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DDR3 clock is 1600, CL is 9 9-9-24 and voltage is 1.50V. LGA 2011 DDR3 default voltage is 1.50V. VENGEANCE series has bigger heatsink. In internet, you can see gold, green, red, black and blue colors for different spec. Default Test CPU 100.0 X 33 => 3300MHz 1.135V Enable C1E and Turbo Boost. Clock is floating between from 1200~3900MHz by CPU utilization ratio. DDR3 1600 CL9 9-9-24 1T 1.250V Hyper PI 32M X 12 => 15m 32.226s CPUMARK 99 => 597 Nuclearus Multi Core => 3082 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 40.27/19329 Nuclearus Multi Core cannot run Multi Thread Speed item. This software need to improve the multi-core support. Fritz Chess Benchmark 6C12T performance is higher than 2700K, 4C8T, when it OC to 5GHz. CrystalMark 2004R3 => 382190 MEM score is almost double LGA 1155. LGA 2011 quad channel bandwidth has really good advantage. CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 10.45 pts CPU(Single Core) => 1.58 pts Single core performance is similar to 2700K default, but multi-core full speed performance is 18% higher than 2700K running at 5GHz. PCMark Vantage => 22612 x264 FHD Benchmark => 28.8 x264 video spec is getting more and more popular. Many people covert video to h264 or x264 format. In this condition, CPU multi-tasking performance is very important. You can see 3960X has very good performance. In this benchmark, the score is higher than 2600K OC to 5.1GHz. It’s really saving time. DDR3 Test ADIA64 Memory Read - 17686 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 39185 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 14370 MB/s It looks like only SiSoftware Sandra supporting quad channel DDR3 bandwidth. The DDR3 1600 bandwidth is almost double of LGA 1156 platform. ADIA64 and MaXXMEM seems don’t support quad channel yet. I hope the next revision can support it. Temperature Test (Room Temp. is 22˚C) Enter to OS Desktop - 29~31 CPU full speed by LinX - 45~48 Intel RTS 2011LC water cooler radiator change to two 12cm fan and the heat dispersion is very good. Enter to OS Desktop is around 30 and full speed is below 50. For multi-core and high performance platform, this is very good.

4 X Black SATA, provided by X79 and support SATA2. 2 X White SATA, provided by X79 and support SATA3 It can mix up to support RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5 and RAID 10. The performance is based on installed SATA devices. 2 X Gray SATA, provided by Marvell 88SE9172 and support SATA3. It supports RAID 0, RAID 1. 2 X 64 Mbit flash, Dual BIOS, 1 X front USB 3.0 and 3 X USB 2.0 devices. Upper Side LGA 2011 CPU uses 16 phases digital PWM. CPU cover is plating processed which is better texture. There are pull rods in both sides. You must be more careful when install CPU. 4 X DIMM DDR3 support 1066/1333/1600/1866/2133. DDR3 max capacity is 32GB. It supports quad channels and Extreme Memory Profile. DDR3 has 2-phase PWM. Right side is 24-PIN power connector. IO 1 X PS2 KB/Mouse 1 X O.C. button 1 X BIOS Switch button 1 X Clear CMOS button 6 X USB 2.0(Red/Black) 2 X eSATA/USB 2.0 Combo(Black) 2 X USB 3.0(Blue) 1 X RJ-45 LAN 1 X S/PDIF Fiber output 5 X Audio jacks Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Audio Processor, CA20K2. It built-in 128MB Memory for CA2020K2. This design is for Creative high end audio card only. Nichicon MUSE ES(Green) and MW(Yellow) Japanese audio caps. 100% copper shielding provides the highest quality sound resolution. The design and components are high end audio card level. X79 chipset heatsink is hand gun this time. The design is exquisite. However, the imposing manner is lower than former magazine design... This time, GIGABYTE adds BT4.0 and Wi-Fi PCI-E card. Lower-right are 2 different USB ports. It supports Apple latest iPhone4S or any other smart phones or tablets which support BT and Wi-Fi. This pic is installing 2 antennas. Left green LED is WIFI and right orange is BT. Test Configuration CPU: Intel Core i7-3960X MB: GIGABYTE G1.Assassin2 DRAM: CORSAIR VENGEANCE CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9 VGA: msi N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II HD: CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB POWER: Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1200W Cooler: Intel RTS 2011LC OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit X58 is the first triple channel platform. X79 enhances to quad channel DDR3. DDR3 is using CORSAIR VENGEANCE, CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9. The packing shows supporting Intel/AMD platforms. DDR3 capacity is 4 X 4GB. Blue color is main tone for this series. The packing is elegant. Users can open cover to check the DDR3 detail spec.

Nov 2008, Intel launched first Core i7 in LGA 1366 platform to redefine the enthusiast position. 2009, Intel launched LGA1156 for mainstream to mid-high range, called first generation Core i structure. Jan 2011, Intel launched 2nd Generation Core i, LGA 1155 platform, to replace LGA 1156 product line. However, Sandy Bridge structure didn’t phase into high end market immediately. That’s why LGA 1366 X58 platform stays for 3 years. Finally, 14 Nov, Intel announced latest LGA 2011 platform with X79 chipset, called Sandy Bridge-E. The main product change in 2011 is LGA 1155 replaces LGA 1156 and LGA 2011 replaces LGA 1366 product line. As latest Intel Enthusiast product, LGA 2011, the market position is same as LGA 1366. CPU is 6C12T mainly. i7-3820 is 4C8T, similar to i7-920. LGA 2011 first launch 2 CPUs, i7-3930K and i7-3960X, are both 6C12T. i7-3820 4C8T will be launched in Jan 2012. The price should be similar to i7-960 or i7-2600K. I am using Intel Core i7-3960X, same price as 990X, is 999USD by K SKUs based. The clock is 3.3GHz. It supports Turbo Boost 2.0 auto OC technology. The max clock is 3.90GHz. It’s physical 6 Cores and Hyper-Threading technology supporting 12 threads, called 6C12T. 32nm manufacturing, TDP 130W, 15MB L3 Cache, the most high-end CPU in LGA 2011. 3960X backside should be 2011 dots in theory. CPU dimension is much bigger than LGA 1366. The main difference of LGA 2011 is optional cooler. Intel provides 2 kinds of cooler for users. Intel BXRTS 2011AC cooler and Intel RTS 2011LC water cooling kit. Intel original water cooling kit is similar to others closed pattern kit. CPU contact surface is copper. If they can polish, it will be even better. Installation guide, accessories and kits. It supports Intel LGA 1155/11156/1366/2011. Fan is DELTA CNDP131F10 and the spec is 12VDC 0.29A Whole kit is 3 years warranty. I think water cooler should provide better service to encourage more users to use it. MB is GIGABYTE G1.Assassin2, X79 Chipset, for Gaming design. It’s same as X58 G1.Assassin color tone, black and green. The appearance is rare to see. It’s E-ATX and size is 30.5cm x 26.4cm. G1 is for Gaming market. GIGABYTE uses better audio and LAN components. Lower-Left Corner 3 X PCI-E X16 support 3-Way AMD CrossFireX/nVIDIA SLI Bandwidth is X16 + X16 or X8 + X8 + X8. 2 X PCI-E X1 1 X PCI Very rare Bigfoot Killer E2100 LAN Chip Built-in Creative CA20K2 audio chip supports Dolby Digital Live and DTS Connect. X-Fi Xtreme Fidelity and EAX Advanced HD 5.0 Technology It supports up to 7.1 channel and High Definition Audio Technology Design in Taipei

