Considering Phenom 9500. Anybody here with one?

Discussion in 'Processors and motherboards AMD' started by R@ven, Dec 17, 2007.

  1. R@ven

    R@ven Master Guru

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    Hi,

    I am upgrading my pc and am seriously considering buying a Phenom 9500. I already order a set of 2x2Gb OCZ ReaperX PC2-6400 4-4-3-15 memory. I will replace the cpu with a black edition phenom the same time as I update to a 9800gtx in april. The board will be a Asus M3A32-MVP Deluxe. I did some research on the penlyn and phenom and here is the pros of each.

    Pros for Q9450
    Faster than Phenom
    45nm
    great overclocker

    Pros for P9500
    Native quad core
    core level power management
    Support AMD to make sure they stay in the market.
    Potensial of killing a penlyn after a few bios updates and steppings.
    Something new to play with rather than buying a new lga775 board (915,955,P965,680i and now a x38). I am a bit fed up with the same stuff over again.

    Do you think a Swiftech H20-220 Apex Ultra kit will be fine for a phenom?

    Is there anybody on this forum with a phenom?
     
  2. Russ_64

    Russ_64 Member

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    I have a P9600 and have so far tested it with my MSI K9A2CF-F and 2x1Gb of PC6400. Not OC'd yet just component testing.

    AFAIK the Black Ed P9600 is due soon. Don't think that there are seperate power planes (power management) for cores - only seperate CPU and IMC. Phenom now have 2 memory controllers so some fun with Single vs Dual Channel with 2/3/4 sticks to test.

    There are issues with MB BIOS compatiblity at present and loads of issues with PC8500 DDR2 not working at 1066, but neither of us have to worry for now.
     
  3. bug77

    bug77 Banned

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    Keep in mind that native quad core means roughly squat.
    It will never kill a Penryn. It needs a new stepping to get rid of the infamous bug, but in order to benefit from that you'd need to buy a new CPU. Motherboard BIOS revisions are not drivers to increase performance. They only improve stability, add support for new components and fix an occasional bug.

    @Russ: Yes, Phenom can scale the frequency for each core independently (too bad they didn't scale the voltage yet). Power consumption is the main reason I don't feel like going quad-core: for intel, all core run as fast as the busiest one and that wastes a lot of power for the home user.
     
  4. OldGuy932

    OldGuy932 Master Guru

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    I have the 9500 sitting in my crosshair right now. Runs 11x251 stable for me with a slight voltage bump, any higher and there's a wall that I can't get through. I have that mainboard coming in today cause I thought I fried my crosshair at one point. I'd say more but I'm going to go and rebench because someone just knocked me off 2 of my #1 spots on hwbot with the 9500. I'll post again when I get the new mainboard running.
     

  5. R@ven

    R@ven Master Guru

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    But you guys with the phenoms, are you happy with them? How is the temps?
     
    Last edited: Dec 18, 2007
  6. R@ven

    R@ven Master Guru

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    Just in time. AMD lanched the Phenom 9600 Black Edition. So I am going to buy one early jan08 and a DFI LANPARTY UT 790FX-M2R board. When I get the board and cpu with my swiftech kit I will do some oc and benchies and let you know.
     
  7. OldGuy932

    OldGuy932 Master Guru

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    I myself might be switching to the dfi board as well. the asus has a bunch of problems and is really starting to tick me off.
     
  8. R@ven

    R@ven Master Guru

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    I also looked a the asus, but the dfi is less expensive and looks better. The asus has wireless and alot of extra crap. I see that amd is dropping the prices as well. Now the 9600 black edition is going to be cheaper than the q9300 from intel and if you look at p35 and x38 price the 790fx is a bargain.

    Can't wait anymore, 9600 Black Edition, DFI Lanparty, 4Gb ReaperX, 2Tb Hdds, Coolermaster Cosmos, Swiftech H20-220. Then I am still waiting on the 9800gtx to finish my rig.
     
  9. bug77

    bug77 Banned

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    So nobody wants to wait for the TLB bug to be fixed. Interesting.
     
