Opinions on X2 3800+ vs 3700+ San Diego?

M

Misadventure

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 13, 2003
Messages
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I am currently trying to decide between the X2 3800+ and the 3700+ San Diego.

The 3700+ will run me around $320 Canadian, the X2 3800+ probably around $400-410 Canadian.

The main differences I am seeing are the 3700+ has 1mb of l2 cache, where the X2 3800+ has 512kb l2cache per core. The 3700+ is 2.2ghz whereas the X2 3800+ is 2.4.

How big of a performance difference will I see between the two chips?
 
ummmmmmmm where to begin

i would HIGHLY recommend the X2 because it is DUAL CORE meaning 2 processors in one.
the 3800+ runs at 2.0 not 2.4 but u can overclock them easily to 2.4 on stock air. The 1 mb of L2 cache im pretty sure does not make that big of a difference in games but the X2's L2 cache is 512kb x 2 which is 1 mb :)
so for the extra money, totally get the X2, ill gurantee you will love it. Im getting one soon :D
 
AlmostEvil said:
ummmmmmmm where to begin

i would HIGHLY recommend the X2 because it is DUAL CORE meaning 2 processors in one.
the 3800+ runs at 2.0 not 2.4 but u can overclock them easily to 2.4 on stock air. The 1 mb of L2 cache im pretty sure does not make that big of a difference in games but the X2's L2 cache is 512kb x 2 which is 1 mb :)
so for the extra money, totally get the X2, ill gurantee you will love it. Im getting one soon :D
Click to expand...

whoops, sorry, i was thinking the regular 3800+ venice which runs at 2.4. the 3800+ X2 manchester runs at 2.0.

more input would be awesome :D
 
If gamming is your thing: If the game is not multi treaded it will not use the second core. makeing it equal to a 3200+Vience. So far most game are not multitreaded. Not sure of any good games that are. Hopefully in the future.

Althought Dual cores really make windows feel snappy
 
If the price difference is only $80 canadian, I would probably go for the X2, even though it probably won't benefit you in many situations. If you could score a 939 Opteron, that would be the best. I am not sure there are any Canadian eTailers though.

X2 will make more sense when the prices drop, games are coded for it and socket M2 is released so you won't have to worry too much about upgrading for awhile. That should all happen in about 7-8 months.

AlmostEvil said:
X2's L2 cache is 512kb x 2 which is 1 mb :)
Click to expand...
Uh... for the record, it is one core @ 512kb cache - they don't share it.
 
AlmostEvil said:
ummmmmmmm where to begin

i would HIGHLY recommend the X2 because it is DUAL CORE meaning 2 processors in one.
the 3800+ runs at 2.0 not 2.4 but u can overclock them easily to 2.4 on stock air. The 1 mb of L2 cache im pretty sure does not make that big of a difference in games but the X2's L2 cache is 512kb x 2 which is 1 mb :)
so for the extra money, totally get the X2, ill gurantee you will love it. Im getting one soon :D
Click to expand...

Why would you make such a strong recomendation when it doesn't seem you have much experience with either chip?

Also, 2 cores with 512kB each does not equal one core with 1MB. Run one instance of any CPU hog (Prime for example) and you'll see that very quickly.

That said, the X2 seems to be gaining a lot of support from a driver standpoint, but the number of explicitly multithreaded games remains limited. There are marginal improvements with the X2 and the latest nVidia drivers for example.

To the OP, what is the rest of your system like?
 
I'll be surprised if dual core becomes useful and mainstream anytime soon. I just got myself a 3700 san diego, and expect it to last me until developers really actually start caring to code games with two cores in mind.
 
Volume said:
I'll be surprised if dual core becomes useful and mainstream anytime soon. I just got myself a 3700 san diego, and expect it to last me until developers really actually start caring to code games with two cores in mind.
Click to expand...
well in day to day windows use, dualcores is allready usefull... remember WinXP is ready to and able to use 2 CPUs

And im sure the next gen game will use 2 CPUs like q4 and new unreal stuff
 
Well, am I really going to see a huge difference either way?

