Intel Core 2 Duo

xlp · n00b Joined: 25 Jun 2004 Posts: 35

Hello Guys

After some time I thought about buying a new PC. I've been using AMD since they were on the market. But now after reading some articles about the new Intel processors, I was just thinking about a change.

Which processor is, in your opinion, the better choice for a gentoo box? The AMD 64 X2 or one of the Intel Core 2 Duo, and which chipset do I choose (is there a big choice?)

I'm most thinking about the software that supports the processor like SMP and stuff. In this case I prefer ease of use and stability over raw power.

Thanks in advance for you tips and opinions.

Greets Timo
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Keruskerfuerst · Posted: Mon Aug 07, 2006 12:02 pm Post subject:

Intel Core Duo 6600 and a P965 chipset based mainboard.

or

AMD Athlon 64 x2 4600 and a Nvidia (570 or 590) or ATI Express 3200 based mainboard.

With applications, that run on both cores, the Intel processors are about 5% faster than the comparable AMD ones.

Paapaa · l33t Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 955 Location: Finland

I think Intel E6600 should be compared to AMD X2 5000+ or FX-62. In some tests even E6400 is faster than FX-62 and in some tests AMD wins. Here is a comparison:

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2795&p=8
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/07/14/core2_duo_knocks_out_athlon_64/page13.html

Here are results from E6300 and E6400 with stock speed and overclocked:

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2802&p=4

It also seems that AMD draws less power when idle but Intel draws less when at full load.

Zygfryd · n00b Joined: 28 Mar 2005 Posts: 13

E6600 is a lot faster than X2 4600+, E6400 is the comparable model and it's still faster in 23 of 26 benchmarks in a suite. At least in 32-bit mode.

I got an E6400 on i965p (gigabyte mobo) recently and since I managed to install the system, it's been very stable, though it only received limited testing (ran a couple minutes of Glest, Tremulous, Googleearth, besides hours of compilation of course). There's sound with ALSA, the integrated NIC works with the sky2 driver.

There are quirks though:
- Both Asus and Gigabyte integrate a JMicron controller for IDE, it's not properly supported until 2.6.18-rc1; you will either need a livecd with that kernel (ie. Ark Linux Live, unstable, but working) or boot from USB.
- The integrated NIC makes an awful high-pitched sound, but I might simply have a faulty unit.
- Neither ACPI nor lm_sensors detect any fans or thermometers, although they're there (BIOS and Windows sees them).

PS. OpenOffice compiled in 4 hours 43 minutes. Now that's an improvement over my old Athlon XP 1700+ with 10+ hours.

EDIT: Scratch the 2.6.18 idea, it works if you add "all-generic-ide" to your kernel arguments.
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xlp · n00b Joined: 25 Jun 2004 Posts: 35

so, as far as I understood thir right, there is no issue in using an intel 64 bit processor although all the guides refer to amd?
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fangorn · Veteran Joined: 31 Jul 2004 Posts: 1886

You have to avoid building the kernel for athlon64 and the -march in /etc/make.conf will have to be nocona instead of athlon64 IIRC.
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batistuta · Veteran Joined: 29 Jul 2005 Posts: 1384 Location: Aachen

maybe not a direct answer to your question. But I'm personally waiting for AMD chips supporting pacifica. This is very cool if you wanna run virtual machines in your box, and pacifica will have a much better performance than Intel's VT. So if virtualization is important for you, this might be a factor. 5% improvement, as it was claimed above, is neglegible and you should look at other factors such us:

- price
- gut feeling (I don't like intel that much)
- quality of compatible motherboards
- power consumption
- trouble (i.e. what is better supported by Gentoo or other OSes when compiling, what breaks less)
- etc etc.

A 5%, even 10% improvement is really nothing. Also keep in mind that more bottlenecks are memory or HD. So get lots of RAM, and a fast HD, possibly a RAID-0 configuration. This will have a more noticible impact.

xlp · n00b Joined: 25 Jun 2004 Posts: 35

Paapaa · l33t Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 955 Location: Finland

Computator · n00b Joined: 23 Oct 2005 Posts: 11 Location: Netherlands

Zygfryd · n00b Joined: 28 Mar 2005 Posts: 13

netjunkie · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 98

I have a core duo notebook, with 1600 processor....in my kernel what should i compile under?

I get kernel panic when i boot, but also note the install is in VMWARE on windows.
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fangorn · Veteran Joined: 31 Jul 2004 Posts: 1886

AFAIK the core duo does not have 64bit extensions. So the only option is x86. Optimization is not a good advice for vmware virtual machines, as you will get problems if you move the installation to a real machine. If any at all compile for Pentium or Pentium-M.
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batistuta · Veteran Joined: 29 Jul 2005 Posts: 1384 Location: Aachen

zuluxxx · n00b Joined: 21 Apr 2006 Posts: 40 Location: Paris, France

Paapaa · l33t Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 955 Location: Finland