Performance and Value
While we can forgive high-performance components for high power consumption - the
GeForce 8800 GTX, the
Radeon HD 4870 X2, to name two such products - the 965 BE hasn't the speed to justify its power draw.
Compared to Intel's Core 2 Quad Q9650, the 965 BE doesn't fare too badly with both CPUs at stock speed - the
Custom PC benchmarks gives the Q9650 an overall score of 1,288 and the 965 BE a score of 1,244, which is pretty close. However, the Q9650 is comfortably faster when both are overclocked, with a score of 1,646 to the 1,464 of the 965 BE. The same story is true of
Cinebench and
X3: Terran Conflict, where the lack of overclocking denies the 965 BE being comprehensively faster than the Q9650.
WPrime is faster on the 965 BE than the Q9650 though, as was [url=6]Crysis[/url so all's not lost for the 965 BE. However, Intel still has the upper hand with its Core i7 range, and we expect
Lynnfield (which is largely based on the Nehalem architecture of Core i7) to be roughly as fast.
A saving grace of the 965 BE might be price - at
£182.45 inc VAT, or
$249 exc Tax, it's around £40 cheaper than the Q9650 which costs
£238.56 inc VAT. Better yet, MSI has its 770-C45 board that costs just
£63.24 inc VAT or its 790GX-G65 for
£100.12 inc VAT both of which are great overclockers. However, the 3.2GHz 955 BE is now just
£146 inc VAT and doesn't have a TDP of 140W, so won't rag the fan of your cooler so hard.
Conclusion
While the 965 BE is pretty quick, and certainly gives the once untouchable Intel Core 2 Quad Q9650 a run for its money, we still wouldn't want to use it. A TDP of 140W is silly these days, and your cooler will let you know that every time you use your PC. We're also disappointed that we couldn't get the CPU beyond 4GHz, or a vcore of 1.5V, despite AMD's claims that the 965 BE would be more tolerant of high voltages.
With Lynnfield on the way, we wouldn't be buying a CPU at all at the moment, but if you've got a compatible motherboard and know you won't able to afford the new motherboard, memory, cooler and CPU that a Lynnfield upgrade neccesitates, we still wouldn't recommend this CPU. A 955 Black Edition is more than £30 cheaper, overclocks just as well and doesn't have a monstrously high TDP.
Reply With Quote
Posting Permissions
