MaximumPC 2004 12

D

uring testing for this month’s

Head2Head, we used as many com-

mon components and drivers as

possible, including a parallel ATA Western

Digital WD2500JB drive, Sound Blaster

Audigy 2 ZS card, and clean installations of

Windows XP Pro with Service Pack 1.

Because the 3.46GHz Pentium 4EE was

tested with Intel’s new 925XE chipset, we

could only use PCI Express and DDR2 RAM

for the P4. PCI-E and DDR2 are not avail-

able for the FX (not yet, at least), so we had

to use an AGP/DDR board. For graphics,

we used an nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra in

AGP for the FX-55, and a PCI-E version for

the P4EE, and we manually set the clock

speeds for each. Corsair Micro RAM was

used in both platforms.

For comparison’s sake, once our tests

were done, we also dropped in a 3.4GHz

Pentium 4 EE operating on the 800MHz

frontside bus and reran our tests.

The Benchmarks

We chose gaming benchmarks to stress

the CPU and chipset, and we ran them at

a low resolution in order to ensure that

the CPU’s performance was the limiting

factor. Perhaps sensing what was coming,

Intel has been evangelizing the argument

that game-based tests using timedemos

aren’t realistic. Timedemos don’t run phys-

ics or AI algorithms that would stress a

CPU, Intel argues, and therefore are just

a test of how fast a CPU can shove vertex

data down the AGP or PCI-E pipe. Point

taken—that’s why we also test with real-

world applications such as Photoshop ,

Premiere , and Mathematica , as well as

SYSmark2004. We also tested the CPUs’

multitasking capabilities by running two

CPU-intensive tasks at the same time.

The Results

Th e FX is such a clear winner that it takes us

back to the good old days, a simpler time

when you could declare a CPU the winner

without having to qualify it like those phar-

maceutical ads that warn of headaches, nau-

sea, and—yikes!—anal leakage.

Simply put, there was no contest in any

of the gaming benchmarks. Even in

SYSmark2004 , where Intel usually leads,

the FX managed to tie the P4EE. The shock

of the day came in our Photoshop 7 test,

which also tends to favor the P4EE. The FX

performed faster in Photoshop than even

our Dream Machine 2004, which uses a P

Prescott overclocked to 3.97GHz. The P4EE

won our MusicMatch 9 test, where we take

a WAV file and convert it to a high-quality

MP3, but not by a large margin.

Another benchmarking shocker came in

our multitasking test, where we run our

Photoshop 7 script and MusicMatch simul-

taneously. In the past, the P4’s Hyper-

Threading put it in front in both tests, but

this time around, the FX completed

MusicMatch first, and then trailed the

Pentium 4EE in Photoshop 7. The only good

news for the P4EE is its Premiere Pro per-

formance—the CPU is still the undisputed

king in this application.

In Conclusion...

With all this said, it’s clear the 1066MHz bus

pays satisfying performances dividends

when compared with the older 800MHz

bus. However, the performance of the P4EE

stood in such stark contrast to the A64FX-

55 that we wonder if there wasn’t an issue

with the BIOS or mobo. We’ll consider

retesting with a different motherboard or

new BIOS when they become available.

Overall, this was such a clear win for the

Athlon 64 FX-55, that there is no arguing our

decision. The Athlon 64 FX is the champ. n

Head 2 Head

24 MA XIMUMPC DECEMBER 2004

Why the Athlon 64 FX-55 Is King of CPUs

Read on to find out exclusive information on how we tested these new CPUs,

and what the results mean for your next CPU upgrade

Best scores are bolded.

CPU Athlon 64 FX-55 Intel Pentium 4

Extreme Edition

Intel Pentium 4

Extreme Edition

CPU clock 2.6GHz 3.46GHz 3.4GHz

Frontside bus Core speed 1067MHz 800MHz

Chipset VIA K8T800 Intel 925XE Intel 925XE

RAM 1GB Corsair DDR400 1GB Corsair DDR2 / 533 1GB Corsair DDR2 / 533

SYSmark 2004 Overall 202 201 194

SYSmark 2004 Content Creation 235 231 226

SYSmark 2004 Office Productivity 173 175 166

Mathematica 5 (seconds) 467.99 497. 875 610

Quake III Arena 1.32 Four Demo (fps) 509.7 477 463

Doom III 1.1 (fps) (^114) 93. 3 90. 8
3DMark 2001 SE 330 Overall 26904 23710 23021
3DMark03 340 Overall 13137 12607 12514
3DMark03 340 CPU 1204 1035 1003
3DMark05 110 Overall (^4438) 3917 3892
3DMark05 110 CPU 5203 4917 4797
UT2003 Demo Fly By (fps) 353 286 278
Premiere Pro (seconds) 622 510 523
Photoshop 7.1 (seconds) 243 268 272
MusicMatch 9 (seconds) 235 (^222) 229
Multi-Task Photoshop 7.1 (seconds) 481 399 410
Multi-Task MusicMatch (seconds) 302 370 373
Sandra RAM (MB/s) 5770 5440 4692
SETI (minutes) 89.9 104. 8 107. 0