AMD Phenom II X4 965 C3 stepping

[Xiomar]

AMD is once again a little life in the high-end sector of its own processor business. This does not happen with new releases in the true sense. Talking about the "known" AMD Phenom X4 965 Black Edition 3.4 GHz, the new is the sense that he now be in the C3-stepping with a TDP of 125 watts is delivered. But the processor, the more negative image stuck due to the very high TDP of 140 watts, and the processor was connected to a voltage of 1.4 volts, in fact, not just from the green side. It is a bit ironic that our new AMD Phenom X4 Black Edition 965 (C3) 33 already in the Calendar week of 2009 was made, was introduced in the first Phenom X4 965th However, just twelve weeks, which lie between the period of the launch of the first Phenom X4 965 to present the current C3 model, then had even the first C2-965 on the back. This was already in the 21th Calendar week, so in mid-May produced. The time it takes for the CPU reaches the mass market.

But what the C3-Stepping supposed to mean exactly? According to AMD, there is no direct benefit increases, rather, three significant things addressed. The first relates to the TDP, which was reduced from 140 to 125 watts. The second point has to do so indirectly: lowering the TDP was probably achieved solely by an adjustment of the voltage, but more on that later. According to AMD engineers with the C3-Stepping the C1E support for power management on the hardware side have implemented what it means for the customer that no drops in performance should occur when switching between the different States more power.

Hoping some more information form other members.

[S_Asnodkar]

According to AMD engineers with the C3-Stepping the C1E support for power management on the hardware side have implemented what it means for the customer that no drops in performance should occur when switching between the different States more power.

This does require a decent motherboard with matching BIOS support. The third and last point. AMD describes the problem solved in the C3-Stepping with the words "memory controller will now support up to 4x DDR3 DIMMs at 1333MHz" factually sober. It is ultimately a smooth operation at DDR3-1333 in all four banks on both channels or promised. As it changes in the last three months have been some and C1E support was improved still, we have the latest BIOS Asus M4A79T our Deluxe played on, which is four weeks old no. The comparison between predecessor and successor of the 965 also really true, we have the old model re-examined in selected tests with the new BIOS version "2103". Used for short hand was once again the old test system, which was virtually already sent into retirement. Since the launch of AMD were included sample but at a surprising time, and the new system is not presentable, the old system had to once again be brought out of retirement briefly.

[Abigail101]

One has to look really close, to see the differences. For a layman, this is almost impossible because of hiding behind all the numbers and letter combination information to specify the exact processor. Most importantly is the first series after the product name in italics. There we find "HDZ965FBK4D GI" for the old 140-watt model and HDZ965FBK4D GM "for the new 125-watt model. That one point difference in this case the new Stepping "C3" and all associated changes. The rest is not difficult to explain. The "H" stands for the Phenom family, the Athlon processors have in place an "A". In the normal quad-core processors, this consists of an "X" and three numbers such as "X945". The "Black Edition" models is first a "Z", then three digits follow - Z965 for example. The energy-efficient models come only with three figures, however, comes at the end then an "E" into the game - that is 600E, 705E, etc.. The next two letters specify the TDP of the processor, and hence the required cooler, with the "FB" stands for 125 and 140 watts. What follows is the base for which the CPU is provided: "K" stands for AM3, "J" for AM2 +. The next point is probably the easiest to guess, but it stands for the number of processor cores - "4". The next letter "D" stands for the assembly cache of 512 KB L2 cache per core and L3 cache size of 6MB. The last two letters stand for the revision of the processor - including the stepping.

[Barsha]

After you have first considered the processors externally and found that these subjects are what they claim to be, according to packaging, is the second look, as usual, the tool CPU-Z. The changes are the mouse over the two CPUs to really notice you really have to look closely. The first is the tension that was reduced from 1.40 to 1.375 volts smooth, is also the stepping of "C2" to "C3" increased properly. So far, so good. To see the difference - if any - to show between the new and the old stepping, we have selected some benchmarks. As we noticed minor differences primarily in applications and theoretical tests, the focus is on these areas. While there are primarily interested in performance, we go in the next section on the power consumption and an additional measurements, which show that the power consumption of the processor due to the voltage reduction has reduced slightly. At the same time, we will examine also the problem of the now dissolved fully loaded with DDR3-1333, which could occur when C2 stepping. But once we have used 2 x 2 GB DDR3, on the second pass, we have repeated the test with 4 x 1 GB DDR3-1333 with identical timing and also the same voltage.

[little-Jacqueline]

For comparison, we also have the new Phenom X4 965 Black Edition, the voltage is raised temporarily to 1.4 volts. It turns out that the stepping has to find the fact that it requires less voltage, the power requirements do not impact - both CPUs are on the same. Besides the lower power consumption of the processor under full load of seven percent, the fact of change in memory configuration is noted positive. In the end, it must be said that the new stepping a step in the right direction has made, however, offer other components by a lot of potential to save electricity. Besides the power consumption and temperature, we also want to take a quick look at the stable overclocking. During our first model of the Phenom X4 965 with 3.8 GHz stable was not to operate , we put our hope in the new version. For this we had to move us beyond the specifications of AMD, which provide for a maximum voltage of 1.4 volts for the new Phenom X4 965 in the C3-stepping. In this case, as with all overclocking attempts, of course, lost the warranty.

[Shanbaag]

The AMD Phenom X4 965 C3 in the new stepping is a very, very gentle evolution. The new version allows the tension just enough to correct down to slip off the processor in the TDP rating of 140 to 125 watts. For the marketing of the end probably more important than the end for the customer significant reductions in power consumption. 140 Watt TDP as scare off, otherwise no processors with such a high power consumption is traded. With 125 watts, the option is divided, however, in a mass of other models and can shine with the high clock of 3.4 GHz. In this respect, AMD has done everything right, exactly three months after starting to send the first version to the new version into the race.