April 4, 201115 yr Which is the cheapest AMD chip has the same (or better) processing power as the i3? Thanks, David EDIT: I'm considering the AMD Phenom II X2 555. It performs well on video encoding tasks.
April 4, 201115 yr Using the i3 540 as a benchmark for pricing and performance ($120 in Canada, and scores a 2847 on cpumark http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html), here's a sample: i3 540 Price: $120 Score: 2847 Watts: 73w (but idles very low in unRaid, according to numerous posts) x4 600e Price: $85 Score: 2601 Watts: 45w x3 455 Price: $95 Score: 2828 Watts: 95w x4 630 Price: $90 Score: 3251 Watts: 95w x4 920 Price: $100 Score: 3307 Watts: 125w x4 640 Price: $100 Score: 3756 Watts: 95w Keep in mind wattage varies greatly. The i3 is an efficient processor (especially at idle), so if you want almost the same power efficiency as well as performance, you're limited to the x4 600e. If wattage isn't important, there's a bunch of x3 and x4 processors that are cheaper and more powerful, but use more juice... And this was just a quick sample, there could be other cpus out there that are a better fit .
April 9, 201115 yr Keep in mind: for video encoding, real cores are better than hyper threaded cores. My x3 720 outperforms my i3 540 by about 10-25% on encoding tasks. There tends to be more of a difference on more difficult encodes (e.g. high def/high bitrate). And that's with 3 real cores vs. 2 hyperthreaded cores. I imagine AMD's newer offerings with four cores will do even better. The 600e is particularly intriguing for the low power consumption, but the price to performance vs. wattage champ appears to be the 640.
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