1100T Full Speed - 238W LinX 0.6.4 FX-8120 Full Speed - 166W LinX 0.6.4 When enter to OS desktop, FX-8120 power consumption is 7~10W lower. When both CPU work at multi-core full speed, FX-8120 power consumption is 72W lower. FX-8120 in default mode, no matter temperature or power consumption, it all shows 32nm advantage. In the premise, it’s only for default mode. I shared FX-8120 OC status in my previous review. Even it’s 95W FX-8120, when I OC over 4.3GHz, the power consumption bump up to over 380W. FX-8120 temperature is also rise a lot. 3D Test msi N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II 3DMark Vantage => P21867 CPU SCORE => 54346 3DMark Vantage => P19559 CPU SCORE => 46417 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1920 X 1080 => 242.92 FPS StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1920 X 1080 => 223.66 FPS FINAL FANTASY XIV 1920 X 1080 => 4018 FINAL FANTASY XIV 1920 X 1080 => 3538 1100T in 3DMark Vantage, the 3D performance is 11.8% higher and CPU score is 17.1% more. In StreetFighter IV and FINAL FANTASY XIV, 1100Ts is also 8.6% and 13.6% higher than FX-8120. You can see for Game, CPU execution performance is very important. Also, most games just need 2~4Cores. For real 3D requirement, core number is not the most important factor. I suggest you to choose higher performance CPU. GIGABYTE 990FXA-D3 Good 1. The price segment is entry level in 3 major brands. 2. It has 4 PCI-E X16 and supports 2-Way ATI CFX and nVIDIA SLI technology. 3. IO provides 8 USB 2.0 and 2 USB 3.0 interface. Including front USB, user can have 14 USB 2.0 devices. 4. Built-in 6 native SATA3 support many RAID modes. 5. BIOS provides plenty items and wide voltage range which is good for OC or fine tune performance. Weakness 1. Heat sink is a little small and no pipe. 2. It’s no front USB 3.0 Port. 3. BIOS is not UEFI interface. Performance ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Components ★★★★★★★★★☆ Specification ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Appearance ★★★★★★★★☆☆ C/P Value ★★★★★★★★☆☆ After so many comparisons, you can see both CPU has their own strength and weakness. As default mode, no matter single core or multi-core performance, Phenom II X6 is all better than FX-8120. FX-8120 has obvious advantage in temperature and power consumption. Its’ CINEBENCH OpenGL page is also very good. Also, FX CPU DDR3 bandwidth wins X6 a lot. This is Bulldozer structure main strength for performance. Maybe many readers think the benchmark is just numbers. They prefer to know the performance in real use environment. I use so many benchmark software, applications or games to test. I think the score is also consultative. In the AMD market, if you are looking for better performance, you can choose Phenom II X6 CPU with 970X or entry 990FX. If you need more cores, better temperature, lower power consumption, latest AMD platform and don’t care the lower performance, you can choose FX-8120. However, the current price is a little bit high. Bulldozer structure introduces 8-Cores to PC market, but the structure and performance is not good enough. If AMD would like to break through the performance bottleneck currently, I suggest they can move Phenom II X6 to 32nm. Also improve Bulldozer structure to be more efficient and launch FX II to win back the users confidence. Above is windwithme sharing for AMD new platforms. As a smart users, for mainstream CPU, what your choice will be? This article is also post in my blog. WIND3C Any comments are all welcome. Finally, Happy Holidays… Let’s countdown to 2012.

1100T DDR3 1610.8 CL7 9-8-24 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 9280 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 12768 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 11660 MB/s FX-8120 DDR3 1879.2 CL9 10-9-24 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 14699 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 18120 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 13862 MB/s DDR3 bandwidth, FX-8120 wins 1100T in big gap. FX-8120 leads 58.4% in ADIA64, 41.9% in Sandra and 18.9% in MaXXMEM. FX-8120 bandwidth score is similar to Intel first Gen. Core i platform. It’s still a little behind 2nd Gen. Core i platform. At least it’s a shot in the AMD arm. In the past 8 years, this improvement is a big step. I hope they can catch up the competitor’s bandwidth. Temperature – Enable Cool 'n' Quiet power saving technology 1100T Enter to OS Desktop - 34(Room temperature is 20˚C) FX-8120 Enter to OS Desktop - 30 1100T Full Speed - 60 LinX 0.6.4 FX-8120 Full Speed - 45 LinX 0.6.4 AMD32nm APU and FX series CPUs always show very temperature in most software. Sometimes, it’s even lower than room temperature. It’s often to see 8~16˚C. However, CPU is not a cooler. The temperature should be higher than room temperature. It shouldn’t be lower environment temperature. I will ignore AIDA number. For right side MB tool to compare, we can use this for reference. Even though, I think this number is still lower than FX-8120 real temperature. In Touch BIOS, 32nm FX-8120 burning temperature is much lower. It has 2 more cores than 1100T. As we set both in default mode, FX-8120 temperature owns the obvious advantage. Power Consumption Test 1100T Enter to OS Desktop (Enable CNQ) - 81W FX-8120 Enter to OS Desktop (Enable CNQ) - 74W 1100T Enter to OS Desktop (Disable CNQ) - 103W FX-8120 Enter to OS Desktop (Disable CNQ)- 93W

CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 5.87 pts CPU(Single Core) => 1.09 pts CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 5.11 pts CPU(Single Core) => 0.96 pts CINEBENCH is fastest updated and complete multi-core support. 1100T in single core performance is 13.5% higher. 6-core full speed is also 14.9% higher than FX-8120 8-core full speed. MP Ratio can see 1100T 6-core efficiency is 5.36x, but FX-8120 8-core is only 5.31x. It looks like it’s caused by 4M8T new structure. OpenGL pages, FX-8120 is 9.3% higher. PCMark Vantage => 13589 PCMark Vantage => 12803 PCMark7 => 3993 PCMark7 => 3845 PCMark Vantage and PCMark7 are both system benchmark. The difference is not big. 1100T total score is a little bit higher. Windows Experience Index - CPU 7.5 Windows Experience Index - CPU 7.5 Basically, Windows Experience Index is very fast and convenient benchmark software. The accuracy is based on persons. If using FX-8120 in other 990FX, the score is 7.8. However, the other benchmark is almost the same. In Z68, I also suffered this issue before. I set DRAM at DDR3-2133 and one Z68 got only 5.9 but the other got 7.9. After comparing three DDR3 bandwidth software, the performance is same for both Z68 platforms. I only can say, Windows Experience Index is very simple benchmark tool. It’s just for reference. DRAM structure is the key change for FX-8120. It uses AMD latest Memory Controller. In CPU 200MHz and don’t OC frequency, the memory can set to DDR3 1866, but 1100T only can reach 1600. This review uses CORSAIR VENGEANCE series DDR3. The model is CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9. The packing shows it supports both AMD and Intel dual channel platforms. The capacity is 2 X 4GB. The clock is DDR3 1600. CAS Latency is 9 9-9-24 at 1.50V. It meets AMD platform latest 1.5V voltage regulation. VENGEANCE series has black, red, blue and green colors. Each color means different spec and use. This VENGEANCE can work at DDR3 1600 CL7 or OC to 1866 CL9. It’s good for enhancing these 2 CPUs performance.

Upper-Left Corner 990FXA-D3 uses 4+1 phases PWM. The upper white connector is 8-PIN DC-In. Black AM3+ socket supports AMD AM3+ FX/AM3 Phenom II/AMD Athlon II CPU. IO 1 X PS2 KB/MS 1 X S/PDIF optical output connector 8 X USB 2.0(Red) 2 X USB 3.0(Blue) 1 X RJ-45 LAN 6 X Audio System Configuration CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1100T / FX-8120 8-Core Processor MB: GIGABYTE 990FXA-D3 DRAM: CORSAIR VENGEANCE CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9 VGA: msi N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II HD: Intel 510 Series 120GB POWER: be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER GOLDEN 550W Cooler: CORSAIR Hydro Series H60 OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit SP1 Besides CPUs are different, the other spec is all the same. Performance Test 1100T CPU 201.4 X 29 => 3323.1MHz(Torbo 3726MHz) DDR3 1610.8 CL7 9-8-24 1T FX-8120 CPU 201.4 X 29 => 3222.4MHz(Torbo 4028MHz) DDR3 1879.2 CL9 10-9-24 1T As same software test below, the first pic is 1100T and second is FX-8120. Hyper PI 32M X 6 => 22m 48.628s CPUMARK 99 => 504 Hyper PI 32M X 8 => 28m 37.477s CPUMARK 99 => 423 CPUMARK and PI both have long history. I still remember K8 was always leading Pentium4 in CPUMARK and PI. Till now, CPUMARK is still very good and easy benchmark software in single core test. Early stage, SUPER PI only can test single core CPU. Now, latest version Hyper PI can support 16 cores. It’s a very common benchmark software. 1100T single core performance is higher than FX-8210 around 19.1% in CPUMARK. In Hyper PI 32M, multi-core full speed is also 26.2% faster. Nuclearus Multi Core => 2216 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 24.33/11677 Nuclearus Multi Core => 16231 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 20.87/10019 Nuclearus Multi Core hasn’t been update after 2008. It doesn’t support multi-core well. As FX-8120, it can run Multi Thread Speed. In contrast, 1100T cannot run this option. Former 6-Cores 980X and recent 3-Cores A6-3500 also cannot finish the test. Implying it cannot support triple murderer cores?! However, we can refer to the full finished ALU Speed and FPU Speed items, 1100T is still leading obviously. Fritz Chess Benchmark is a multi-core benchmark by chess. It can support to 8 threads. 1100T 6-core full speed is 24.33 and FX-8120 8-core full speed is 20.87. 1100T is still 16.6% higher. CrystalMark 2004R3 => 222715 CrystalMark 2004R3 => 219825 CrystalMark 2004R3 test several items performance in full system. 1100T is still a little ahead in total score. If look into CPU performance, you can refer to the ALU and FPU to see the difference. For DDR3 performance, FX-8120 has more advantages. You can see detail test below.

