AMD Phenom-II X2-560BE Callisto Processor Review

With the release of the Deneb based quad core processors known as the Phenom II series, AMD started to grab a nice share of the mid-range and higher market share by offering quad-core processors for quite a bit less than the competition. Back in June of 2009, Benchmark Reviews was there when AMD started a new trend with Deneb based processors that didn't quite meet the rigorous standards of testing on all four cores. Rather than tossing the processors that had two or three cores that still functioned perfectly, AMD decided to turn off the bad cores and release them as much less expensive dual and triple-core processors. The dual-core versions got a couple of extra perks as well. For one, the price was enticing at $99. For another, the processors were Black Editions, meaning they had unlocked multipliers for easier overclocking. The first black edition dual-core Phenom-II to hit the market was the X2-550BE. Just over a year later and 200MHz faster, AMD is releasing the Phenom-II X2-560BE at 3.3GHz with the same promise, to give would-be overclockers and enthusiasts the opportunity to toy around without spending a bundle. In this article, Benchmark Reviews is bringing you the details on the X2-560BE (model HDZ560WFGMBOX). The new dual-core's unlocked multiplier will be pushed to the limit and we will see how it measures up to the competition.

According to the August Steam Hardware Survey, more than half of gamers use a dual-core processor in their systems. While quad-core processing is on the rise, it still represents only about a quarter of gamers. That's may have something to do with the fact that still few programs, including games, utilize more than one or two cores effectively. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is the latest release of Phenom-II series dual-core processors made specifically for overclocking. The Black Edition versions of AMD CPUs are released with unlocked multipliers so that overclocking is as easy as a couple of quick changes to the BIOS.

The release of Black Edition CPUs from AMD and Extreme Edition CPUs from Intel marks a change in the way the CPU manufacturers have done business for the last little while. Originally, most processors came without a lock on the multiplier and PC enthusiasts were left to their own designs when it came to overclocking. Soon, both chip manufacturers became to clamp down on the freedoms provided to their customers and overclocking became something that took a lot of work. Motherboard manufacturers have often tried to provided users ways of getting around the overclock killers put on CPUs. This once meant that changing jumper settings on motherboard in order to increase bus speeds or voltage was the way to do things. Now, even without unlocked CPUs, many motherboard manufactures have begun putting new features into their BIOS that allow for easy increases in bus speed and core CPU voltage.

The Black Edition CPUs with unlocked multipliers make overclocking easier than ever. All a user needs to do to overclock their system now is enter the bios and change the standard multiplier on their CPU and increase it. To find the best possible stable overclock, some tweaking of the CPU voltage and bus speeds may be necessary, but for a quick and effective overclock, nothing beats the ease of a Black Edition (or Extreme Edition in the case of Intel CPUs) processor.

At Benchmark Reviews, we have already seen the incredible ability of Athlon-II and Phenom-II AMD processors to overclock. The CPUs are frequently able to reach clock speeds in excess of 20% faster than their stock speeds. With a black edition CPU like the Phenom-II X2-560BE, we expect no less and the CPU will be pushed to the limit in order to find its breaking point.

With each new release of a Phenom-II processor, AMD reasserts its control on the mid-level market segment by providing another great quality CPU at an affordable price. The release of the Phenom-II X2-560BE HDZ560WFGMBOX dual-core processor is no different. At 3.3GHz, the X2-560BE becomes the fastest Phenom-II dual-core processor on the market. Similar to previous Phenom-II dual-core entrants to the market, the Phenom-II X2-560BE will have a relatively low MSRP, this time of $105. Benchmark Reviews as been there for the release of many of the most recent Athlon-II and Phenom-II processors and we wouldn't miss the chance to bring you the test results on the latest Phenom-II Black Edition dual-core release. In this article, Benchmark Reviews compares the Phenom-II X2-560BE HDZ560WFGMBOX dual-core to a variety of other processors in a comparable price range, as well as some more expensive dual and quad-core processors.

With the August Steam Hardware Survey showing us that less than 6% of gamers are using DX11 compatible systems, we are taking this opportunity to bring you a review focused at discovering the performance increase, if any, of upgrading just one piece of equipment, your CPU. Many of the review articles I read make me feel as though the performance they offer are just too far out of reach because it will require nearly a complete system overhaul in order to see the increased levels of performance with the new equipment. Using a high-end DX10 video card in this review can help show the performance increase available for those of us who may need to upgrade just one piece at a time.

