Review Consensus: AMD FX Processor 8150 Underwhelming

[btarunr]

It's been in the works for over three years now. That's right, the first we heard of "Bulldozer" as a processor architecture under development was shortly after the launch of "Barcelona" K10 architecture. Granted, it wasn't possible to load close to 2 billion transistors on the silicon fab technology AMD had at the time, but AMD had a clear window over the last year to at least paper-launch the AMD FX. Delays and bad marketing may have cost AMD dearly in shaping up the product for the market.

After drawing a consensus from about 25 reviews (links in Today's Reviews on the front page), it emerges that:

• AMD FX-8150 is missing its performance expectations by a fair margin. Not to mention performance gains in its own presentation, these expectations were built up by how AMD was shaping the product to be a full-fledged enthusiast product with significant performance gains over the previous generation
• AMD ill-marketed the FX-8150. Hype is a double-edged sword, and should not be used if you're not confident your offering will live up to at least most of the hype. AMD marketed at least the top-tier FX-8000 series eight-core processors as the second coming of Athlon64 FX.

• FX-8150 launch isn't backed up by launch of other AMD FX processors. This could go on to become a blunder. The presence of other FX series processors such as the FX-8120, six-core and four-core FX processors could have at least made the price performance charts look better, given that all FX processors are unlocked, buyers could see the value in buying them to overclock. TweakTown took a closer look into this.
• There are no significant clock-for-clock improvements over even AMD's own previous generation. The FX-8150 drags its feet behind the Phenom II X6 1100T in single-threaded math benchmarks such as Super/HyperPi, the picture isn't any better with Cinebench single-threaded, either.
• Multi-threaded data streaming applications such as data compression (WINRAR, 7-ZIP) reveal the FX-8150 to catch up with competition from even the Core i7-2600K. This trend keeps up with popular video encoding benchmarks such as Handbrake and x264 HD.
• Load power draw is bad, by today's standards. It's not like AMD is lagging behind in silicon fabrication technologies, or the engineering potential that turned around AMD Radeon power consumption figures over generations.
• Price could be a major saving grace. In the end, AMD FX 8150 has an acceptable price-performance figure. At just $25 over the Core i5-2500K, the FX-8150 offers a good performance lead.
• Impressive overclocking potential. We weren't exactly in awe when AMD announced its Guinness Record-breaking overclocking feat, but reviewers across the board have noticed fairly good overclocking potential and performance scaling.

In all, AMD FX-8150 has almost become another example to cite at a marketing class, of how to effectively handle hype. It is sure to underwhelm some. If it's any compensation, Duke Nukem Forever is still the most underwhelming development this year for the gamer-overclocker community.

[random]

Well at least the price is right, although I did expect more from Bulldozer.. turns out it was just a toy truck to intel after all. :/

[Kantastic]

Originally Posted by random

Well at least the price is right, although I did expect more from Bulldozer.. turns out it was just a toy truck to intel after all. :/

IMO the price is a little off. I'd be hard pressed to pay more than $200 for the 8150 model. If anything, the long-term overclocked power draw will bump the cost up a chunk.

[random]

Originally Posted by Kantastic

IMO the price is a little off. I'd be hard pressed to pay more than $200 for the 8150 model. If anything, the long-term overclocked power draw will bump the cost up a chunk.

Judging from the Guru3D reviews, at 4.6ghz the 8150FX barely beats the 2600k at stock in 3Dmark06 by 300ish points and at the same time consumes almost triple the power.


8150FX - 586w consumption at 4.8ghz

2600k - 313w at 5ghz

......imo these are very bloody poor results, I have no idea how the market works but I just hope Intel won't decide to hike up their prices with their upcoming Ivy.

[xenocide]

Originally Posted by random

......imo these are very bloody poor results, I have no idea how the market works but I just hope Intel won't decide to hike up their prices.

Why on Earth would they? They will sell 3x as many CPU's at the current price point as they would if they raised their price. If anything, they could stand to lower the cost a tad bit and out value BD while outperforming it. Let's not forget that SB has been out since February, so anyone who wanted this level of performance could have already had it for almost a year.

