Building Computer From Scratch

Magnus Helander · April 17th, 2004, 03:49 PM

Is there anyone with experience of editing with the new AMD64 FX and/or Opteron for workstations (I'm confused which is what - will flame AMD marketing department at some point)

/magnus

Glenn Chan · April 17th, 2004, 06:44 PM

The FX processors are souped up versions of the AMD64 processors. They can use dual channel memory and have a larger cache if I remember correctly. They are a few to several percent faster than the normal processors. Anyways, they are worth buying only if you have really, really deep pockets since they only add a smidgen of performance (hard to notice) for a lot of extra money.

Opterons can be put in dual/quad/8-way processor setups (200 series for duallies, 400 for 4-way, 800 series for 8-way). They cost a lot more.

The normal AMD64 processors, the FX series processors, and the Opterons have some differences in the memory controllers which I don't know too well.

Dual processor setups don't help too much for Vegas (Vegas isn't that good at taking advantage of dual processor setups), although the MPEG2 encoder that comes with Vegas+DVD will. This might change when network rendering comes around. You might see some bigger performance gains from dual processors by network rendering to your own computers. This works with After Effects, so it might with Vegas 5.

Magnus Helander · April 18th, 2004, 01:01 AM

<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : Anyways, they are worth buying only if you have really, really deep pockets since they only add a smidgen of performance (hard to notice) for a lot of extra money.

-->>>

That is what I couldn't figure out, the Opteron processor is 4x more exensive than standard AMD 64 Athlon, but there is no real performance increase. I read the Mac G5 vs. P4 vs. AMD64 shootout made by pcworld _and_ macworld at

http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,112749,pg,8,00.asp

and it just does not make sense, why spend the money?

/magnus

Glenn Chan · April 18th, 2004, 01:42 AM

Opterons can be used in multiprocessor setups. Normal AMD64 processors can't.

2- From what I remember of PCWorld and MacWorld, they don't run very good benchmarks. They usually aren't relevant to what you do.

April 17th, 2004, 03:49 PM	#16
Magnus Helander Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Sweden Posts: 221	Opteron? Is there anyone with experience of editing with the new AMD64 FX and/or Opteron for workstations (I'm confused which is what - will flame AMD marketing department at some point) /magnus __________________ Magnus Helander, Crossmediageek on G+

April 18th, 2004, 01:01 AM	#18
Magnus Helander Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Sweden Posts: 221	<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : Anyways, they are worth buying only if you have really, really deep pockets since they only add a smidgen of performance (hard to notice) for a lot of extra money. -->>> That is what I couldn't figure out, the Opteron processor is 4x more exensive than standard AMD 64 Athlon, but there is no real performance increase. I read the Mac G5 vs. P4 vs. AMD64 shootout made by pcworld _and_ macworld at http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,112749,pg,8,00.asp and it just does not make sense, why spend the money? /magnus __________________ Magnus Helander, Crossmediageek on G+

April 17th, 2004, 06:44 PM	#17
Glenn Chan Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Toronto, Canada Posts: 4,750	The FX processors are souped up versions of the AMD64 processors. They can use dual channel memory and have a larger cache if I remember correctly. They are a few to several percent faster than the normal processors. Anyways, they are worth buying only if you have really, really deep pockets since they only add a smidgen of performance (hard to notice) for a lot of extra money. Opterons can be put in dual/quad/8-way processor setups (200 series for duallies, 400 for 4-way, 800 series for 8-way). They cost a lot more. The normal AMD64 processors, the FX series processors, and the Opterons have some differences in the memory controllers which I don't know too well. Dual processor setups don't help too much for Vegas (Vegas isn't that good at taking advantage of dual processor setups), although the MPEG2 encoder that comes with Vegas+DVD will. This might change when network rendering comes around. You might see some bigger performance gains from dual processors by network rendering to your own computers. This works with After Effects, so it might with Vegas 5.

April 18th, 2004, 01:42 AM	#19
Glenn Chan Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Toronto, Canada Posts: 4,750	Opterons can be used in multiprocessor setups. Normal AMD64 processors can't. 2- From what I remember of PCWorld and MacWorld, they don't run very good benchmarks. They usually aren't relevant to what you do.