WorldBench
WorldBench's overall score is a pretty decent indication of general-use performance for desktop computers. This benchmark uses scripting to step through a series of tasks in common Windows applications and then produces an overall score for comparison. WorldBench also records individual results for its component application tests, allowing us to compare performance in each. We'll look at the overall score, and then we'll show individual application results alongside the results from some of our own application tests.

Already, we see some of the same trends as in our past articles. The cheapest offerings—AMD's Athlon X2 5600+ and Intel's Core 2 Duo E7200—score highest on our performance-per-dollar chart, while the outrageously expensive Core 2 Extreme QX9775 two-way setup delivers the least bang for your buck.

The scatter plot helps bring the performance question into perspective. The Core 2 Duo E7200 and Core 2 Duo E8400 fare better than alternatives at similar price points, and the Athlon 64 X2 5600+ doesn't look so hot. Quad-core chips don't look especially attractive here, either, which isn't surprising considering that few WorldBench tests take advantage of more than two cores.

We should probably take a minute to say something about AMD. As you can see in the scatter plot, all of the AMD chips are clumped together below the Intel offerings. The differences in performance between the two aren't huge—remember that we cropped our Y axes to make the results readable—but AMD's offerings don't perform as well in WorldBench's application suite overall.

Productivity and general use software

MS Office productivity

The AMD CPUs do well in Microsoft Office. Our value chart and scatter plot both show the Athlon X2 5600+ beating out the Core 2 Duo E7200, and the Athlon 64 X2 6000+ and 6400+ rival the Core 2 Quad Q9300 and Core 2 Duo E8500. However, a look at the Y axis and our performance chart suggests that the Office test isn't particularly CPU-bound, making for relatively small differences in actual performance.

Firefox web browsing

The picture is a little more mixed in Firefox, where the E7200 gets back at the 5600+ and the E8400 steps all over the 6400+. Because Firefox doesn't seem to have much use for more than a couple of CPU threads, Phenoms and Core 2 Quads don't really shine.