In the past years, AMD CPU performance hasn’t been revolute. Since 2006, first time K8 performance crossed over by Core 2 Duo, they started to focus on multi-core and parity price. For entry or mainstream PC users, it’s good news. During that time, AMD high end product lost the performance strength, they only could move to mid-end market. After Core i launched, the single core performance gap was even bigger. Multi-core became main product strategy for AMD. Windwithme would like to share CPU comparison since FX-8120/8150 lanuched. Originally, I would like to use 3 unlocked CPUs which price is around 200USD to compare. They are AMD Phenom II X6 1100T, AMD FX-8120 and Intel Core i5-2500K. For 2500K performance, I have shared many times which you can refer my former reviews. Moreover, 2500K may make this stage brutally. After consideration, I decided to use AMD only. AMD Phenom II X6 series, 1090T has the best C/P value. However, I pick Phenom II X6 1100T due to the price is similar to FX-8120. 1100T packing is all black which meets Black Edition. Left side is AMD Phenom II X6 1100T. Right side is original cooler. Black Edition CPU cooler is bigger size and cooper pipe design. This cooler is same grade as FX-8120. Before the battle, let’s introduce the players. Left side representative - AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition 45nm, 6-Cores, official clock is 3.3GHz, TDP 125W Core name is Thuban and supports Turbo Core to 3.7GHz. L2 is 3MB and L3 is 6MB. Right side representative - AMD FX-8120. 32nm, 8-Cores、official clock is 3.2GHz Normal FX-8120 is 125W. This review is using lower power consumption version, TDP is 95W. Core name is Zambezi and supports Turbo Core to 4.0GHz. L2 is 8MB and L3 is 8MB. Just judge by spec, FX-8120 manufacturing is more advanced. FX-8120 has bigger L2 and L3 cache. After sharing to each core, actual L3 is 1MB and L2 is 2 times of 1100T. I pick AMD current most high end chipset 990FX - GIGABYTE 990FXA-D3. Using entry 990FX MB can have better C/P. Blue PCB is standard color of GIGABYTE. This year, they also use black PCB for high end MB to enhance texture. Lower-Left Corner 4 X PCI-E 2.0 X16 support 2-Way ATI CrossFireX/nVIDIA SLI. Dual VGA bandwidth is X16+X16. The others are X4. 2 X PCI-E X1 1 X PCI Realtek RTL8111E LAN chip. Realtek ALC889 audio chip supports 7.1 channels High Definition Audio and S/PDIF output. Lower-Right Corner 6 X Blue SATA provide by SB950 and support SATA3. It also supports RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, RAID 10 and JBOD. TPM security encryption module slot and dual 32 Mbit Flash BIOS. Upper-Right Corner 4 X DIMM DDR3 support 1066/1333/1600/1866/2000(OC). The max DDR3 capacity is 32GB. DDR3 2000 needs to pull CPU clock. Next is 24-PIN DC-In connector.

StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1920 X 1080 => 270.63 FPS Above is the performance of three kinds of 3D software under 4.7GHz, which is also affected by the CPU performance. Regarding the 3D scores, it is 10% less than that of 2500K OC 5GHz. It needs to be further improved in the future AMD architecture. 990FX provides the bandwidth of ATI CrossFireX X16+X16, which can get better performance than the dual-VGA of the same specification. External frequency of FX-8120 also gets good performance. If you want to increase the DDR3 performance more, the most direct way is to increase the CPU external frequency. In this way, it can probably reach the level of DDR3 2000~2200. CPU 262 X 18 => 4716MHz DDR3 2096 CL10 11-10-27 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 14914 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 19369MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 15013MB/s The external frequency of FX-8120 can be stable around 255MHz. CPU external frequency within the overclocking range also performs well. After increasing DDR3, it can almost reach 15000 MB/s in AIDA64 Memory Read. Compared with the previous AMD platforms, the bandwidth performance when overclocking is increased by about 40~50%, which is also one of the greatest feature for this new platform. Reaching 5GHz Super PI 32M X 1 => 16m 49.743s CPUMARK 99 => 554 5GHz is not easy to reach for FX-8120, even if the heat dissipation system is enhanced. The key is whether the physical quality of the CPU is excellent or not. Generally, it can reach almost 4.8~4.9GHz, thereby making operating system (0S) run smoothly. Although reaching 5GHz in OS, it can’t be stabilized, which can be only reached under single PI and 32M. If it requires running 8 PIs simultaneously, it can’t be reached even if it is 1M. That’s why the overclocking should consider whether each core of the multiple cores has the same excellent physical quality. BIOSTAR TA990FXE uses the AMD’s most advanced 990FX integrated with SB950 chipset. The price in U.S. is about US$115(no more than NT$3,500), which is affordable to most people. The performance is also one of the major features of BIOSTAR, which gets good performance in the test after overclocking. Moreover, 990FX has the advantage of dual-X16 and built-in native SATA3 and USB 3.0, which is quite advanced in the hardware specification. BIOSTAR TA990FXE Advantages 1. The package and materials are both above the level, and the price is still fair among 990FX series. 2. Its BIOS has been integrated with UEFI interfaces, with rich options, and a large voltage range as well as excellent overclocking capability. 3. It includes Japanese solid capacitors, built-in POWER/RESET buttons and simple debug LEDs. 4. It adopts Atheros AR8151 network chip, which is a renowned brand among the network chip brands. 5.It has the built-in and native SATA3 and USB 3.0，and provides two PCI-E X16s and conventional PCIs for extension. Shortcomings 1. CPU voltage is fluctuated greatly when system is standby and at full speed. 2. BIOSTAR has no distribution channel in Taiwan. Performance ratio ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Material ratio ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Specification ratio ★★★★★★★☆☆☆ Appearance ratio ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Performance vs. Price ratio ★★★★★★★★★☆ In AMD’s Bulldozer platform, we can see the improvement brought by the new architecture, and the shortcomings as well. The advantage is that AMD integrates new 32nm process, and launches the 8-Cores design in the common PC consumption market for the first time. When FX-8120 is not in the overclcoking state, the power consumption and temperature both get good performance. The overclocking degree also pushes the AMD CPU and DDR3 clock to higher field, and the DDR3 performance is improved greatly as well. The shortcoming is the price which made AMD proud all the time. This time FX-8120/8150 will make the consumer feel some kind of expensive. The single-core performance is a little bit lower than that of 1090T, so are the multi-task performances of some software. When overclocking FX-8120 to 4.3GHz or higher, the temperature and power consumption amount will increase a lot. These three aspects should be strengthened by AMD to increase the efficiency under multi-task environment through architecture optimization, BIOS modification or software support. I think many AMD fans have been waiting for Bulldozer architecture for more than one year, who can only know the 8-core performance from the hearsay news on the Internet or the test information revealed by media abroad during this period. In this article, windwithme spent nearly two weeks to make calibration for overclocking. Initially, I hoped it could reach the level of stable burning by 4.6GHz or higher to present the best performance of FX-8120. However, it didn’t make it, which is pitiful. Bulldozer brings about surprises and some disappointment. Personally, I think the disappointment is more than surprises. When writing this article, I got some complicated feelings. Maybe it is because I still have the passion of pursuing K7 high C/P and K8 high-performance CPU. When can we see the unsurpassed magnificence of AMD when the performance of K8 Athlon 64 3000+/3200+ was overwhelming on the market again? When will AMD make us crazy about it again, and make some new-era architecture that is really perfect in overall aspects? I still hope AMD can perform better in the medium- and high-order market in the future, and have the glorious period as before. I believe that it is also the expectation of many consumers... This article is also posted in my blog WIND3C. 3C fans are welcome to visit and propose suggestions.

