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AMD Phenom II Energy Efficient CPUs tested

by on15 July 2009

Index




With a reduced TDP rating of 65W for the Phenom IIs is very neat, triple-cores do not shine here, just 20W shy of the 720 is not that great. The 905e does better, about 40W less is much more competitive and is closing the gap compared to Intel. You can see this especially in the CB efficiency charts.  Because we saw some inconsistencies we did all power testings again, two cores loaded always with 3DMark and one or two cores running lamemt. The 905e now can match Intel's Q9 offerings even running slower clock by clock.

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Conclusion

Both CPUs are priced quite equally to the top of the AMD range. While both are not Black Editions, both CPUs can match the clocks of the top CPUs easily. The nice advantage for both CPUs is the reduced energy consumption, so now you can be "green" and an AMD "fan-boy". Also the lower VCore decreases the temperature, so monster-coolers are not necessary but good cooling is always welcome. 

The Triple-Core AMDs are placed against Intel Dual-Core offerings and they can beat them easily. Also the E8 series is way to expensive, because for the same money you can buy Q8 Quad-Cores and Q9s are only slightly more expensive.

In an upcoming article we will check out how standard CPUs react to undervoltaging, as requested by some of our readers. Please note that some low-end boards don't allow undervoltaging.

The 705e is available for about €103 or £ or $124. With the right board you may also unlock the fourth core, something our boards don't allow. Of course the quad-core is more expensive and does sell for about €164 or £139 or $190. So for the more enthusiast user we can recommend the new AMD CPUs and with graphics-cards priced low too, you can build a gaming-machine easily. While the 705e does not shine that much, the 905e does deserve our Recommended Award.


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Last modified on 15 July 2009
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