The Phenom-II X2-560BE HDZ560WFGMBOX in this review will be tested against many of the Athlon-II line of processors including the X4-640, X4-645 and two other Athlon-II processors, the X2-260 and the X3-445. This will give us a good overview of the scaling of dual, triple, and quad-core members of the Athlon-II family when compared to the Phenom-II dual-cores with an L3 cache. Results from recent tests of a couple of Intel Core i5 processors, the 655K and the 680, will be included to show performance across the platforms available. Finally, a Core i7-920 will round out our review, giving us a view of the relative high-end of quad core processing.

Let's move in and take a look at some of the features and specifications of the Phenom-II X2-560BE HDZ560WFGMBOX AM3 dual-core processor.

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by Advanced Micro Devices.

Phenom-II X2 AM3 Features

• Helps improve system performance and efficiency by directly connecting the processors, the memory controller, and the I/O to the CPU.
• Designed to enable simultaneous 32- and 64-bit computing
• Integrated Memory Controller
  • Benefits: Increases application performance by dramatically reducing memory latency
  • Scales memory bandwidth and performance to match compute needs
  • HyperTransport Technology provides up to 16.0GB/s peak bandwidth per processor-reducing I/O bottlenecks
  • Up to 37GB/s total delivered processor-to-system bandwidth (HyperTransport bus + memory bus)

AMD Balanced Smart Cache

• Shared L3 cache (either 6MB or 4MB)

• 512K L2 cache per core

  • Benefit: Shortened access times to the highly accessed data for better performance.

AMD Wide Floating Point Accelerator

• 128-bit floating point unit (FPU)

• High performance (128bit internal data path) floating point unit per core.

  • Benefit: Larger data paths and quicker floating point calculations for better performance.

HyperTransport Technology

• One 16-bit link at up to 4000MT/s
• Up to 8.0GB/s HyperTransport I/O bandwidth; Up to 16GB/s in HyperTransport Generation 3.0 mode

• Up to 37GB/s total delivered processor-to-system bandwidth (HyperTransport bus + memory bus)

  • Benefit: Quick access times to system I/O for better performance.

Integrated DRAM Controller with AMD Memory Optimizer Technology

• A high-bandwidth, low-latency integrated memory controller
• Supports PC2-8500 (DDR2-1066); PC2-6400 (DDR2-800), PC2-5300 (DDR2-667), PC2-4200 (DDR2-533) or PC2-3200 (DDR2-400) SDRAM unbuffered DIMMs - AM2+
• Support for unregistered DIMMs up to PC2 8500(DDR2-1066MHz) and PC3 10600 (DDR3-1333MHz) - AM3

• Up to 17.1GB/s memory bandwidth for DDR2 and up to 21GB/s memory bandwidth for DDR3

  • Benefit: Quick access to system memory for better performance.

AMD Virtualization (AMD-V) Technology With Rapid Virtualization Indexing

• Silicon feature-set enhancements designed to improve the performance, reliability, and security of existing and future virtualization environments by allowing virtualized applications with direct and rapid access to their allocated memory.

  • Benefit: Helps virtualization software to run more securely and efficiently enabling a better experience when dealing with virtual systems

AMD PowerNow! Technology (Cool'n'Quiet Technology)

• Enhanced power management features which automatically and instantaneously adjusts performance states and features based on processor performance requirements

• For quieter operation and reduced power requirements

  • Benefit: Enables cooler and quieter platform designs by providing extremely efficient performance and energy usage.

AMD CoolCore Technology

• Reduces processor energy consumption by turning off unused parts of the processor. For example, the memory controller can turn off the write logic when reading from memory, helping reduce system power.
• Works automatically without the need for drivers or BIOS enablement.

• Power can be switched on or off within a single clock cycle, saving energy with no impact to performance.

  • Benefit: Helps users get more efficient performance by dynamically activating or turning off parts of the processor.

Dual Dynamic Power Management

• Enables more granular power management capabilities to reduce processor energy consumption.

• Separate power planes for cores and memory controller, for optimum power consumption and performance, creating more opportunities for power savings within the cores and memory controller.