[afw]

I was hoping that the performance might be equal to 2600k or better ... so that I can start my First AMD build ... now I'll just have to go ahead and buy the 2600k or wait and go for the 2700k ...

Better luck next time AMD ...

[entropy13]

[(FIH) The Don]

atleast it doesnt cost around 1000$ as the last gen FX, but meh, this is REALLY bad for business AMD, you just shot yourself in the foot.

yeah call me fanboi, i stick with my 2600K

[xenocide]

Originally Posted by (FIH) The Don

atleast it doesnt cost around 1000$ as the last gen FX, but meh, this is REALLY bad for business AMD, you just shot yourself in the foot.

yeah call me fanboi, i stick with my 2600K

At least when they had $1000 CPU's they were top notch by a long shot. These are middle of the pack and even priced questionably considering their current offerings...

[Hustler]

Underwhelming....????

please, it's an utter turd.

[Yellow&Nerdy?]

They might as well have called it Phenom III...

[bbmarley]

Originally Posted by entropy13

http://i47.tinypic.com/2vnhzra.gif

lol how long have you been saving that for

[Bjorn_Of_Iceland]

Probly would fix it right on its revision..but man.. it suck indeed.

[the54thvoid]

Originally Posted by bbmarley

lol how long have you been saving that for

It doesn't matter, it's funny.

[entropy13]

Originally Posted by bbmarley

lol how long have you been saving that for

I got it from another user who posted it in a thread in [H]ardocp's forum. What's your point?

[mtosev]

AMD did it again but I was expecting that it will be slower than Intel's top of the line CPUs.

[caleb]

Such summaries should be done at the end of product review done here on TPU. I don't see any value added by that kind of product summary. Specially before even a review here is done.

[RejZoR]

AMD's main segment right now are low and mid end APU's. Maybe they can't beat Intel at highest end but then again they don't have any competition in those lower segments where users expect low price and high performance even for gaming. Which AMD APU's can deliver.

And even if the higher end CPU's aren't as fast, if the price is good, it doesn't really matter.

[DigitalUK]

those benchmarks are really strange. 1 minute the bulldozer goes head to head with intel on really heavy workloads then on lighter stuff seems to fall over. also the intel cpu's seem to always be given the advantage eg higher memory speeds for i7 etc. it also used 1333 and 1600 memory , i thought bulldozer was surposed to use 1866.

[the54thvoid]

Originally Posted by DigitalUK

those benchmarks are really strange. 1 minute the bulldozer goes head to head with intel on really heavy workloads

Good versus a 4 core in highly threaded tasks. Sort of it's design focus

Originally Posted by DigitalUK

then on lighter stuff seems to fall over.

Has sub Phenom per core performance, so light tasks are worse.

Very Good performance charts here:

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...review-20.html

[1c3d0g]

Originally Posted by caleb

Such summaries should be done at the end of product review done here on TPU. I don't see any value added by that kind of product summary. Specially before even a review here is done.

I disagree.

What?!? Are you mad that TPU has published the facts? This "bulldozer" sucks, period! Poor performance, extremely power-hungry, not competitive price-wise, I mean, who the hell in their right mind would purchase such a piss-poor product?!? LMAO...

[Pap1er]

Originally Posted by entropy13

http://i47.tinypic.com/2vnhzra.gif

I almost started to cry after viewing this image...
This is exactly how would I express customers slap over AMD face xD xD xD

[NdMk2o1o]

Bemusing how the Phenom II x6 can beat it in some tests, surely it should be better all round than PII as it's a new architecture so even if BD can't best SB it SHOULD be better than their last generation, no???

[PaNiC]

the funny thing is amd would have got more proformace if they just did a 32nm die skrink on the thuban

[Frick]

Originally Posted by NdMk2o1o

Bemusing how the Phenom II x6 can beat it in some tests, surely it should be better all round than PII as it's a new architecture so even if BD can't best SB it SHOULD be better than their last generation, no???

That is dissapointing aye, but on the other hand it's on par with 2500k and even 2600k in heavily threaded stuff. Some users will be happy.