AMD Phenom II 810, 805, 720 & 710 AM3 CPUs

February 11, 2009 | 08:57

Tags: #2 #45nm #710 #720 #805 #810 #am2 #am3 #benchmark #consumption #cpu #crysis #ddr3 #efficiency #ii #performance #phenom #power #result #review #x3 #x4

Companies: #amd #test

Power Consumption

When we test power consumption, we consider it as a whole platform so whether the CPU includes a memory controller or it's separate on the northbridge doesn't make a difference to what we measure at the wall and how much electricity is paid for. As always, we tested with all the power saving features enabled on the CPUs specifically.

While it's difficult to compare the motherboards in an apples to apples scenario, none of the motherboards used feature specific power regulation for the CPU phases and all of them are performance parts from DFI, Intel, MSI or Gigabyte.

Idle Power Consumption

Power at wall socket. BIOS Defaults, all onboard hardware enabled. Windows Desktop Idle

  • AMD Phenom II X4 940 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 920 (4x2.8GHz, 45nm C3)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 710 (3x2.6GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 810 (4x2.6GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 720 BE (3x2.8GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 805 (4x2.5GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Athlon X2 7750 (2x2.7GHz, 65nm B3)
  • Core i7 920 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm)
  • Core i7 940 (4x2.93GHz, 45nm)
  • Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm C1, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 45nm C1, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom X3 8750 (3x2.4GHz, 65nm B3)
  • AMD Phenom X4 9850 BE (4x2.5GHz, 65nm B3)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 720 BE (3x2.8GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 810 (4x2.6GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 710 (3x2.6GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 805 (4x2.5GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm C1, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 45nm C1 DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom X4 9950 BE (4x2.6GHz, 65nm B3)
  • Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 65nm G0, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 65nm G0, DDR3)
    • 98.0
    • 98.0
    • 100.0
    • 101.0
    • 101.0
    • 101.0
    • 103.0
    • 103.0
    • 103.0
    • 104.0
    • 107.0
    • 107.0
    • 107.0
    • 107.0
    • 108.0
    • 109.0
    • 109.0
    • 110.0
    • 110.0
    • 110.0
    • 110.0
    • 113.0
    • 113.0
    • 113.0
    • 114.0
    • 115.0
    • 115.0
    • 130.0
    • 133.0
0
25
50
75
100
125
150
Watts (lower is better) - Average Reading
  • Idle

Load Power Consumption

Power at wall socket. BIOS Defaults, all onboard hardware enabled. Prime95 Load

  • Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • AMD Athlon X2 7750 (2x2.7GHz, 65nm B3)
  • Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 710 (3x2.6GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 805 (4x2.5GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 720 BE (3x2.8GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 710 (3x2.6GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 810 (4x2.6GHz, 2.0GHz HTT, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X3 720 BE (3x2.8GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 805 (4x2.5GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm C1, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm C1, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 45nm C1, DDR2)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 45nm C1, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 810 (4x2.6GHz, 45nm C2, DDR3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom X3 8750 (3x2.4GHz, 65nm B3)
  • Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm C0, DDR2)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 920 (4x2.8GHz, 45nm C3)
  • Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm C0, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom II X4 940 (4x3.0GHz, 45nm C3)
  • Core i7 920 (4x2.66GHz, 45nm)
  • Core i7 940 (4x2.93GHz, 45nm)
  • Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 65nm G0, DDR3)
  • AMD Phenom X4 9850 BE (4x2.5GHz, 65nm B3)
  • Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 65nm G0, DDR2)
  • Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, 45nm)
  • AMD Phenom X4 9950 BE (4x2.6GHz, 65nm B3)
    • 142.0
    • 147.0
    • 152.0
    • 160.0
    • 163.0
    • 164.0
    • 165.0
    • 166.0
    • 167.0
    • 173.0
    • 175.0
    • 177.0
    • 178.0
    • 179.0
    • 179.0
    • 179.0
    • 180.0
    • 183.0
    • 184.0
    • 186.0
    • 186.0
    • 187.0
    • 196.0
    • 211.0
    • 215.0
    • 231.0
    • 240.0
    • 247.0
    • 284.0
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
Watts (lower is better) - Average Reading
  • Load

This pretty much seals the deal as far as we're concerned. True, it could be down to the motherboard and memory differences rather than CPU itself, but both the MSI AM2+ and Gigabyte AM3 boards are enthusiast class with plenty of features so at the wall this is the price you pay and the cost of running is higher with DDR3 memory. At idle, it's a solid 10W for every CPU and under load it's also higher by several watts as well (especially for the quad-cores).

Comparatively, AMD has an energy efficient setup compared to Intel's Core 2 Quads in particular for the most part or, at least competitive in the price-performance stakes. The triple-cores don't drop the power level that much, but a single core is less of an impact when there's a large L3 cache to feed as well.
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