hand, the G3258 is struggling with stuttering, lag, and other issues, if it even successfully runs at all.
nikaldro - Tuesday, June 2, 2015 - link
Son?? Who the hell are you?!?For the same price, an fx6300 STOMPS an i3 in most cases.
The i3 is a bit better than the pentium of course, but the doubled price makes it a bad choice for budget builds, and if budget isn't a major concern, just 60$ more grant you an i5, wich totally CRUSHES an i3.
Lolimaster - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
The cheapo gaming way with a dedicated gpu is the Athlon 870K (quad core).AS118 - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
I've got to agree with that. The 860K's not bad either.Lolimaster - Tuesday, June 2, 2015 - link
Steamroller offers better performance than piledriver on modern games. It also destroys piledriver in emulation (dolphin for example).