AMD Launches Phenom II X4 940 and 920

The company's fastest processors to date


After much anticipation and a series of leaked details running on the Internet, the Sunnyvale, California-based chip maker has finally seen it fit to officially introduce its next generation of desktop computer processors. Designed on a 45nm process technology, the new desktop-tailored CPUs have been dubbed Phenom II, coming as an evolved product, when compared to the company's first Phenom processors. With the launch, AMD announced two new processor models, namely the Phenom II X4 920 and what is now the company's flagship model, the Phenom II X4 940. Both processors boast a quad-core architecture and, despite their design similarities with Intel's Core i7, these new CPUs will be priced lower than $300.

The technical specifications on these new processors are pretty much what has been rumored for a good time now. Boasting a 45nm process technology, the Phenom II comes as the first AMD consumer processor based on a manufacturing technology that Intel's CPUs have benefited from for a while now. The Phenom II processors have a higher 6MB L3 cache, compared to the first generation, which only provided a 2MB cache size. The L2 and L1 cache size is similar to that of the 65nm Phenoms, namely 512KB per core and 64K+64K per core, respectively. There are 758M transistors on the new Phenoms while the maximum TDP is rated at 125W.

Additional features include support for a series of instructions, such as MMX 3DNow!, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSE 4a. As far as specific technical details go, the Phenom II X4 920, the lowest performance and cheapest (at the moment) Phenom II processor, will provide its users with a clock speed of 2.8GHz. The higher-clocked X4 940, also dubbed the Black Edition, is expected to come with a core speed of 3.0GHz. What is more impressive about the new Phenoms is that, according to AMD, they will be capable of providing an overclocking capability that will allow them to exploit frequencies in the 6GHz area, using extreme cooling solutions.

This next-generation of Phenom processors will be priced at $235 and $275 for the X4 920 and X4 940, respectively. The expected price point is even more impressive when compared to that of Intel's latest, high-performance CPU, the Core i7, codenamed Nehalem. Also, due to their support for both AM3 and AM2+ sockets, the new 45nm-based quad core CPUs from AMD will make up for an excellent upgrading choice, for all AMD users that up until now could only go with the first generation of Phenom processors.

A series of reviews have already made their way on the Internet, providing crucial info on the performance capabilities of the new Phenoms, which have, unfortunately, failed to rise to those of Intel's Core i7. Nevertheless, the Phenom II is regarded as a considerable leap forward, offering users what the first Phenom processors could have provided. The Phenom II would be a much better competitor for some of Intel's Core 2 Quad processors, which still take advantage of the company's old CPU architecture.