Intel Pentium D 805 - Dual Core on a Budget

by Anand Lal Shimpi on 4/7/2006 12:00 AM EST
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  • JakeBlade - Tuesday, April 11, 2006 - link

    I love how this site does a power consumption test with like the only two dual core P4s that don't have ESST. Don't be afraid to run a P4D 950 with ESST and see how it's power consumption compares to the X2/Opteron.
  • ashr7870 - Wednesday, March 23, 2016 - link

    Old comment, I know, but it would be the same as the D-820, since the Prescott/Smithsfield/Presler implementation of SpeedStep only reduces speeds to 2.8GHz, or x14 - minimum multiplier on the D's. All Anand would get out of running a 950 is higher load power.
  • jballs - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    Dang i haven't even hooked up my 144 yet and I see that quake 4 benchmark. It got beat pretty badly by dual cores. Im guess the numbers are the average frame rate, do the minimum frame rates tell any diffent of a story? Were the single core CPU's tested on the using the patch for dual cores? Anybody know of a possibility that that patch would lower single core perf.? Man if this is a sign of things to come i might have wnated to go with a dual core even though I only care about game performance.
  • poohbear - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    well i dont think dual cores will go mainstream until the UT2007 engine is released, as it's built from the ground up to be a multithreaded application. quake4 is an exception, although oblivion states it supports multithreading but have'nt seen any testing done on it.
  • phillock - Tuesday, January 30, 2018 - link

    this might help you https://visual.ly/community/Infographics/entertain...
  • peternelson - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link


    At the moment the 805 is a good deal and has been heavily discounted.

    However, from the recent anandtech story about intel pricing, the price of 9xx chips is due to REDUCE quite a bit on 23 and/or 30 April.

    And further big reductions on say 950 are due when Conroe launches (even if it is in small volumes then).

    My point is that the RELATIVE BARGAIN of the 805 now will be rivalled by 9xx on a price/performance/cost/benefit basis. ie it has Hardware virtualisation, is COOLER for the given amount of work, and with the new 9xx steppings, will be further improved in April. Thus the 805 will still be good value but not as far ahead of 9xx as it is now.

    You are right that as a budget "stop-gap" until Conroe it is tempting, which makes it all the more useful if 975X "conroe-ready" boards could be made NOW with "conroe ready" stickers slapped on the boxes.

    Once the price drops, 930 should be more attractive than they are today. Also intels roadmap still shows 950 quite a while into the future so (again after the price drop) that could be good to go for.

    If I can't locate a Conroe ready 975X board to put some current intel processor into soon, I may have to spend money as soon as AMD have AM2 chips out (15 May to system builders) and a corresponding AM2 motherboard.
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    I have to say, though, that getting a 975X motherboard and slapping in a PD 805 is a bit of a mismatch. Most 975X boards cost in the neighborhood of $200 or more, so I'd be looking more at a cheap 775 motherboard with a cheap 805 CPU to hold you over. That's what I've got right now (as one PC - runs Folding@Home quite well for the price!)
  • xtremejack - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    As of April, all 975XBX mobos are Conroe-ready
  • peternelson - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link



    From April.... All 975X motherboards are Conroe ready
    Interesting....

    I can buy a 975XBX Intel board from a local reseller.

    Actually we are Intel resellers/processor integrators ourselves!

    But HOW CAN I TELL the difference between an early 975XBX that was NOT Conroe ready without component and wire mods, from the NEW 975XBX which is conroe ready already?

    Is it some board revision number marked on the board?
    Is it some "conroe ready" sticker on the box and/or board?

    If I can't find rival vendors offering 975X board for conroe I may have to buy the own brand intel one (although this was not anand's first choice when reviewed), but even then I need a CLEAR way to differentiate between a conroe-ready version of it and a not ready.

    Is there a link to Intel information about the differences?

    "From April" is pretty useless as there is a timelag between USA availability and stock reaching distribution channels in the UK so we can buy it off them. Also the problem of distributors holding stock and selling it after the changeover date. I need a way to tell the difference.