CrystalMark 2004R3 => 282679 CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 7.62 pts CPU(Single Core) => 1.15 pts PCMark Vantage => 16970 PCMark7 => 4432 Windows experience index - CPU 7.8 After overclcoking FX-8120 to 4.7GHz, the performance of CINEBENCH is increased by about 20% in single core, and over 50% in 8-core at full speed. Besides, MP Ratio is also increased to 6.63x, which should be an important factor to cause the significant improvement of the multi-core performance. The performance of other software in the entire platform is significantly improved as well. It seems that the performance of FX-8120 after overclocking is comparatively outstanding. However, the Windows experience index is still 7.8 scores. The simple test software built in Windows7 is necessarily enhanced in the accuracy aspect. DDR3 1866.6 CL8 10-9-24 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 14194 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 18627 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 13985MB/s FM1 APU released by AMD in July, if without overclocking, can be maximized to DDR3 1866. The architecture of AM3+ Bulldozer this time has the same specification. It is unlike the previous platforms that can only support DDR3 1600 at most. The improvement in frequency is also the feature of this new platform, and the bandwidth is slightly increased after it is adjusted to DDR3 1866. Power consumption test System standby - 79W CPU at full speed - 401W CPU test items in CINEBENCH R11.5 running For the power consumption duing system standby, it just increases 5W once overclocking. It may be resulted from enabling C&Q power-saving technology. This part is fairly good. However, the power consumption amount after overclocking increases a lot. When I tried 4.3GHz by using LinX burning, the power consumption reached around 380W. It couldn’t conduct burning by using LinX under 4.7GHz. When I tested the 8-core capabilities by CINEBENCH R11.5, it still got the data of 401W. The power consumption of FX-8120 after overclocking is quite high, which is one of the factors in need of improvement in the future. I don’t share more about the temperature test after overclocking. The first reason is that LinX can be only running under 4.3~4.5GHz. After replacing it with Thermaltake advanced air cooler or CORSAIR H80 to enhance the heat dissipation capabilities, the overclocking stability couldn’t be improved as well. Another reason is that displayed temperature is only around 42~46 Celsius, which should not be the actual temperature. When I disassembled the tower air cooler after burning at 4.3GHz, the heat dissipated from the heat sink shocked me a lot. 3D test msi N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II 3DMark Vantage CPU SCORE => 58318 FINAL FANTASY XIV 1920 X 1080 => 4021

Power consumption test System standby - 74W CPU at full speed - 157W LinX 0.6.4 The power consumption of FX-8120 obtains rather good performance under default configuration. The power consumption difference between standby and full speed is 83W. The integration of 32nm process is greatly helpful to the CPU of AMD’s new-era FM1 or AM3+ architecture. Below will share the overclocking of FX-8120 BIOSTAR has integrated new UEFI graphic interfaces in 990FX BIOS. Some power-saving functionality in the CPU information page can make some further adjustment. O.N.E calibration page Voltage page CPU Vcore +0.050~1.450V CPU-NB Over Voltage +0.050~0.200V Memory Over Voltage -0.250~+0.490V NB Over Voltage +0.010~0.490V CPU HT Over Voltage +0.010~0.300V SB Over Voltage +0.010~0.300V NB HT Over Voltage +0.010~0.300V CPU frequency multiplication can be adjusted here too. To increase the external frequency, it needs to lower NB FID first. If you want to reduce CPU voltage, you can also start from the option of Core VID As for the DRAM frequency and parameter settings, generally, smaller the values are, higher the performance is. Different from the previous platforms, FX-8120 supports DDR3 1866 for the first time. In the past, the maximum CPU of the version inferior to 1100T can be only adjusted as 1600. Below it is set as DDR3 1866 CL8 10-9-27 1T PC Health Status CPU temperature detection data is higher than some software in OS, so this comparison is much closer to the actual temperature performance. Above are the set values by windwithme to overclock FX-8120 to 4.7GHz and integrate with DDR3 1866. The overclocking settings are easier than that of frequency-unlocked FX CPU. It just needs to adjust CPU frequency multiplication, and then adjust the CPU voltage to the acceptable value. In comparison, the overclocking of DDR3 is also in the similar way, which requires adjusting DDR3 1600/1866 first, and then setting parameters or increasing DDR3 voltage. If the operation voltage can be stabilized after overclocking CPU/DDR3, it means that the overclocking is successful. Overclcoking performance test CPU 200.0 X 23.5 => Voltage of 4700MHz at full speed is 1.452V DDR3 1866.6 CL8 10-9-24 1T Hyper PI 32M X 8 => 22m 29.028s CPUMARK 99 => 520 Nuclearus Multi Core => 23265 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 30.51/14643

CPU default performance test CPU 200.0 X 16 => 3200MHz DDR3 1600 CL7 9-8-24 1T Hyper PI 32M X 8 => 30m 21.240s CPUMARK 99 => 436 Nuclearus Multi Core => 16066 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 20.75/9958 CrystalMark 2004R3 => 220281 CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 5.04 pts CPU(Single Core) => 0.95 pts PCMark Vantage => 14105 PCMark7 => 3884 Windows experience index - CPU 7.8 The single-core performance of FX-8120 presented in CINEBENCH R11.5 is almost the same as that of A8-3850 or Athlon II X4640, and 10% lower than that of Phenom II X6 1090T. So the FX series needs enhancement in single-core performance. Multi-task is still the major feature of FX-8120. The software of CINEBENCH can get score of about 5.04 under 8-core at full speed. However, by taking a close look, we can see that it only gets 5.31x for MP Ratio. Compared with 3.89x of X4 640 and 5.22x of x6, the best multi-task performance can only reach the level of the last-generation X6. It may be correlated to the design of new architecture, or the performance will be enhanced by Windows 8 as mentioned on the Internet. As for the best Windows experience index of above software, FX-8120 can get the high score of 7.8 under default configuration. DDR3 1600 CL7 9-8-24 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 13516 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 16554 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 12839 MB/s DDR3 performance is obviously improved in AM3+ CPU. Compared with 1090T under DDR3 1600, it is improved by over 30%. It should be the best improvement among FX series. It has gone through three generation of DDR~DDR3, from K8 DDR to the latest 1090T DDR3. Regarding the DRAM bandwidth, the maximum Read keeps around 10000 MB/s. Over the past eight years, the AMD bandwidth has been increased finally. Although a small step in PC market, it is a big one for AMD. It is hoped to catch up with the competitor’s platforms in DDR3 performance in the future. Temperature performance (Ambient temperature is 22 Celsius) System standby - 13~27 CPU at full speed - 22~33 LinX 0.6.4 In comparison with the temperature by touching the water cooled radiator, the burning temperature of FX-8120 under default frequency is lower than that of 1100T, so the temperature improvement is great. It can be seen from the shared test of 32nm A8-3850 that the CPU temperature is always low according to much software. It remains the same after I use A75 of more than three brands. However, the temperature is not so low when I touch the heat sink, which is about 50 Celsius according to my analysis. The abnormal CPU temperature is also shown on FX-8120. As mentioned by some media abroad, it might be caused by the inaccurate temperature information provided by FX CPU to MB. The above temperature data detected by various software is just for reference, but without representing the actual temperature of FX-8120 capably.

