Test notes
Please note that several of our test CPUs are actually underclocked versions of other products. Specifically, the Pentium 4 model 540 and 550 entries are actually our Pentium 4 560 3.6GHz engineering sample, which came with an unlocked multiplier for testing at different speeds, running at 3.2 and 3.4GHz, respectively. Similarly, the 130nm version of the Athlon 64 3500+ is a down-clocked Athlon 64 3800+, and our Athlon 64 3200+ results were achieved by testing the 90nm Athlon 64 3500+ at 2.0GHz. For most intents and purposes, save perhaps for our power consumption tests, these underclocked processors should perform just like the real McCoys.

Our testing methods
As ever, we did our best to deliver clean benchmark numbers. Tests were run at least twice, and the results were averaged.

Our test systems were configured like so:

All tests on the Intel systems were run with Hyper-Threading enabled.

Thanks to OCZ for providing us with memory for our testing. If you're looking to tweak out your system to the max and maybe overclock it a little, OCZ's RAM is definitely worth considering.

The test systems' Windows desktops were set at 1152x864 in 32-bit color at an 85Hz screen refresh rate. Vertical refresh sync (vsync) was disabled for all tests.

We used the following versions of our test applications:

• Cachemem 2.65MMX
• SiSoft Sandra 2004 SP2.b
• Compiled binary of C Linpack port from Ace's Hardware
• DOOM 3 with trdelta1 demo
• Far Cry 1.2 with tr3-pier demo
• Counter-Strike Source with trdemo1
• Unreal Tournament 2004 v3323 with trdemo1
• 3DMark05 v110
• Sphinx 3.3
• LAME 3.96.1 (build from mitiok.cjb.net)
• Xmpeg 5.0.3 with DivX Video 5.21
• Cinebench 2003
• POV-Ray for Windows 3.6
• ScienceMark 2.0 beta (23SEP03 build)
• picCOLOR v4.0 build 479
• WorldBench 5.0

The tests and methods we employ are generally publicly available and reproducible. If you have questions about our methods, hit our forums to talk with us about them.