  • Benefit: Helps improve platform efficiency by providing on demand memory performance while still allowing for decreased system power consumption

HDZ560WFGMBOX Specifications

• Model Number & Core Frequency: X2-560 / 3.3GHz
• OPN# HDZ560WFGMBOX
• L1 Cache Sizes: 64K of L1 instruction and 64K of L1 data cache per core (256KB total L1 per processor)
• L2 Cache Sizes: 512KB of L2 data cache per core (1MB total L2 per processor)
• L3 Cache Size: 6MB (shared)
• Total Cache (L2+L3): 7MB
• Memory Controller Type: Integrated 128-bit wide memory controller *
• Memory Controller Speed: Up to 2.0GHz with Dual Dynamic Power Management
• Types of Memory Supported: Support for unregistered DIMMs up to PC2-8500 (DDR2-1066MHz) -AND- PC3-10600 (DDR3-1333MHz)
• HyperTransport 3.0 Specification: One 16-bit/16-bit link @ up to 4.0GHz full duplex (2.0GHz x2)
• Total Processor-to-System Bandwidth: Up to 37.3 GB/s bandwidth [Up to 21.3 GB/s total bandwidth (DDR3-1333) + 16.0GB/s (HT3)]
• Packaging: Socket AM3 938-pin organic micro pin grid array (micro-PGA)
• Fab location: GLOBALFOUNDRIES Fab 1 Module 1 in Dresden, Germany (formerly AMD Fab 36)
• Process Technology: 45-nanometer DSL SOI (silicon-on-insulator) technology
• Approximate Die Size: 258mm2
• Approximate Transistor count: ~758 million
• Max TDP: 80 Watts
• AMD Codename: "Calisto"
• MSRP: $99

  *Note: configurable for dual 64-bit channels for simultaneous read/writes

Information on the Features and Specifications comes from AMD.

Closer Look: Phenom-II X2-560BE

Let's get in close for a look at the new Phenom-II X2-560BE. The X2-560BE, like most Phenom processors, is built on the Deneb die. The Deneb die is a native quad-core die used for the Phenom-II chips and is 258mm2. It's built on a 45nm process and has around 758 million transistors. The TDP (thermal design power/point) of the Phenom-II X2-560BE is 80 Watts. Just to be clear here, the TDP isn't the amount of power the CPU is capable of pulling. It is the maximum amount of power dissipated by the processor under normal circumstances. It isn't the max amount of power that the processor can consume, as overclocking and other circumstances might cause the CPU to draw more power that it's TDP. The Phenom-II dual-core is codenamed Calisto.

AMD has been making the Phenom-II processors for quite a while now. Global Foundries, the chip manufacturer, has gotten better and better and making these chips so that they don't have many errors. With this higher yield comes more stability in the processors and an overall higher quality chip. Since the inception of the Phenom-II and Athlon-II chips, AMD has consistently released new CPUs that are just higher clocked versions of the older chips they are replacing. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is 100MHz faster than the Phenom-II X2-555BE.

A couple of things about the way AMD operates makes the Phenom-II X2-560BE and all Athlon-II and even dual and triple-core Phenom-II processors quite interesting to toy around with. AMD isn't very keen on throwing away processor. Because of this, if one section of the processor fails testing, AMD will use the good parts of the processor and re-sell it as a lower model. As I mentioned, the Phenom-II, codenamed Calisto, is built on the Deneb die, which is a native quad-core die. While this usually happens because one or two of the four cores didn't withstand the quality assurance testing it was put through, occasionally a chip's disabled cores will operate just fine. In the 700 series AMD motherboard southbridge chipsets, there was a feature called advanced clock calibration that could potentially unlock undamaged disabled cores. In the 800 series chipsets this feature was disabled, but many motherboard manufactures came up with their own ways of unlocking the cores. ASUS 800 series motherboards may come with a switch on the board that will allow for core unlocking, Biostar added a feature it calls Core UnlocKING into it's bios, and ASRock has a feature called UCC (Unlock CPU Cores) that it has with it's 800 series motherboards.

The chances here with the Phenom-II X2-560BE are slightly better than that of Athlon-II chips that it will have the ability to unlock anything. As we talked about earlier, AMD is having better yields with their processors recently, which severely cuts down the chances that many processors are made and distributed with bad cores. That helps increase the chances that an X3 processor or even an X2 might have unlockable cores, but only slightly. Regardless of the chances of success, we are enthusiasts here at Benchmark Reviews. Getting a CPU for testing and not trying to unlock it is just against our nature. Unfortunately, when I tried to unlock any hidden the disabled cores on the Phenom-II X2-560BE we received for testing, there was nothing there. The chip is a normal functioning dual-core processor built on the Deneb die with two disabled cores. Neither core was usable and I was met with a computer screen that flashed green and then by the entire computer shutting off when I tried to activate either one. I had to reset the CMOS before I was able to get the computer to even turn on again.