Upper left of the motherboard TA990FXE adopts 4+2 phase power supply. The upper left is 8Pin power input. It adopts the black AM3+ slot exclusively for AMD’s advanced MB. IO 1*PS2 keyboard 1*PS2 cursor 1*S/PDIF Out 1*FireWire IEEE 4*USB 2.0(Black/red) 2*USB 3.0(Blue) 1*eSATA2(Red) 1*RJ-45 Network hole 6*Audio Sound effect hole View of the heat dissipation module on the heat pipe It is not bad in the texture and the contact area, and the red aluminum sheet makes it look more beautiful. The heat sink of North Bridge 990FX has large area for Aluminum extruded heat dissipation. Its shape is also designed for the consideration of preventing the large VGA from being stuck The heat sink of South Bridge SB950 is a little thin. If it is designed as North Bridge, they will be consistent in the view and texture. Test platform CPU: AMD FX-8120 8-Core Processor MB: BIOSTAR TA990FXE EXTREME EDITION DRAM: CORSAIR CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9R VGA: msi N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II HD: CORSAIR FORCEGT 120GB POWER: Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1200W Cooler: CORSAIR Hydro Series H60 OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit SP1 There are more and more enclosed water cooled products in the market within the last two years, which have advantages of unnecessary replacement of coolant booster, convenient installation and good performance. Even the AMD’s most advanced FX-8150 is integrated with solution of the water cooled heat sink. Moreover, Intel has also started to buy water cooler heat sink since the series of Sandy Bridge-E. The heat sink used in this test is CORSAIR water cooled module, with the module number as Hydro Series H60 that is featured by silence. Below is the external package of H60. The warranty period is as long as five years, and the package size is much smaller than that of H80. The attached accessories The bottom is the installation manual and introduction of other product information. The upper left side is a 12*12*2.5 cm fan, with the maximum rotation speed as 1700 RPM, fan flow as 74.4 CFM, sound volume as 30.2 dBA. The upper right side is the buckles and installation screws for each platform. H60 supports the platforms of AMD AM2/AM3. Intel LGA 775/1155/1156/1366. The left side is the entirely-black water cooled radiator, dimension of 120mm*152mm*27mm H80 water cooled radiator is 38mm thick, while H60 is 27mm thick, whose dimension is different from these two. The right side is the water block. There is a clear brand logo on the upper side. This picture is the view installed with Intel Buckles. It can be seen from the rear side that the bottom of the water block is copper. The stacked fin sheets in the middle of the water cooled radiator provide larger heat dissipation area.

During the second half of 2011, AMD has released two new architectures, one of which is FM1 APU platform released in early July. This platform is mainly integrated with the built-in GPU in CPU by AMD for the first time, and the 3D performance thereof is greatly improved than before. Regrettably, FM1 is incompatible with AM3+ pin under its own brand. I have already shared three articles about the test of FM1 platform. FM1 mentioned above belongs to the product line of the medium-level or entry-level platform, while Bulldozer is the new platform advanced than medium-level of AMD, which is a hot term on the Internet. By following the design of the previous platforms, Bulldozer’s architecture adopts AM3+ pin. CPU has three categories of 4-Cores FX-4100、6-Cores FX-6100 and 8-Cores FX-8120/FX-8150, among which the two 8-Core categories are the most eye-catching. After all, they are the first products shown in the Desktop PC market. After several delays, AMD Bulldozer is finally issued in the mid of October and has been sold on the market successively. There is a lot of related information on the Internet and graphic magazines. This time I bought an AMD FX-8120 Processor with 8-Cores, 32nm process and TDP of 95W. The core name is Bulldozer, the clock is 3.2GHz and the specification from Turbo Core to 4.0GHz, L2 8MB and L3 8MB is supported. The upper left is FM1 A8-3850, lower right is AM3+ FX-8120. The front side comparison between the CPUs of these two architectures The rear side comparison The left is FM1, and the right is AM3+. It can be obviously seen that the CPU pins of these two are incompatible. Recently, some cyber friends mention that I shared little information about the CPU. Personally, I think CPU can be only described by specification and appearance photography. As for other CPU information, it can be told from the software test below, which is the major part of this article. Through the pictures of practical test, the CPU performance can be fully presented. Therefore, this time I add the comparison of the two sides between the CPUs of these two AMD pins, thereby hopefully sharing more details about the CPU-related information. Regarding the chipset, AMD provides the combination with the three types of 970, 990X and 990FX. 990FX was successively on shipment by major MB manufacturers in August. FX-series CPU was however released in the mid of October, about over two months later. It is rare in the past PC market. MB uses BIOSTAR TA990FXE, which is in red package, and belongs to the EXTREME EDITION version under its own brand. Whole view of BIOSTAR TA990FXE AMD adopts the dual-bridge chipset design as before instead of single chipset, combining the North bridge 990FX with the South bridge SB950. This combination is the most advanced chipset of AMD, and most MB brands only release the ATX specification. As for the color, it still uses black PCB, and other slots such as PCI-E or DIMM use red or white. The advantage of white color is that it is conspicuous when installed in the PC. Compared with the other advanced products that are just in black and red colors, it shows better texture. Lower left of the motherboard 3*PCI-E 2.0*16, ATI CrossFireX technology supported, bandwidth *16+*16+*4 1*PCI-E*1 2*PCI Atheros AR8151 network chip Realtek ALC892 audio chip, 8 sound channels HD Audio supported Lower right of the motherboard 5*red SATA, SB950 chip provided, SATA3 specification, and RAID0, RAID1, RAID5 and RAID10 supported Blue is the front USB 3.0 expansion slot, simple Power, Reset button, built-in Debug LED Upper right of the motherboard 4*DIMM DDR3, support 800/1066/1333/1600/1866/2000(OC), with the maximum capacity as 16GB. DDR3 2000 can be only achieved by CPU OC external frequency. The next is 24-PIN power input.

Intel HD Graphics Built-in 3D Performance Default clock is 1100 MHz 3DMark Vantage => P1015 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1280 X 720 => 26.58 FPS OC clock to 1500MHz 3DMark Vantage => P1383 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1280 X 720 => 33.28 FPS Intel Sandy Bridge IGP 3D performance is much higher than LGA 1156. If you have more performance demand, you can consider Intel HD3000 series. However, the CPU price is much higher. The OC range is still ok. After OC, the 3D performance increases 25~36%. As built-in IGP performance, it’s only for low 3D demand users. It’s not easy to replace entry VGA products. Now, most ITX MB provides one PCI-E X16 for future upgrade. Most ITX Cases are only compatible with Low Profile VGA. This time, I use GIGABYTE R645OC-1GI for 3D test. Core/Memory clock are 675/1600MHz. It’s Low Profile which compatible with ITX. It’s 1GB DDR3 and chipset is AMD Radeon HD6450. This is OC version. The default clock is higher than HD6450. The price is in entry segment. 3DMark Vantage => P1807 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1280 X 720 => 53.41 FPS Radeon HD6450 is AMD latest entry 3D graphic chipset. The performance is 2 times faster than Intel IGP. For Low Profile spec, the performance will be lower than standard size VGA, due to dimension, temperature and power saving. HD6450 performance is for your further upgrade reference. If you are not ITX case users, you can choose other better performance cards. GIGABYTE H61N-USB3 Good 1. Support D-SUB / DVI / HDMI display mode and S/PDIF fiber/coaxial output 2. 4 USB 2.0 and 2 USB 3.0 for upgrading USB wireless or more. 3. Support Sandy Bridge series CPU. You can use LGA 1155 CPU from Clereon to Core i7. 4. With 32nm entry dual core CPU, the temperature and power consumption is outstanding. 5. Built-in IGP 3D performance is much improved comparing to LGA 1156. The DDR3 bandwidth is also enhanced. Weakness 1. Only support 2 SATA. 2. Price could be lower. Performance ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Components ★★★★★★★★★☆ Specification ★★★★★★★★☆☆ Appearance ★★★★★★★★☆☆ C/P Value ★★★★★★★★☆☆ ITX platform for HTPC also needs to consider the HD video playback perforamcne. It’s not a problem for Intel platform. My previous review used to share the Intel HD Graphics playback performance. When playing 1080P Blue-Ray video, the CPU utilized rate is only 10%. You don’t have to worry about the quality in latest platform. GIGABYTE H61N-USB3 provides quite good IO options. It’s very suitable for HTPC or high performance small PC. If they can change to 4 SATA and lower price, this will be high C/P ITX product. CPU options are wide. You can choose by budget, for more hi-end Core i3 or i5 CPU. If you would like to build high performance ITX within budget, you can choose Celeron G530 or Pentium G620. Recently, I saw FM1 APU A75 chipset also has ITX platform. I am glad to see more MB makers to join this competition. It will make price be parity which is good for users. This review is using rare Intel G620T version. Taiwan disti doesn’t sell this version. However, I still would like to share with who love ITX platform. This review is also in my blog WIND3C, Welcome to visit and comment.

