Nehalem vs Harpertown vs Shanghai in Spec Tests

[Mandrake]

I found these interesting results:



What you're looking at is a single Core i7 at 3.2GHz vs a single Harpertown at 3.2GHz vs. dual Shanghai CPUs at 2.7GHz.

I find it absolutely incredible that a single i7 is besting dual Shanghais in some integer workloads! Since Bloomfield and Gainestown share the same socket and the same Tylersburg chipset these numbers are quite representative of what Gainestown will score in these workloads. Of course, in that case you'd be looking at DP server scores instead of scores for a single CPU.

[huddy]

Ouch... smackdown in the server arena.

[Viperabyss]

Got a link to the website for that?

[Mandrake]

Another small thought is this: For MP servers next year Intel will release 'Beckton' with eight cores, sixteen threads, 24MB L3 cache and quad channel memory. If a single quad core i7 can pump these kinds of numbers out, then a server running four octa-core Beckton CPUs is just going to shatter all previous records.

[JumpingJack]

This is unfortunate for AMD, Nehalem 2P is simply gonna wipe the floor ... Shanghai will not have much of a competitive opportunity, they have about a quarter to gain some share.

[Boyne7]

just goes to show how well engineered the nehalem core is, the server parts should be brutal.

[JumpingJack]

Links for the nehalem numbers:
CFP2006 Result: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Asus P6T Deluxe (Intel Core i7-965) (test sponsored by Intel Corporation)

The number above, 82.9 base 86.9 peak for FP rate... guys, this is within spitting distance of the best barcelona 2P ... 2360. A single chip Nehalem (top bin) is almost as fast as 2P barcelona ... Shanghai is about 20% faster for this bench compared to barcelona ... 2P nehalem will scale probably 80% ... you are looking at, I am guessing roughly, 40 to 60% lead in 2P nehalem over shanghai when it launches. This is ungodly.


To see the Nehalem numbers, go to spec.org, click Results select CPU2006, then select search. Choose processor from the drop down, then for text search "i7" ...

Jack

[Cain]

Holy crap, a single nehalem beating dual shanghais in int and doubling the score of harpertown in FP. See ya AMD, was nice knowing you.

[randomizer]

Intel's bringing out the big guns now, and they don't even have 2 on the board yet.

[Simul4ti0n]

That's insane! What is AMD gonna do now?

[MagicLess]

AMD still has the price/performance angle to work, for now, at least.

[arisythila]

We will see where this takes us. Intel has always been worse off in 2P and 4P and 8P configurations than AMD has. We will see if Nahelem will close the gap. Personally, I think Shanghai is going to be a hit, I mean I see no SQL queries in those tests, So I'd like to know how AMD performs in that senario.

We will see...

[NMDante]

Yes, Shanghai should still hold it's ground, especially since it is simply a "drop in" (with BIOS udpate) upgrade from existing Barcelona systems. I am not sure how the SQL numbers will look, but an improvement in SQL queries wouldn't be a surprise.

But Core i7 single socket numbers are quite surprising. Whether or not 2P will show the same performance gains is unknown, yet, but if 2P does perform just as well as a single socket, it could be changing of the guard at 2P, 4P, and 8P systems.

[djgandy]

These are amazing results. Intel can finally dominate the rate benchmarks. I don't see SQL queries being a problem for Intel. The memory bandwidth improvements should give them the boost they need.

Has anyone looked at the Dunnington benchmarks. i7 isn't that far off some of the lower clocked 24 core Dunningtons :O

[Ches111]

NMDante,

I think the "drop in" comment from my years of experience is really not much of a threat. Most IT departments Capitalize and depreciate equipment over a 5 year period. That is typically tracked by chassis or blade. Not usually by component level. So most are likely to upgrade the whole chassis at a time rather than a proc. Some of the smallish/smaller companies may entertain this but large and medium will like EOL or End of Life a chassis before replacing anything. Unless of course they have a cpu failure and want to replace with new.

[arisythila]

Well, I just want to see if we get a substantial gain in SQL performance. That's where the money is. AMD Systems usually gain performance with every CPU you drop in. Intels usually loose performance when you keep dropping in CPU's. After 2 CPU's its better to just get an AMD system. But with Nahelem here, We have to wait and see. in the hosting world, it all comes down to a couple of things,

1. Memory bandwidth
2. SQL Crunching Power.

Web Servers tend to cache web pages, and SQL data into memory. So retrieval of this information and how quick it can do it is impairitive. SQL Performance is also pretty crucial. a majority of SQL databases are usually ran on 4P AMD systems.

We will see how this all plays out.

[TechnologyCoordinator]

Will this scale on the server side! I hope!