AMD's Six-Core Phenom II X6 1090T & 1055T Reviewed
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 27, 2010 12:26 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- AMD
- Phenom II X6
A very smart man once told me that absolute performance doesn’t matter, it’s performance at a given price point that makes a product successful. While AMD hasn’t held the absolute performance crown for several years now, that doesn’t mean the company’s products haven’t been successful.
During the days of the original Phenom, AMD started the trend of offering more cores than Intel at a given price point. Intel had the Core 2 Duo, AMD responded with the triple core Phenom X3. As AMD’s products got more competitive, the more-for-less approach didn’t change. Today AMD will sell you three or four cores for the price of two from Intel.
In some situations, this works to AMD’s benefit. The Athlon II X3 and X4 deliver better performance in highly threaded applications than the Intel alternatives. While Intel has better performance per clock, you can’t argue with more cores/threads for applications that can use them.
When Intel announced its first 6-core desktop processor, the Core i7 980X at $999, we knew a cheaper AMD alternative was coming. Today we get that alternative, this is the Phenom II X6 based on AMD’s new Thuban core:
It’s still a 45nm chip but thanks to architecture and process tweaks, the new Phenom II X6 still fits in the same power envelope as last year’s Phenom II X4 processors: 125W.
Update: AMD tells us that it gave us the wrong pricing on the 1090T. The part sells for $295, not $285, in 1000 unit quantities.
CPU Specification Comparison | ||||||||
Processor | Clock Speed | Max Turbo | L2 Cache | L3 Cache | TDP | Price | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1090T | 3.2GHz | 3.6GHz | 3MB | 6MB | 125W | $295 | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1055T | 2.8GHz | 3.3GHz | 3MB | 6MB | 125W | $199 | ||
AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE | 3.4GHz | N/A | 2MB | 6MB | 125W/140W | $185 | ||
AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE | 3.2GHz | N/A | 2MB | 6MB | 125W | $165 | ||
AMD Phenom II X4 945 | 3.0GHz | N/A | 2MB | 6MB | 95W | $155 | ||
AMD Phenom II X4 925 | 2.8GHz | N/A | 2MB | 6MB | 95W | $145 |
You also don’t give up much clock speed. The fastest Phenom II X6 runs at 3.2GHz, just 200MHz shy of the fastest X4.
When Intel added two cores to Nehalem it also increased the L3 cache of the chip by 50%. The Phenom II X6 does no such thing. The 6 cores have to share the same 6MB L3 cache as the quad-core version.
The Phenom II X6 die. Monolithic, hexa-core
There’s also the issue of memory bandwidth. Intel’s Core i7 980X is paired with a triple channel DDR3 memory controller, more than enough for four cores under normal use and enough for a six core beast. In order to maintain backwards compatibility, the Phenom II X6 is still limited to the same dual channel memory controller as its quad-core predecessor.
CPU Specification Comparison | ||||||||
CPU | Codename | Manufacturing Process | Cores | Transistor Count | Die Size | |||
AMD Phenom II X6 1090T | Thuban | 45nm | 6 | 904M | 346mm2 | |||
AMD Phenom II X4 965 | Deneb | 45nm | 4 | 758M | 258mm2 | |||
Intel Core i7 980X | Gulftown | 32nm | 6 | 1.17B | 240mm2 | |||
Intel Core i7 975 | Bloomfield | 45nm | 4 | 731M | 263mm2 | |||
Intel Core i7 870 | Lynnfield | 45nm | 4 | 774M | 296mm2 | |||
Intel Core i5 670 | Clarkdale | 32nm | 2 | 384M | 81mm2 | |||
AMD Phenom II X4 965 | Deneb | 45nm | 4 | 758M | 258mm2 |
The limitations are nitpicks in the grand scheme of things. While the 980X retails for $999, AMD’s most expensive 6-core processor will only set you back $285 and you can use them in all existing AM2+ and AM3 motherboards with a BIOS update. You're getting nearly 1 billion transistors for $200 - $300. Like I said earlier, it’s not about absolute performance, but performance at a given price point.
AMD 2010 Roadmap | |||||||
CPU | Clock Speed | Max Turbo (<= 3 cores) | L3 Cache | TDP | Release | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1090T | 3.2GHz | 3.6GHz | 6MB | 125W | Q2 | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1075T | 3.0GHz | 3.5GHz | 6MB | 125W | Q3 | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1055T | 2.8GHz | 3.3GHz | 6MB | 125W/95W | Q2 | ||
AMD Phenom II X6 1035T | 2.6GHz | 3.1GHz | 6MB | 95W | Q2 | ||
AMD Phenom II X4 960T | 3.0GHz | 3.4GHz | 6MB | 95W | Q2 |
We'll soon see more flavors of the Phenom II X6 as well as a quad-core derivative with 2 of these cores disabled. As a result, motherboard manufacturers are already talking about Phenom II X4 to X6 unlocking tools.
The new Phenom II X6 processors are aimed squarely at Intel’s 45nm Lynnfield CPUs. Both based on a 45nm process, AMD simply offers you more cores for roughly the same price. Instead of a quad-core Core i7 860, AMD will sell you a six-core 1090T. Oh and the T stands for AMD’s Turbo Core technology.
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kenupcmac - Wednesday, December 1, 2010 - link
so now amd x6 is better for 3dmax compare to intel i7?Wabid Wabit - Tuesday, December 28, 2010 - link
Please check the site out, it is not a Intel Fanboy site or a AMD Fanboy site, but has the info you need, this page was an old post but the site has the info from then and now and it looks like - wait for it - wait for it - Intel just plain kicks ass - and all us Computer Geeks know that.http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html
azizul.hoque - Monday, January 17, 2011 - link
Hi,Can I use this processor for 3D studio MAX?
tipoo - Saturday, May 7, 2011 - link
Of course you can use it.superccs - Saturday, June 11, 2011 - link
I have disabled the middle 2 cores on my 1055T (240Mhz FSB auto voltage, CnQ, and Turbo enabled) and it works quite well at bringing down temps when gaming. When turbo core is active the voltage of all cores goes up to 1.475, so disabling the cores saves power and temps.This works well in the summer, during the winter all heaters are enabled.
rustamveer - Friday, July 29, 2011 - link
sir i wanted to upgrade my pc with amd phenom2 1090t and i' m new to amd processors.but sir please suggest me which motherboard i will choose i don't know much abt motherboard????
please also tell me the price rate in india of phenom2 1090t and motherboard????????
i will be very thankful to you....waiting for you reply!!!!!!!
archangel2003 - Saturday, February 4, 2012 - link
Sounds a lot like the cycle magazines touting one bike having 1.5 HP more than the other, but really, how much riding is done nearly bouncing off the rev limiter?Same thing with these chips.
How often are you going to experience the slight difference between these top of the line "at it's limits" Intel chip compared to the AMD at 1/3 the price?
I think the point of the article was that the huge cost savings of an AMD offsets the slight difference in performance.
BTW, all my computers have Intel only because that ia what they had in them, and if in the future I needed to make a choice, I would need better info like this article offeres.
I could have went with the AMD 6 core for less than my i7 IntelQuad core cost!
Somebody23 - Tuesday, September 17, 2013 - link
I have managed to push my 1090T to 4.2ghz all cores. it was mostly stable on benchmark.Downgraded 100mhz to 4.1ghz. It's stable at 4.1ghz computer doesnt bluescreen in 3 hours stability test.