  10. OldGuy932

    OldGuy932 Master Guru

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    Not all processors have the bug. I would assume that if a processor did have the bug, then it would not overclock very well. Mine runs perfectly stable at 11x251=2761@ 1.31 volts, but no amount of voltage gets me farther stable, a few benchmarks will run with the htt at 252. And let me know how you like the dfi board, cause if it works well for you I'll probably get that along with the 9600 BE and an am2 mounting kit for the vapochill because according to macci over on xtremesystems, they have no coldbug like the a64's did.
     

  11. bug77

    bug77 Banned

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    They do (otherwise why would they recall all Opterons from retail?). Higher frequencies only mean higher chances for the bug to kick in.
     
  12. OldGuy932

    OldGuy932 Master Guru

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    So that why I can't stabilize 11x252, but I still have a wall trying to set it to 253.:wanker:
     
  13. InfDaMarvel

    InfDaMarvel Guest

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    These things will be worth your time once AMD lowers the prices like rumored and fixes the bug with a new stepping.
     
  14. Keitosha

    Keitosha Ancient Guru

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    Nonsense! The TLB bug is because of a bug in the L2 cache, which isn't affected by clock speeds.

    The bios workaround for this bug (which comes with a 10% performance loss) disables the L2 cache of the Phenom, so that the bug can't occur.

    But as of today, AMD has lowered (greatly and as a Christmas present) all Phenom prices. Here in Holland we can buy a 9500 for a @#$^% 170 (was 240 euro's 1 week ago!!!) euro and 200 euro for the 9600 (was 300 euro 1 week ago).

    Ontopic:

    I tried a 9500 from a friend and it's a monster oc'er! I could reach 2.9Ghz (everything stable, Prime/SuperPI/Orthos and Vista 64) and 3.0Ghz (not Prime stable, but it is with everything else.).

    This is quite a surprise! I didn't expect this! :D

    Some food for the mind: Phenom OC discussion on XS.
     
    Last edited: Dec 18, 2007
  15. KiM6800GS

    KiM6800GS Master Guru

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    lol.


    so you're willing to disable your L2 cache to fix the bug? i don't think that's a wise and good decision.
     

  16. Keitosha

    Keitosha Ancient Guru

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    For accurate calculations or servers, it wouldn't mind disabling the L2 cache, but normal pc users/gamers wouldn't notice the bug. The chances of running into the TLB bug is very very rare. Us tweakers and gamers can leave the L2 cache on without experiencing problems.

    I will explain the TLB bug.

    The bug sits in the handling of data within the L2 cache. Normally the L2 cache writes the data (on hdd or whatever when a calculation is complete) away, but due to the TLB bug it sometimes "forgets" to write away its data, thus creating inconsistencies in the results.
     
  17. M1ckY

    M1ckY Master Guru

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    It rather is the L3 cache. And it actually even isn't that. It's just this stupid little Translation Look-aside Buffer.

    I'll wait for the new stepping and then choose AMD or Intel. But the people that have a good Phenom (seem to be around 50%) can easily clock it to 3 Ghz and more and tell about better performance than compareable systems with Intel Quads. That's strange I think but gives me some hope. :)
     
  18. bug77

    bug77 Banned

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    Where? I'm really curious, as I'm under the impression Phenom is just below Conroe, clock for clock.
     
  19. M1ckY

    M1ckY Master Guru

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    I got this from some user reviews on alternate.de and some other sites. But that's only the opinion of some users (that may or may not know what they're talking about) and as I said I find it a bit strange. :3eyes:
    And yes, I also thought that the Phenom would loose clock for clock against Intels Quads in most benches.
     
  20. OldGuy932

    OldGuy932 Master Guru

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    I've only noticed it being alot faster at is crossfire. The bandwidth available to the cards is just...amazing. On hwbot I got the second place spots with x1650xt crossfire on 3DMark03 and 3DMark05 and 3rd on 3DMark06. The person right behind me in '03 and '05 has a Q6600 at 3.6 ghz, where I'm only at 2761 mhz. He beats me in '06 because of the cpu test. If you need actual scores, they are posted on hwbot.org.
     

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