CrystalMark 2004R3 => 100733 CINEBENCH R11.5 CPU => 1.71 pts CPU(Single Core) => 0.88 pts PCMark Vantage => 5117 WindowsI - CPU 6.1 The platform performance is 2~3 times faster than AMD ITX E350 APU. Sandy Bridge single CPU execution performance is very high. In dual core, the score is even higher. This ITX platform performance is good enough for HTPC. If you use Celeron G530, the platform will be cheaper. DDR3 Test G620T DDR3 1064.2 CL5 6-5-18 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 12352 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 10982 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 12909 MB/s In Sandy Bridge structure, DRAM performance is much improved. These years, I have shared several Intel ITX platforms. For ADIA64, same built-in IGP ITX platform, LGA 1156 is 7641 MB/s and LGA 775 is 5930 MB/s. G620T improves 161% and 208% performance. For AMD E350 APU, it’s 3936 MB/s. The bandwidth gap is even bigger. For DRAM performance, the improvement can break users’ bad image of ITX is low performance platform. Temerature Enter to OS Desktop - 35~41(Room Temperature is 27˚C) CPU Full Speed - 45~49 Intel Burn Test v2.4，Stress Level Maximum Comparing to G620, G620T temperature is acceptable. G620T CPU full speed is 3~4˚C lower. I think it will be better if the difference can be more than 5˚C. However, 2 coolers thickness are different. It may causes G620T be hotter. For normal usage, the open air burning temperature not over 50 is very good. Power Consumption Enter to OS Desktop - 29W CPU Full Speed - 40W Intel Burn Test v2.4，Stress Level Maximum OCCT Power Supply Test(CPU and GPU are both full speed) - 54W G620T power consumption is better than G620. G620T is 10W lower in CPU full speed mode. Intel 32nm and higher single thread performance, the dual core CPU can achieve lower temperature, lower power consumption and high performance in ITX platform.

Backside, as ITX is smaller, some chips are mounting in back. BIOS Screen, M.I.T. Menu You can see hardware real time info inbottom Clock Setup Page CPU ratio can be lower. DDR3 clock for G620T is 800 and 1066MHz. Integrated Graphics clock adjustable range is wider. CPU Related Technology CPU cores can be adjusted and C1E is power saving feature. DDR3 set as CL6 7-6-18 1T to enhance bandwidth. Voltage Page G620 CPU default voltage is 1.065V in MB and G620T is 1.020V. The voltage gaps are not big. You can set manually to lower the voltage. As the pic, I lower to 0.800V and it passed the burning test. DRAM voltage also drops from 1.500V to 1.300V. It can lower power consumption and heat. PC Health Status In LGA 1155 generation, if you want to OC, you need K sku CPU and P67/Z68 MN. For ITX platform, I don’t need it. Also, Sandy Bridge performance is also improved. The key point of ITX platform should be lower power consumption or heat. You can fine tune the system parameters by BIOS. System Configuration CPU: Intel Pentium G620T MB: GIGABYTE H61N-USB3 DRAM: CORSAIR CMX8GX3M2A1600C9 VGA: Integrated Graphics HD: TOSHIBA 750GB POWER: Thermaltake TR2 450W Cooler: Intel Original Cooler OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit Performance Test CPU 99.8 X 22 => 2195.0MHz DDR3 1064.2 CL6 7-6-18 1T GPU 1100MHz Hyper PI 32M X 2 => 15m 47.608s CPUMARK 99 => 338 Nuclearus Multi Core => 7569 Fritz Chess Benchmark => 6.80/3263

Formerly, most ITX platform spec is always using NoteBook CPU and SO-DIMM. These components raise the system cost and the MB price is also much higher than ATX MB. In the past 3 years, HTPC market started to ramp. ITX products are easier to find now. In the past, AMD ITX platform is easy to find due to its high 3D performance IGP. Since Intel LGA 1156 IGP performance caught up AMD and Sandy Bridge is 3~5 times faster 3D performance. Many MB makers launched H67 or H61 ITX MB and the price is much lower. Mostly, the price is only a little higher than same level ATX or M-ATX boards. It can help HTPC buyers to lower their budget. So far, H61 is the lowest chipset for LGA 1155 platform. This segment competition is also very high, so the C/P is very well. For CPU, Intel naming rule is the same. Pentium and Celeron series is also in Sandy Bridge dual core CPU line. This time, I use Intel Pentium G620T, the price is little higher than G620. The internet shows 7USD higher. The “T” means low heat version. The clock and voltage is lower. It’s a pity that Taiwan doesn’t phase in this CPU. You can use G620 instead of G620T with same setup. Right is Intel bundled cooler and you can see the difference in following picture. Intel Pentium Processor G620T, clock is 2.2GHz. Physical 2 Cores don’t Hyper-Threading and maximum is 2 threads, called 2C/2T. It’s 32nm, 35W max TDP, and 3MB L3 Cache. It’s LGA 1155 entry 2 Cores CPU. Original Cooler Comparison Left side is Intel 2 Cores CPU version. Celeron, Pentium or Core i3 use this model. Right side is G620T one. You can see it’s thinner and smaller. It’s easier to install in compact case. MB is GIGABYTE new H61N-USB3. It’s Mini-ITX and size is 17 X 17 cm. Even though the price is higher than M-ATX H61 USB3 MB, it’s still very parity ITX MB comparing to the past. CPU PWM is 4+1 phases. As H61 cannot adjust multiplier, this is enough for Core i7. 2 X DIMM DDR3 slots support 16GB. It built in SATA2. IO 1 X S/PDIF fiber and coaxial output. 1 X D-SUB / DVI / HDMI 4 X USB 2.0(Black) 2 X USB 3.0(Blue) 1 X RJ-45 LAN 1 X eSATA(Yellow) H61N-USB3 PWM. GIGABYTE always stress for components as you can see here. This is security TPM slot. H61 chipset heat sink is big and good texture.

IOMETER 2008 4KB Test - 100% Write / 100% Seupential Total I/Os per Second 66899.10 AMD A75 SATA3 performance is a little lower than Intel Z68 mostly. Comparing to formerly AMD chipset performance, A75 has been improved. The gap with Intel chipset is smaller. AMD structure has no SSD accelerating mode. If you would like to use SSD, I recommend capacity is from 90 to 120GB. Drive C, system drive, can use SSD and the data drive can use cheap 2TB HDD to build the ideal system. Third platform is NoteBook, acer TimelineX 3830TG. It’s Intel 2nd generation Core i and chipset is Intel HM65. The first time I saw 3830TG was Computex. I am impressed by its appearance. Main tone is blue and the cover is aluminum. The thickness is under1 inch. It built in individual graphic and long duration battery. The design is similar to business style. The CPU and 3D performance is mid-end above. It’s a kind of balance model. 3830TG price is also very parity. The weakness is 1.87Kg, a little bit heavy. However, it doesn’t impact the C/P value of this NB. CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB install at SATA3 as system drive. HD Tune Pro 4.60 Benchmark Read - Average 458.5 MB/s Access Time 0.178ms ATTO DISK Benchmark over 512k test, the max Read is 550.3 Mb/s and Write is 510.0 MB/s. File Benchmark over 2048k test, the Read can achieve almost 500 MB/s. CrystalDiskMark <All 0x00, 0Fill> Read - 472.3 MB/s Write - 459.8 MB/s <All 0xFF, 1Fill> Read - 478.9 MB/s Write - 450.2 MB/s AS SSD Benchmark - 423 Seq Read - 478.14 MB/s Write - 118.33 MB/s 4K-64Thrd Read - 107.38 MB/s Write - 121.99 MB/s Set Force GT as OS drive, you can see the performance drop a little, but it’s acceptable. 4K performance is much lower than PC. I hope 3830TG can improve it by updating BIOS. NB SSD performance normally is lower than PC. However, Intel chipset still has the standard level for transferring performance. BootRacer Time to Logon 9 seconds Time to Desktop 16 seconds Maybe some readers think it’s just benchmark. They cannot feel the real performance. I change 3830TG drive to TOSHIBA MK6461GSY 640GB 7200rpm and test the booting time. BootRacer Time to Logon 19 seconds Time to Desktop 42 seconds TOSHIBA 7200rpm 640GB HDD is 42 seconds and CORSAIR Force GT SSD 120GB is only 16 seconds. OS are both Windows7 64bit SP1 with same drivers and software. Force GT speed is 2.63 times faster. SSD is really helpful for NoteBook system performance. Formerly, NoteBook hardware spec is always much lower than PC. Using SSD can improve system performance which you can feel since system bootup, shutdown and execute files. In 2011, SATA3 spec becomes more popular and it improves SSD performance indirectly. Formerly, entry 32GB SSD price can get 64GB now. User also can have bigger capacity. 64GB mid-end SSD market now goes for 128GB due to the price drop. SSD capacity and price cannot be comparing with HDD. However, they are looking for different applications. By the other hand, 128GB in PC platform can be drive C, system drive and replace HDD in NteBook. This year, SSD price drop make user have higher capacity and the applications are wider. For SATA3 SSD, there are several types of controllers. However, many SATA3 SSD Write speed is only 200~300 MB/s. CORSAIR Force GT uses SandForce SF-2281 controller chip, the max Write can achieve over 500 MB/s. For 4K performance, it’s almost the best solution in current SSD structure. It’s a very good controller in SATA3 SSD. Force GT appearance is eye-catching and good texture. The capacity has 60~480GB for users to choose. Plus CORSAIR has good reputation in after service and firmware update, you must put this model in your new SSD wish list. Above Force GT benchmark is for your reference. This article is also post in my blog WIND3C , Welcome your comments.