  • JackPack - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    As you're aware, "April" alone is meaningless. In fact, it's misleading.

    There is a PCN (106056-00) on Intel's website describing the updated D975XBX. The newer D975XBX (non-system integrator version) carries an altered assembly number ending with -304.
  • peternelson - Sunday, April 9, 2006 - link


    Thanks Jack, that PCN was exactly what I needed.

    I had previously looked through the Intel site but not found it myself.

    Given that the physical changes were only "add 10 resistors and 2 capacitors", I wonder whether Gigabyte, Asus etc al will be modding their 975 board. Heard rumours about Asus but that their new ones won't be shipping until July? No news on Gigabyte.
  • Viditor - Sunday, April 9, 2006 - link

    Great info...thanks Jack!
  • xxtypersxx - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Interestingly enough, we found that for the most part the Opteron 165 just isn't worth it compared to the Athlon 64 X2 3800+. Thanks to AMD's on-die memory controller, the higher clock speed of the 3800+ is more useful than the larger L2 cache of the Opteron 165.


    Well I am running an opteron 165 @2.6 ghz on a 1.45vcore, and I'd say its definately worth it. And that information is blatantly wrong, as the 3800+ runs at 1.8ghz stock, same as the 165
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    No, the X2 4200+ is a 2.2 GHz 512K part, the 3800+ is a 2.0 GHz 512K part, and the Opteron 170 is also a 2.0 GHz part but with 1024K. The 165 is definitely 200 MHz slower than the X2 3800+. Now, as for your quote, finish the paragraph:

    (Overclocking makes things a bit more interesting, naturally.)

    This is not an overclocking article, and if you're not going to overclock then there is absolutely no reason to spend $20 more for the Opteron 165 only to get slightly slower performance. The added cache gives a 3-5% performance boost at the same clock speed; the added 200 MHz accounts for an 11% performance boost in CPU power. It's not too difficult to see which is larger.

    That said, I have two X2 3800+ chips and an Opteron 165. The X2 chips hit 2.60 GHz, and the Opteron 165 hits about the same speed. The retail Opteron HSF is definitely better, but for serious overclocking you'd probably want to spend another $50 on an aftermarket HSF anyway. Is the Opteron 165 a bad purchase? No. It's also not the greatest thing ever to hit the planet. If I were to rate the X2 3800+ vs. the Opty 165, I have to call it a tie. Both are great chips, both overclock well, and both reach very near the same final performance levels in my experience.
  • Kougar - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    I've really been wanting a good definite article on ALL of these proccessors! Thank you very much! This is so handy to have as a reference when people want to know what to go with for what application/purpose. I am very much looking forward to that overclocking article, it'd be very neat to see all of these processors in it ;) Can finally see how much of the hype about Opterons is grounded in fact!

    When prices on both the 800 and 900 series plummet to next to NOTHING within several months for Conroe (http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=1619">LINK), this will be handy to know. Hopefully AMD will focus on fully converting over to 300mm and 65nm processes quickly to help lower their marginal costs and therefore their own retail prices.

    I did think it was rather sad to see the day when a Celeron D was fairly competetive or outright winning against a Athlon 64 3000+ though, excluding games... Guess that was just me!
  • artifex - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Please include Mersenne Prime and/or distributed.net keycracking in your testing suite :)

    No, seriously, each has short benchmarks to run. And these "temporary" machines will need something to do after we all upgrade again in a few months.
  • Googer - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Pentium D 805 coupled with a cheap 945 motherboard can't be beat.


    I thought Conroe was going to run only on a 975 Chipset and early chipsets produced by Intel has a design mistake that needed to be reivised. So early spec 975 motherboards were indended to run conroe but will not, you will need a revion 2 board/chipset.
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    We're not saying you can upgrade from 805 to Conroe with the same motherboard. We're saying that for about $230 you can get a reasonable socket 775 motherboard and a PD 805 and it should handle all of your multithreaded computing needs until the AM2/Conroe launches.