When released, the Phenom-II X2-560BE will be AMDs flagship Phenom-II dual-core processor and the fastest Phenom-II dual-core available at 3.3GHz. X2-560BE will support the same types and speeds of RAM as the X4-640 with DDR2 support at 1066MHz and DDR3 support at 1333MHz. Many RAM kits are now available at much higher speeds than this, but I wouldn't worry. In our test machine, we are using a 1600MHz DDR3 dual-channel kit, and it works just fine. For testing, I dropped the speed of the RAM to 1333MHz to match the RAM being used in the Core i7 test machine. The stock bus speed for the Phenom-II X2-560BE also stays the same, and matches all the other Athlon-II and Phenom-II chips at 200MHz with a 2000MHz HT Link speed. The memory controller on the Athlon-II X4-645 matches the HT Link speed at 2000MHz and can be configured as either one 128-bit channel or two 64-bit channels. Like the other AMD chips we have seen, the Phenom-II X2-560BE will come with full virtualization support through AMD-V technology. This won't affect most of us, but if you or your business needs to run Windows 7 in XP mode, this will come in handy.

In addition to overclocked, many readers have recently asked me about undervolting a CPU in order to make it as utility friendly as possible. Not much is getting cheaper these days, and the price of electricity is on the list of utilities that continue to increase in price and make our lives that much more stressful. When I CPU can run at stock speeds but on less voltage than it is set for, you will see a decrease in the amount of energy the processor uses. With the Phenom-II X2-560BE processor, I was able to set the voltage to 1.15v, down from a normal 1.4v, and run it stably at the stock speed of 3.3GHz. Check out our overclocking section at the end of the review to find a complete overview of how we overclocked the Phenom-II X2-560BE and how we got it to reach 4.1GHz.

Even without the possibility of unlocked cores, the Phenom-II X2-560BE still represents an excellent opportunity for us to have some fun. As a black edition processor, I have high expectations of the overclock ability of the Phenom-II X2-560BE from experimentation with previous Athlon-II series processors. Everything from the Athlon-II X2 chips up through the X4 chips have been able to get close to 4.0GHz with only air cooling, providing a sizeable increase in performance.

I started off overclocking the Phenom-II X2-560BE by gradually increasing the bus speed until I could no longer boot into Windows. Since the multiplier on the X2-560BE is unlocked and starts at x16.5, I started by increasing the multiplier by x.5 at a time. I made it to x21 while still being able to boot into Windows. At x21, the clock speed was 4.2GHz, but the Phenom-II X2-560BE failed the stress testing at this speed. I clocked the multiplier down just half a step to x20.5 making the clock speed 4.1GHz and the CPU withstood all of the stressing I put it through. To get it to 4.1GHz I had to increase the voltage to 1.6v. Before increasing the voltage, I attempted to get the CPU as high as I could without any extra voltage. I was able to get the Phenom-II X2-560BE to 3.9GHz with a multiplier of x19.5 without ever increasing the voltage. At that speed, the CPU also withstood all the stress testing I put it through. I tried to the get the Phenom-II X2-560BE even higher by increasing the bus speed and decreasing the multiplier, but the 4.1GHz I reached stock bus speed and an increased multiplier was the fasted I could get.

Testing and Results

Before I begin any benchmarking or overclocking, I thoroughly stress the CPU and memory by running Prime95 on all available cores for 12 hours. If no errors are found, I move on to a gaming stress test. To do this, I use Prime95 again to stress the processor, while running an instance of FurMark's stability test on top of this. If the computer survives this test for 2 hours without lockup or corruption, I consider it to be stable and ready for overclocking. After achieving what I feel is stable overclock, I run to these tests again for certainty. The goal of this stress testing is to ensure the clock speeds and settings are stable before performing any benchmarks. I adopted this method from another writer here at Benchmark Reviews and it seems to do a great job of flushing out what only seem to be stable overclocks.

Once the hardware is prepared, we begin our testing. Each benchmark test program begins after a system restart, and the very first result for every test will be ignored since it often only caches the test. This process proves extremely important in the many gaming benchmarks, as the first run serves to cache maps allowing subsequent tests to perform much better than the first. Each test is completed five times, with the average results displayed in our article.

