Intel's Core i5 Analyzed and Tested (150+ Benchmarks)

Posted 09/08/2009 at 8:00am | by Gordon Mah Ung

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CPU Buyers Guide

What’s the best budget chip available today for those interested in getting good performance on the cheap? We’ll walk you through the top five chips and tell you which one to buy.

AMD 3.4GHz Phenom II X4 965 BE

It’s bad news for AMD’s recently released quad-core. Its best and brightest could never compete with the Core i7-920 in performance, but it certainly outgunned it in price. Now with Intel’s LGA1156 Lynnfields here, it can’t even compete on price. As of this writing, the Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition had a list price of $245. The Core i5-750 has a list price of $200 and it mercilessly punts the Phenom II X4 965 BE up and down the field. Only in the mostly-single threaded Photoshop CS3 and POV Ray 3.7 did the Phenom’s 700MHz advantage put it over the top. Against the Hyper-Threaded Core i7’s though, the virtual cores vaulted the Nehalems over the Phenom II X4 965 everywhere. The good news for the Phenom II X4 965 is that it isn’t dead ass last. That falls to its old nemesis, the 2.83GHz Core 2 Quad Q9550. There, the Phenom II X4 965 BE serves space-cold revenge to the only chip here not to sport an on-die memory controller. Yeah, so you Intel fan boys say so what? Core 2 is an end of life CPU big whoop, but you gotta take your victories as you can get them.

The real bad news for AMD is that it’s not expected to get its next-generation Bulldozer core out now until 2011 so it can build it on a 32nm process. With Core i5 pushing the $200 range and Core i3 around the corner and expected to push into the ultra-budget range, there’s going to be very little maneuvering room for AMD’s rather dated design.

Still, there is place for the Phenom II X4 965 BE: existing upgrades. The processor will drop into a large assortment of existing AM2+ boards (you should check your mobo maker’s web site first for support) and even though it’s slower than a Core i5/i7, it’s a hell of a lot cheaper and easier to remove your current Athlon 64 X2 part and drop in the Phenom II X4 965 BE. Once you do that, you can thumb your nose at the Intel boys who have to replace their LGA775 boards and likely do an OS reinstall to upgrade to Core i5 and Core i7. Heck, there’s even rumors of a six-core AM3 part which would likely drop into modern AM2+ board so there’s some solace for AMD fans even if the performance isn’t there.

Intel 2.83GHz Core 2 Quad Q9550

We’ve said for months that Core 2 was a lame duck and it gets even lamer with the introduction of the LGA1156 parts. The Core 2 can’t compete with its Nehalem brethren on any front. Even the lowly – and cheaper Core i5-750 – gives the Core 2 Quad Q9550 such a bad beat down, that AMD would likely feel bad for it. And as we said, even the Phenom II X4 965 BE mostly smokes the Core 2 Quad. Sure, the Core 2 Quad surprisingly outperforms the Phenom II X4 965 BE in a couple of places, but it’s still the loser. We could have reached for the highest bin Core 2 Quad, the 3GHz Q9650, but at $319 on the street and list, it makes no sense.

Hell, even at the street price of $220, it’s hard to justify the Core 2 Quad Q9550 over a new Core i5 rig. Even AMD’s Phenom II has a better roadmap as the company will support it through at least through 2010 with newer, faster CPUs. The same can’t be said of Intel which is unlikely to introduce faster Core 2 parts. There is still a place for Core 2 though: If your box is rolling a dual-core and the LGA775 board supports 45nm quads, it would be dumb not to get one more upgrade out of it. Outside of that, it’s clear Core 2’s glory days are long, long gone.