    975X support for Conroe is still a bit unknown - I'm not sure if early 975X boards will work, and I don't even know that all current 975X boards will work. 945 *won't* work as far as I know, as 965 will be the "value" platform for Conroe processors.
  • hoppa - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    I was very tempted until I saw those power ratings.... yikes.
  • kyparrish - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    This is the kind of article we all love reading, one that's well-detailed and concise.
  • Nick5324 - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Agree, good stuff! I'm looking forward to the overclocking write up.
  • whitelight - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    i liked how you included a large variety of cpu's. thanks!
  • lifeblood - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Having read all the reviews of EE this and XF that, I was starting to think my poor little +3000 was ready for the garbage heap. After reading this article I was very happy to see my +3000 still does quite well in office productivity and games which is it's primary use. I guess I will keep it around another year before upgrading to an X2.
  • PrinceGaz - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Superb article Anand, this is the kind of article I like; a test that includes all of the likely alternative chips that might be considered and where something useful is said under each graph instead of just presenting page after page of graphs with no comments. Okay so I look at the graphs first and make my own mind up, but it's always good to see what someone else thinks in each test to see if I missed something important. I look forward to more articles like this; hopefully the Pentium D 805 overclocking article will also look at overclocking the other chips, not just the 805.

    The one error I refer to is that although the Celeron D processor is correctly identified as having 256KB L2 cache in pages 2 and 3 of the article, on all of the graphs (page 4 onwards) it says 512KB. Shouldn't take long to fix.
  • Dfere - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    I liked the article- not for the graphs. I rad the beginning, some of the set up and the conclusions, and the comments. I am not a tech head! I agree it is nice to get a broad based analysis/market comparison, especially on the "value" segment orbusiness stuff. (CPA here).
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Fixed, thanks! (Not as easy to correct as you might suspect... graphs require a bit more effort, but at least it was only one change per graph.)
  • YellowWing - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    No mention of 64 bit support in the 805, is 64 bit possible?
  • Viditor - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    quote:

    No mention of 64 bit support in the 805, is 64 bit possible?

    Yes...
    FSB = 533 MHz
    Cache = 2x1MB
    Clockspeed = 2.66 GHz
    Virtualization = No
    Enhanced Speed Step = No
    EM64T = Yes

  • YellowWing - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Thanks
  • JackPack - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Yes, of course.
  • Briggsy - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Whilst any new system I build will have 'be quiet, dammit' as one of the core requirements, this processor seems to be good value, if only because it is so cheap for what it is, and that it surely will overclock by 25% to catch up with the 3800+ in performance (although the 3800+ can overclock to leave it in the dust, heh).

    Of course here in the UK power prices aren't 10c/kwh except overnight on economy power plans, so the value does start to look quite poor if you're into buying systems to last 3 years.
  • Remedyy - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    One article I'm looking forward to, if Anand could is webserver test. A test showing how it performs in server work over a socket 939 or IT looking to upgrade from Dual socket 370 Pentium-III's or Dual Socket A Athlon MP's maybe curious about how this Pentium-D 805 may or may not be an improvement over their previous box being hosted. The TCO is so low, but is the performance there in SQL or other front end entry level work?

    Asus & Supermicro make many entry level Server boards based on the Socket 775 that are ready to run with a chip like the 805.

    Maybe Jarred can answer that? :)
  • Woodchuck2000 - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Bought it a couple of weeks ago, bundled with a cheap 'n' nasty motherboard for £125 - bargain!