Formerly, AMD chipset IO performance is always lower than Intel. The SATA transfer rate is also lower. A75 is parity product which native support SATA3 and USB3.0. It’s APU advantage so far. I hope the native SATA3 chipset can enhance AMD platform transfer performance. Test Configuration CPU: AMD A8-3850 MB: GIGABYTE A75M-S2V DRAM: CORSAIR CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9R VGA: AMD Radeon HD6550D HD: CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB / Intel 510 SERIES 120GB POWER: Thermaltake TR2 450W Cooler: Thermaltake BigTyp 14Pro OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB install at blue SATA3. Non-OS driver is without any data. HD Tune Pro 4.61 Benchmark Read - Average 509.8 MB/s Access Time 0.127ms Write - Average 400.9 MB/s Access Time 0.181ms Random Access Extra tests Sequential middle Read - 413.582 MB/s Write - 411.701 MB/s Random seek 4KB 29152 IOPS File Benchmark over 2048k test, the Read is over 500 MB/s. ATTO DISK Benchmark over 512k test, the max Read is 546.5 Mb/s and Write is 505.2 MB/s ADIA64 Read Test Suite - Linear Read(Middle) 527.9 MB/s SSD Benchmark TOTAL 3926.22 CrystalDiskMark Seq Read - 515.9 MB/s Write - 136.6 MB/s <All 0xFF, 1Fill> Read - 511.2 MB/s Write - 494.3 MB/s <All 0x00, 0Fill> Read - 510.0 MB/s Write - 495.1 MB/s ADIA64 Linear Read Average 500.1 MB/s AS SSD Benchmark - 462 Seq Read - 505.29 MB/s Write - 78.69 MB/s 4K-64Thrd Read - 118.10 MB/s Write - 96.63 MB/s AS SSD Benchmark 4K-64Thrd Read - 30232 iops Write - 24738 iops

CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB install at SATA3. Non-OS driver is without any data. HD Tune Pro 4.61 Benchmark Read - Average 519.6 MB/s Access Time 0.113ms Write - Average 337.2 MB/s Access Time 0.183ms Random Access Extra tests Sequential middle Read - 413.582 MB/s Write - 421.780 MB/s Random seek 4KB 34451 IOPS File Benchmark over 1024k test, the Read is over500 MB/s. ATTO DISK Benchmark over 32k test, the max Read is 560.5 Mb/s and Write is 500.0 MB/s. ADIA64 Read Test Suite - Linear Read(Middle) 527.0 MB/s SSD Benchmark TOTAL 4310.19 CrystalDiskMark Seq Read - 513.6 MB/s Write - 145.6 MB/s <All 0xFF, 1Fill> Read - 533.2 MB/s Write - 488.3 MB/s <All 0x00, 0Fill> Read - 533.7 MB/s Write - 489.2 MB/s CrystalDiskMark default test is random. You can see the Write performance is lower. This is because of SandForce controller structure. The algorithm will be lower in this software default mode. On the left hand side, CrystalDiskMark change to sequence mode, the Write performance is close to official spec. ADIA64 Linear Read Average 522.7 MB/s AS SSD Benchmark - 491 Seq Read - 510.75 MB/s Write - 111.09 MB/s 4K-64Thrd Read - 106.48 MB/s Write - 116.18 MB/s AS SSD Benchmark in Seq Write is similar to CrystalDiskMark. However, this software doesn’t provide sequence mode to test. AS SSD Benchmark 4K-64Thrd Read - 27259 iops Write - 29741 iops In Compression-Benchmark, you can see the Read speed is very stable. Write curve is climbing from 150 MB/s to 470 MB/s. IOMETER 2008 4KB Test - 100% Write / 100% Seupential Total I/Os per Second 86253.69 4K Write in IOMETER 2008 test can achieve 86K IOPS which is higher than official spec 85K. 4K performance is key strength of SandForce controller. This transfer rate is the best in the current market. Force GT bundle Z68 platform almost can reach the highest speed except some software cannot unleash real SandForce Write performance. Even Z68 chipset, different MB have the performance gap. You have to beware of it. 2nd desktop PC test is GIGABYTE A75M-S2V. APU structure is AMD latest key product. A75 chipset provides 6 SATA3 and the scalability is better. I use same brand MB to avoid other factors to impact SSD performance besides chipset.

Solid-State Hard Drive has been launched for years and performance is satisfied with most users. In the past, it’s limited with SATA2 3Gb/s bandwidth, so the SSD performance hadn’t been improved for years. SSD max performance in the past few years was just over 200MB/s. During that time, there were many high end MBs supported SATA3, but the performance improvement was not much. SSD performance bottleneck started to change from Jan 2011, Intel Sandy Bridge native support SATA3. Although, AMD launched 990FX and A75 middle year also native support SATA3. It makes SSD own higher bandwidth. SATA3 supports 6Gb/s is 2 times faster than SATA2. Currently, SSD has SATA2 and SATA3. SATA3 read write performance is over 300MB/s. Windwithme previously share Intel 510 Series which support SATA3 450/220 MB/s SSD. This review is another SATA3 SSD. The performance is different with Intel 510 SSD. USA brand CORSAIR has variety product line which you can see its importance in SSD field. This is CORSAIR latest product line, Force Series GT which use SandForce controller. GT series packing is eye-catching red is different with Force Series black color. Content Left side is Force GT 120GB and right side is black 3.5” adaptor and screws. Product is 2.5” and capacity is 120GB. Official spec with ATTO Disk Benchmark is 555/515 MB/s. Random 4K max writing is 85000 IOPS. It’s almost SSD highest 4K spec. Besides the prominent black, the shell is matt metal surface texture. CORSAIR provides 3 years warranty and capacity has 60/90/120/180/240/480G. Users can choose SSD capacity by budget and demand. The back is black metal material. The hair-line surface design is really improving the texture. Lower-Right is SATA3 and power connector. The outlook is same as SATA1 and SATA2. You have to distinguish by packing or sticker. You can see other 2 silver laser stickers. It’s for warranty and internal hardware safety. I recommend you to keep it in origin. 3.5” adaptor is very useful. If you are using SSD in DeskTop PC, you can save money and time to find an extra one. Force GT uses SandForce latest SF-2281 controller which is very popular now. CORSAIR has used in Force GT since June. It’s very early to use this controller/ For Force GT internal structure, you can find in Google. I will not share here. Let’s start from desktop platform which uses GIGABYTE Z68X-UD3H-B3. It provides 2 native white SATA3. This MB C/P value is good in Z68 market. The price is a little lower than Z68 mainstream. It’s GIGABYTE new black design. It also includes most necessary spec. The chipset is Intel latest Z68. It bundles ISRT software to set HDD and SSD as RAID0 mode to make SSD as system accelerating cache. According to small capacity SSD users, this is very good features. If SSD capacity is over 60GB, you can set it as drive C is better. Test Configuration CPU: Intel Core i7-2700K MB: GIGABYTE Z68X-UD3H-B3 DRAM: CORSAIR CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9R VGA: Intel HD Graphics 3000 HD: CORSAIR Force Series GT 120GB / Intel 510 SERIES 120GB POWER: Thermaltake TR2 450W Cooler: Intel original cooler OS: Windows7 Ultimate 64bit

