AMD Phenom 9600 review

AMD's first quad-core processor has been a long time in the making, but the Phenom is finally here.

AMD is keen to stress that this is the first 'true' quad-core design; Intel's Core 2 Quad is essentially two dual-core processors in one package. The disadvantage of Intel's approach is that there's no shared cache between all four cores - each pair has individual cache memory.

AMD has added a 2MB Level 3 cache to the Phenom to eliminate this problem. According to the company, this boosts performance because it allows the delivery of a large amount of data to one core, or smaller amounts of data to all four simultaneously.

You can also buy a triple-core Phenom, called the X3, which is a cheaper alternative. It's basically a quad-core Phenom with one failed core. We'll review this in next month's Labs test of processors.

Despite shouting about the Phenom's 'true' quad-core design, AMD admits that none of the current models in its Phenom range (including the 9600 on test here) is a high-end processor that can compete with Intel's top-end Core 2 Quads. Instead, AMD aims to undercut Intel's prices and make quad-core processors available to everyone.

The 9600's four cores run at 2.3GHz, and each has 512KB of L2 cache to play with. The new L3 cache is available to any or all of the cores. Although the chip will work in AM2 motherboards, you'll need an AM2+ board such as MSI's K9A2 (opposite) to get the most out of the Phenom. This is because AM2+ motherboards support the Phenom's superior power management and HyperTransport 3, the link between the processor and the other components on the motherboard. This runs at 2.6GHz, whereas older AM2 motherboards with HyperTransport 2 have a slower 1.4GHz link. The Phenom's integrated memory controller supports DDR2 RAM up to 1,066MHz.

Sadly, the 9600's performance in our benchmarks was mildly disappointing. It managed only 103 in our audio-encoding test, a score most dual-core laptops beat. Its strength lay in video encoding, where it proved to be one of the fastest processors we've seen. Its score of 364 pales in comparison with that of Intel's similarly priced Core 2 Quad Q6600, though, which scored 453 in this test. It also managed 227 in our multitasking test - far ahead of the Phenom's 175.

Other Intel processors will cause problems for Phenom, too. For around £120 you can buy a Core 2 Duo E6750, which is noticeably quicker overall in our benchmarks. You might expect four cores to be more efficient at multitasking than two, but the E6750 scored a whopping 234 in our multitasking test.

AMD will launch two new Phenoms over the next few weeks, the 9700 at 2.4GHz and the 9900 at 2.6GHz, but Intel isn't resting on its laurels either. New Core 2 Quads, based on a more efficient 45nm process, will be available at around the same time, and we expect the Q9300 (which runs at 2.5GHz) to cost around £160-£170 and be much quicker than the Phenom 9600. Unless AMD drops its prices and the performance of the faster models is noticeably better than that of the 9600, Intel's processors will still be better value.