    Runs very quickly compared with my old Sempron 2600+, overclocks happily to 3.32GHz (667FSB) on air with no v-core increase. Given the incredibly cheap motherboard and stock cooling, when I upgrade my motherboard and cooling in a few months' time, I won't be surprised if it hits 3.6Ghz without too much hassle...
  • kierandill - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Likewise; mine arrived last Thursday along with a Gigabyte motherboard from NewEgg. By that evening I had it running stably in Windows XP at a 40% overclock (3.72HGz) with stock (Intel retail box) heatsink/fan and no vCore increase. Idles in the 42C range. Amazing. I never got my Athlon XP more than about 15% on simple air cooling.
    I don't have any of the bencmarks from this article so I can't say how it compares to these exactly, but it is up in the AMD 64 X2 4400+ neighborhood on the non-3D benches I do have. Only real 3D bench I have is Q3 timedemo, and most sites use something else. FYI I get ~271fps on timedemo1 @1280x1024 with an Ati X700Pro PCIex.
  • Furen - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Care to share the motherboard brand? Fry's is bundling this chip with an ECS mobo for $150 and I'm mighty tempted to build yet another PC if it'll be dirt cheap...
  • poohbear - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    actually there are currently 3 games that provide support for dualcores, Quake 4, COD2, and the newly released Oblivion. it'd be nice to see some tests on Oblivion to see how much it benefits from dual core cpus (especially when doing some of the .ini tweaks for dual cores that reportedly provide a big boost in performance).
  • nordhus - Sunday, April 9, 2006 - link

    4 games, City of Heroes/City of Villains also supports dualcores.
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Is there some special step to enable SMP support in Oblivion? If there is, I haven't heard about it yet and I'm apparently missing out on vastly improved performance!

    As it stands, I've been playing a lot of Oblivion, and I'll be damned if it's actually using both cores in anything resembling an efficient manner. Performance of the two cores together never breaks 100% (out of 200%), which is indicative of single-threaded performance. Windows may be executing gaming instructions on both cores, but the game appears to be as single core as Doom 3, Far Cry, BF2, etc.
  • poohbear - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    yep go to the ini file and change these settings:

    http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showt...">http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showt...

    all the increases have mostly been on dual core cpus. cheers.
  • JarredWalton - Sunday, April 9, 2006 - link

    Nothing like a game that supports dual cores, but only if you know how to properly hacked the INI file. There seem to be quite a few other hidden options for Oblivion in the INI files as well. I haven't had a chance to actually run benchmarks with the SMP hacks enabled, but that will be coming soon enough.
  • poohbear - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    amazing how a dualcore opteron @ the same speeds as a non dual core can have a 30fps increase in quake4! :0 (aside from the extra 1mb cache) hope that's a sign of things to come.
  • Sunrise089 - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Coming after the Black and White article, it's easy to see the high and low in AT writing. This artcle was fantastic, especially page 2, where Anand comments on all the possible chips in the low-middle marketplace. It's nice to see my Opteron 144 still able to win a benchmark. How important this info will be with Conroe around the corner is anyone's guess, but it's nice to see all the information put out there so effectively.

    Now if you will, write up an overclocking story on the Opteron 144, X2 3800+, Pentium D 805, and Pentium 4 3.2ghz.
  • Calin - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    And power use for the overclocked 805 is a must :D
    there goes the idea of having a small, silent, somewhat high performance computer with an 805 :(...
  • Pete84 - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Why wasn't the chip overclocked? They supposedly have very good headroom.
  • JarredWalton - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Read the last page. That article is in the works.
  • Viditor - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    As this is the low end, could you guys throw in an overclocked Sempron as well?
    Just askin...:)
  • stephenbrooks - Saturday, April 8, 2006 - link

    Agree on the Sempron. Also wondering about the new Celeron 355 at 3.33GHz as the poor 351 gets left behind in all those graphs (though it is cheaper - I almost want the $ figure written on the graphs so I can tell if it's a fair competition or not).

    I wonder why Intel is making no 512KB L2 cache chips?
  • Questar - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Why?

    This thing would mop the floor with a Sempron.
  • Viditor - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    quote:

    This thing would mop the floor with a Sempron.

    Never let the facts get in the way of a good story, eh? :)

    Seriously guys, since Semprons are in this same and slightly lower price range, it would be of great benefit to see a comparison so that we can make some buying decisions.

    Cheers!
  • mino - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Actually Sempron 3100+ has about the same performance as A64 3000+.

    even 2800+ would be faster than 805 in singlethread scenario.

    Not saying 805 is bad (actually it is now the best value for money).

    Jus your comment is OFF.
  • mino - Friday, April 7, 2006 - link

    Should have been Sempron 3400+ ~ A64 3000+ ...

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