Idle mode – 3:54:30 Consider 9Cell battery supports this high performance notebook; it’s good on both idle and full loading battery life. If full speed could use over 2 hours will be better, but for high level gaming notebooks this is closer to mission impossible, especially it comes under 3.5kg. Use GT683R to make HD video playback, it could used around 3 hours; it’s enough for normally carry out usages. Consider on bigger size and higher performance notebook products, the battery life already better than old models, 32nm CPU is good on power saving, and MSI ECO engine is working fine. THX user interface Enable SMART VOLUME and DIALOG PLUS options This will make sound stage brighter, but middle frequency will reduce a little, recommend using for video playback. Below is my sound experience, this is more subjective, compare with most notebooks built in speakers. When turn on the maxima volume, the sound is really loud enough that you don’t have to worry about this point. High frequency – Will not present over frequency sound, sound detail is really good. Middle frequency – Crystal sound effect, better than double A brand notebooks with sound enhancement models. The sound detail is closer to same level notebooks from TOSHIBA. Low frequency: The 2.1 channel design with a subwoofer, low frequency is really good as a notebook; you could feel the sound power, not to strong and very clear. The sound quality of GT683R is really good, it’s suitable for high quality video and gaming, good on sound detail and crystal surround sound stage, it’s a type of multimedia speaker design. The middle frequency is already better than most notebooks, is MSI could enhance this part, it will become great. Summarized on MSI GT683R Pros: 1.Suitable size and weight of 15.6” gaming notebook, hardware performance closer to gaming PC. 2.Dual SATA3 port and 4DIMM slot design, make this notebook have good space to increase system performance and expansion space. 3.Rich IO ports, besides D-Sub and 2x USB2.0, HDMI, 2x USB3.0 and eSATA ports to use. 4.Designed with gamer style and 5 part of orange LED light, big size gaming keyboard, Turbo, Cooler Boost to increase GPU and fan performance. 5.Special 2.1 channel speakers design with Sound by Dynaudio, it’s really helpful on high level sound quality. 6.Built in 1920x1080 Full HD LCD, it’s good for gaming and video playback. Cons: 1.The shield around touch pad will increase the quality if comes with matted and non glare design. 2.Used non glare panel will be better for gamers. 3.The price is a bit higher than normal notebooks. Performance Ratio ★★★★★★★★★★ Material Ratio ★★★★★★★★★☆ Specification Ratio ★★★★★★★★★★ ID Design Ratio ★★★★★★★★★☆ Cost/Value Ratio ★★★★★★★☆☆☆ (Above Ratio of stars was based on HDD 500GBx2 RAID 0, DDR3 4GBx4 and Blu-Ray Combo) The main design of MSI Gaming Series notebooks is 15.6”, 16” and 17.3” size. Different size comes with different ID style design, the GT683R comes with newer gamer style ID, made some special design on 3D shield and LED lights, that make the notebooks ID looks with better quality with style and similar as race car shape. This is the main improvement from MSI to make their Gaming Series more gamer oriented design. The 2.1 speakers system is excellent, and could present better surround sound stage with THX technology, it’s really good for gaming and movies. Keyboard designed with independent number keys, also marked the WASD keys for smoother FPS gaming experience. LED lights also have different lighting style, the lights could set to follow the tempo and right/left sound volume. Look on the spec., it built with Core i7 CPU and nVIDIA GTX560M graphics, for storage systems used dual SATA3 with HDD RAID 0 features, these are all definitely high performance combinations and could fulfill most heavy loading usages. The overall of GT683R presents high class design; it’s indeed a good notebook of the gaming series. If it could add in some overclock features in BIOS such as Alianware notebooks, and enhance the ID design with better shield material, it will become better. MSI GT683R also have many different specification combinations in different regions, this review was based on my on hand version of the specifications. At last I apply the color celebration file by Spider tool, it fits for all GT680/GT683 series notebooks. windwithme msi GT683R This article is also post in my own blog WIND3C , Welcome your visit.

FINAL FANTASY XIV 1920 X 1080 => 2181 After overclocked, it will get around 15% gaming performance increase, P11639 score is really high of notebook platform. If you sense the GPU is hot after overclock, you could press the fan icon on left side of the control panel; this will increase the fan speed to 110% and reduce some system temperatures. MSI GT683R apply unique Turbo feature, actually the GTX560M already got high performance for a notebook, enable Turbo and use Afterburner software to adjust the frequency, it’s great help on 3D gaming performance. DDR3 performance tests DDR3 1330.6 CL9 9-9-24 1T ADIA64 Memory Read - 15235 MB/s Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 17017 MB/s MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 16038MB/s DRAM bandwidth is an advantage on Sandy Bridge platform, it’s around 20% higher than last generation Core I platform, and 2x faster than Core 2 Duo platform. Because of 4DIMM of DDR3 slot, once used with 16GB, it’s really good enough to use for recent years. Temperature (Room temp. around 25℃) System idle – 42~45℃ CPU full speed – 85~88℃ Intel Burn Test v2.4，Stress Level Maximum The idle mode temperature is same as other notebooks with i5-2410M, this is good. Full loading temperature close to 90℃, the fan is not too noise, and not high frequency noise as well. GT683R designed with bigger size thermal module and fan, when used for 4 Core 8 Treat Core i7 and high power GTX560M, this kind of temperature is acceptable. Enable Cooler Boost to boost fan speed. Idle mode – 42~43℃ CPU full loading – 80~82℃ Intel Burn Test v2.4，Stress Level Maximum If we let fan runs with 110% speed, the fan will become louder than auto control. Idle mode could reduce 1~2℃ and full loading mode could reduce 5~6℃, it’s really good effect when on full loading usage. This is also a good feature with value to reduce system temperature, users could try this if needed. Power watts tests Get into OS only and not running any program. – 28W CPU full loading – 91W Intel Burn Test v2.4，Stress Level Maximum CPU and GPU all full loading – 158W OCCT Power Supply tests Above 3 power watts benchmark data runs with AC adaptor mode, CPU/GPU could runs with full speed at full loading. The power consumption of idle mode is close to normal notebooks, Core i7 full speed is also acceptable. If used CPU/GPU with full loading, it’s much higher than normal Core i5/GT540M notebooks platform. But if we compare with PC desktop, compare the power consumption and performance ratio, 158W is really great. Battery life test 9Cell batteries, runs BatteryEaterPro Full speed – 1:11:15

HD Tune Pro 4.61 Benchmark Read - Average 429.1 MB/s Access Time 0.221ms CrystalDiskMark Seq <All 0x00, 0Fill> 471.1 MB/s Write - 450.1 MB/s <All 0xFF, 1Fill> 472.5 MB/s Write - 448.7 MB/s HD Tune Pro 4.61 Benchmark File Benchmark highest reading performance over 520MB/s ATTO DISK Benchmark test will over 554.1MB/s reading speed when test data over 256k, and highest writing speed over 510MB/s. BootRacer Time to Logon 8 seconds Time to Desktop 15 seconds After installed SSD with SATA3 interface, it totally presents great performance of native SATA3 on Sandy Bridge platform. It’s over 2x faster than HDD RAID 0. If users want extreme speed, could try to use 2x SSD RAID 0 to reach the top. Most of the test items comes with 450~470MB/s speed, ATTO DISK test is very close to formal data speed, boot up speed is much faster with shorter time, SSD is indeed the fastest weapon to increase system access performance. Compare CORSAIR Force GT performance on PC desktop, most performance is 10% faster than GT683R. This happened on many notebooks of SATA3 performance, since SATA3 still new, hope MSI could enhance their BIOS to raise the SATA3 performance. Most notebooks in the market only come with GT540M, a friendly price on standard notebooks. GT683R equipped with GeForce GTX560M graphics from nVIDIA, and built in 1.5GB DDR5 with higher performance. GPU 813/GDDR5 1250 MHz 3DMark Vantage - P10090 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1024 X 720 => 220.70 FPS 1920 X 1080 => 128.96 FPS DEVIL MAY CRY4 DX10 1920 X 1080 => 104.66/86.98/111.92/73.50 fps FINAL FANTASY XIV 1920 X 1080 => 1921 Monster Hunter Frontier 1920 X 1080 => 5081 Built in GTX560M graphics present great performance on 3D benchmark, of course the 3D and gaming performance is the key benefit of a gaming notebook. Under 1920x1080 resolution, most games run smoothly, even with highest detail still could run most heavy games over 24~30fps. These benchmark was tested on AC mode with adaptor, MSI designed with ECO mode and GTX560M also have power saving feature, so the performance will drop a lot when on battery mode to save more power. Touch the Turbo key on top of keyboard will unlock the GPU frequency limitation, and will overclock GPU around 5% to make 3D Mark Vantage over P10400 score. GTX560M overclock to 870MHz/1625MHz test Turn on Turbo function and use MSI Afterburner software to overclock. 3DMark Vantage - P11639 StreetFighter IV Benchmark 1920 X 1080 => 149.32 FPS