My real question is this: Is the X2 going to outperform the 3700+ in gaming? In windows, I'm sure it will dominate. Like, if the X2 runs on par with the 3700+ in gaming, I will be happy. If it runs better, that's awesome... if it runs worse, then I'm skeptical.

Which cpu will run better in which situations is what I'm asking, I guess. If the X2 wins all out, then I'll definetely pick her up.
 
I'll be buying a new CPU in the new year and I was wondering the same thing:

Single core or dual core.

My main applications are games though I do other thing to like video encoding/conversion.
 
dual core 4 sure feature of games u gonna need it and plus u will be able to run more programs at onces and thats always great
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Uh... for the record, it is one core @ 512kb cache - they don't share it.
Click to expand...

Yes they do, they're able to share their cache at nearly fullspeed over the SRI. A multi CPU system wouldn't work too well if they didn't have access to eachothers cache.

For all intents and purposes, the Manchester is a 1mb cache dual core, and the (full) Toledo is a 2mb cache one.
 
robberbaron said:
For all intents and purposes, the Manchester is a 1mb cache dual core, and the (full) Toledo is a 2mb cache one.
Click to expand...
agreed. feel free to dig through amd's tech docs if you think otherwise ;)
 
i recommend the X2... i went from a 3000+ [email protected] to a [email protected], and the 3800+ blows the venice away. this is definately the most robust computing experience i've ever had... its insane when i can let cubase do its thing encoding, switch to another app, and have 0 slowdown... i haven't tried gaming, but i'm not much of a gamer either, hell i only have a stock clocked 9800 pro(9800np flashed to pro)...
 
I have a 3700+ and I have it overclocked to 2.8 Ghz. You will not get that from an X2. That over clock does show some gains in games. Gaming wise i would say save some cash get the 3700+ and take the money you saved and get a GTX or more RAM. if you are looking for multitasking/encoding/ripping other things that will take advantage of X2 then do it. Gaming IS NOT one of them. dont listen to the people here that say "im sure in the future games will take advantage of X2" if you go and read some articles from programmers they will tell you that it is very dificult to write code for multiple cores. Think about this, 64bit has been out for much longer than the X2 and do we see any 64bit benefit in games? basic reply is put the money into something else, X2 is sweet if you are going to use it. Dont by it in hopes that games will eventually use it though cause thats just being nieve.
 
RHollister said:
I have a 3700+ and I have it overclocked to 2.8 Ghz. You will not get that from an X2. That over clock does show some gains in games. Gaming wise i would say save some cash get the 3700+ and take the money you saved and get a GTX or more RAM. if you are looking for multitasking/encoding/ripping other things that will take advantage of X2 then do it. Gaming IS NOT one of them. dont listen to the people here that say "im sure in the future games will take advantage of X2" if you go and read some articles from programmers they will tell you that it is very dificult to write code for multiple cores. Think about this, 64bit has been out for much longer than the X2 and do we see any 64bit benefit in games? basic reply is put the money into something else, X2 is sweet if you are going to use it. Dont by it in hopes that games will eventually use it though cause thats just being nieve.
Click to expand...
i took my 1.8ghz venice 3000+ to 2.8, and the difference between my venice and my 3800+ is night and day with my 3800+ at 2.8ghz. and with multithreaded vid card drivers already out(can enable it with atitraytools i guess), and multithreaded gaming coming soon imo, all you naysayers will definately be eating your words. with the ps3 and xbox 360 being based on multicore cpu's, and intel and amd both offering multicores, even apple offering multicores, game designers will have to follow suit.
 
Elysian said:
i took my 1.8ghz venice 3000+ to 2.8, and the difference between my venice and my 3800+ is night and day with my 3800+ at 2.8ghz. and with multithreaded vid card drivers already out(can enable it with atitraytools i guess), and multithreaded gaming coming soon imo, all you naysayers will definately be eating your words.
Click to expand...

multithreaded video drivers have not shown any noticable improvement. and games take years to develope games coming out in the next year have been in development for atleast a year or so already (aka previous to X2s being mainstream). Most good games run off older engines i.e. q4 off doom engine. show me any information pointing toward games becoming multithreaded. not saying at some point in the future games will become multithreaded, but i think we will have changed our hardware 5 times before then.
 
