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AMD Does DDR3 - The AM3 Phenom II

By Vincent Chang - 9 Feb 2009

Power Consumption

Power Consumption

All doubts about these 95W Phenom II processors were cleared instantly in our power consumption tests, with the X4 810 easily drawing less power at idle and at peak than the 125W X4 920. Of course, the lower clock speed on the 810 could be a reason for this, though the 2.8GHz X3 720 also posted similar figures (after accounting for its one lesser core). Also, the MSI DKA790GX Platinum used to test the 95W Phenom IIs has been updated to BIOS version 1.6, which solved an issue where the C1E power consumption numbers were not as low as it should be. This issue affected our initial Phenom II testing (X4 940 and 920) so the gap between the 125W and 95W Phenom IIs should be a bit closer (~5W narrower) than suggested here.

Looking at these results, the new 95W Phenom II processors generally consume less power than Intel's Core i7 processors, though the mainstream quad-cores from Intel (like the Q9300) still maintain the edge here when it comes to power efficiency, especially since the performance of the Q9300 is more than a match for the Phenom II X4 810. Finally, the 65nm Q6600 is looking its age when compared to the newer Intel quad-cores with its higher power draw.

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