| AMD Phenom-II X4-965 BE 125W CPU HDZ965FBK4DGM |  |
| Reviews - Featured Reviews: Processors | |
| Written by Olin Coles | |
| Wednesday, 04 November 2009 | |
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Closer Look: Phenom-II X4-965 BEThe latest series of processor from AMD offer a large 1.47 x 1.47" (37.31 x 37.31mm) integrated heat-spreader surface, which helps dissipate all 125W maximum TDP that the Phenom-II X4-965BE CPU is capable of producing. Compared to Intel's latest Core i5 series, as well as the older Core 2 Duo/Quad processors which measure 28.5 x 28.5mm, the Phenom-II AM3 processor offers 71% more contact surface area. If you compare the latest Intel Core i7 processors which measure 32 x 35mm, then the Phenom-II series still offers 24% more contact surface area. For overclockers, this means a much larger area to cool, but also much more manageable core temperatures.
The AMD Phenom-II X4-965 Black Edition processor (HDZ965FBK4DGM) is specified as having a 0.825-1.4V nominal voltage, and uses the 45nm (.045-micron) DSL Silicon on Insulator (SOI) process technology construction. AMD's 125W X4-965 is a socket AM3 938-pin organic micro pin grid array (micro-PGA) processor by design, with backwards compatibility to the AMD2+ socket. There's also "Heavy" load support for DDR3-1333, and with proper BIOS implementation the memory controller will now support up to 4x DDR3 DIMMs at 1333MHz.
The Phenom-II X4-965 BE processor offers a total cache of 8.5MB, split into three levels. The L1 cache delivers 64K of L1 instruction and 64K of L1 data cache per core (512KB total L1 per processor), while the L2 cache offers 512KB of data cache per core (2MB total L2 per processor). The final level 3 (L3) cache shares 6MB among the four processor cores.
Based on the updated 125W TDP architecture, increased cache size, and a larger IHS footprint, this 'Black Edition' Phenom-II may be exactly what hardware enthusiasts and overclockers need during an economic recession. In the following sections, Benchmark Reviews tests the 125W Phenom-II X4-965 directly against the Intel Core i5-750 to illustrate value, while also comparing performance against the original 140W AMD Phenom-II X4-965 BE. While benchmarks help separate the products, real-world experience and gaming frame rates paired with affordable product pricing will ultimately decide which CPU is really 'better'.
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Comments
Even if they both used the exact same memory kit for each system, the Intel i5 would still have the advantage of an integrated multimedia controller directly on the CPU.