I just jumped from a 3200+ to an X2 3800+ and I love it. Windows is a helluva lot snappier and since I tend to do multiple things at once on my PC, the difference is more noticable. Also Newegg dropped the price for the X2 3800+ to $332.00.


~Novensu
 
RHollister said:
multithreaded video drivers have not shown any noticable improvement. and games take years to develope games coming out in the next year have been in development for atleast a year or so already (aka previous to X2s being mainstream). Most good games run off older engines i.e. q4 off doom engine. show me any information pointing toward games becoming multithreaded. not saying at some point in the future games will become multithreaded, but i think we will have changed our hardware 5 times before then.
Click to expand...

While I think you should get the 3800 I have to agree with this guy, just look at half life 2 and all the games stemming from it. Quake 1 engine -> Goldsource(HL1 heavily modified Q1) -> Source(Half life 2 heavily modified goldsource). Dont beleive it? look at the sdk source dig hard enough you will find comments from WAAAYYYY back in the day(respectively) However there are big name companies like epic dumping green into new games engines like the unreal 3 engine , as i understand it, the unreal 3 engine will support the full range of new nonsense i.e. physics cards, dual cores etc.. So my point is .....I have no point, but I do know this, If you get the 3800 X2 beautful women will want to have sex in your backyard.
 
justin82 said:
While I think you should get the 3800 I have to agree with this guy, just look at half life 2 and all the games stemming from it. Quake 1 engine -> Goldsource(HL1 heavily modified Q1) -> Source(Half life 2 heavily modified goldsource). Dont beleive it? look at the sdk source dig hard enough you will find comments from WAAAYYYY back in the day(respectively) However there are big name companies like epic dumping green into new games engines like the unreal 3 engine , as i understand it, the unreal 3 engine will support the full range of new nonsense i.e. physics cards, dual cores etc.. So my point is .....I have no point, but I do know this, If you get the 3800 X2 beautful women will want to have sex in your backyard.
Click to expand...

Not positive, but I think he's basically saying the x2 is more "future-proof". In any case, hope your right about the beatiful women, I have an x2 on the way! :)
 
From what I've read here, and what I've been able to find out elsewhere. The X2 just isn't really that much of a benifate to you Dougerly.. Think about what you do on your computer...

I personally agree with people statements on how multicore games aren't going to really hit the market for any forseable time frame. And it is also very true that by the time they do, the X2 chips out there will be old news, and you'd probably have to upgrade to see any benifate anyway..

I say go with the 3700+ personally.
 
MaJ-ReD said:
From what I've read here, and what I've been able to find out elsewhere. The X2 just isn't really that much of a benifate to you Dougerly.. Think about what you do on your computer...

I personally agree with people statements on how multicore games aren't going to really hit the market for any forseable time frame. And it is also very true that by the time they do, the X2 chips out there will be old news, and you'd probably have to upgrade to see any benifate anyway..

I say go with the 3700+ personally.
Click to expand...
True. By the time the X2 is "useful" for gaming, there will be even better variations of the X2 (different cores, clocks, etc.) for a comparably cheaper price. If you're looking into investing in new technology, see first if the game developers are willing to open it up to you.

That is why I went with that brand new San Diego in my sig.
 
interstingly enough there are two articles on the front page that show the single vs. multicore question answered in numbers. Here is the HardwareOverclockers article:

http://www.hardwareoc.at/Single-vs.-DualCore.htm

even though I dont exactly agree with the comparison of the 3800+ single with the 3800+ X2 since they run at different clocks. If you are going to run them at different clocks you might as well just overclock them to their fullest potential and then compare atleast you would then be able to say you compared both of them maxed out.
 
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