In this review, we will be comparing the performance of the Athlon-II X4-640 against two other Athlon-II processors, the X2-260 and the X3-445. These processors run at very similar clock speeds to the Athlon-II X4-640. We have overclocked the X2-260 from its original 3.2GHz to 3.8GHz, and we have also overclocked the Athlon-II X3-445 to 4.0GHz for the testing. In addition to these, we have tested an Intel Core i7 920 using almost all of the same test equipment, only changing the motherboard and RAM. All of the tests except for one set of the gaming tests were performed using the NVIDIA GTX 285 video card. This was to ensure that the performance of the CPU wasn't bottlenecked at any time by the GPU. The gaming tests were run using both the GTX 285 and the on-board Radeon HD 4290 video card.

Intel X58 Test Platform

• Processor: 2.66GHz Intel Core i7 920 Bloomfield/Nehalem BX80601920 ($280)
• Motherboard: MSI X58 Pro LGA1366 Intel X58 ATX
• System Memory: Kingston 6GB (3 x 2GB) KVR1333D3K3/6GR DDR3 1333MHz (PC3 10666) (CL7-7-7-20)
• Video: MSI N285GTX-T2D1G-OC NVIDIA GTX 285 1GB
• Disk Drive 1: OCZ Agility Series OCZSSD2-1AGT30G 30GB SSD
• Disk Drive: SEAGATE Barracuda ST31500341AS 1.5TB SATA
• Optical Drive: ASUS DRW-24B1ST DVD Burner
• PSU: Corsair CMPSU-850TX 850W
• Enclosure: NZXT GAMMA
• Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium x64

AMD Socket AM3 Test System

• Processor: 3.1GHz AMD Athlon-II X4-645 ADX645WFK42GM (MSRP $122)
• Processor: 3.3GHz AMD Phenom-II X2-560BE HDZ560WFGMBOX (MSRP $105)
• Processor: 3.0GHz AMD Athlon-II X4-640 ADX640WFK42GM (MSRP $99)
• Processor: 3.2GHz AMD Athlon-II X2-260 ADX260OCK23GM (MSRP $76)
• Processor: 3.1GHz AMD Athlon-II X3-445 ADX445WFK32GM (MSRP $87)
• Motherboard: ASUS M4A785TD-M EVO 785G Motherboard with 128MB Sideport Memory
• System Memory: 2x2GB Patriot Gamer Series DDR3 (1333MHz@7-7-7-21)
• Video: MSI N285GTX-T2D1G-OC NVIDIA GTX 285 1GB; Onboard ATI Radeon HD 4290
• Disk Drive 1: OCZ Agility Series OCZSSD2-1AGT30G 30GB SSD
• Disk Drive: SEAGATE Barracuda ST31500341AS 1.5TB SATA
• Optical Drive: ASUS DRW-24B1ST DVD Burner
• PSU: Corsair CMPSU-850TX 850W
• Enclosure: NZXT GAMMA
• Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium x64

Intel P55 Test Platform

• Processor: 3.2GHz Intel Core i5 655K Unlocked CPU
• Processor: 3.6GHz Intel Core i5 680 CPU
• Motherboard: ASUS Maximus III Formula P55 Motherboard
• System Memory: 2x2GB G.Skill ECO Series DDR3 (1333MHz @ 7-7-7-20)
• Video: Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB
• Disk Drive 1: OCZ Agility Series OCZSSD2-1AGT60G 60GB SSD
• Disk Drive 2: SEAGATE Barracuda 1TB SATA
• PSU: Antec Signature 850W
• Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate x64

Benchmark Applications

• EVEREST Ultimate Edition v5.50 by Lavalys
• Passmark PerformanceTest v7.0
• PCMark Vantage v1.0.2.0 by Futurmark Corporation
• SiSoft Sandra 2010.1.16.92
• Cinebench v11.5
• Resident Evil 5 Benchmark
• Devil May Cry 4 Benchmark
• Street Fighter 4 Benchmark

EVEREST Benchmark Tests

Lavalys EVEREST is an industry leading system diagnostics and benchmarking solution for enthusiasts PC users, based on the award-winning EVEREST Technology. During system optimizations and tweaking it provides essential system and overclock information, advanced hardware monitoring and diagnostics capabilities to check the effects of the applied settings. CPU, FPU and memory benchmarks are available to measure the actual system performance and compare it to previous states or other systems. Furthermore, complete software, operating system and security information makes EVEREST a comprehensive system diagnostics tool that offers a total of 100 pages of information about your PC.

All of the benchmarks used in our test bed rely on basic x86 instructions and consume very low system memory while also being aware of HyperThreading, multi-processors, and multi-core processors. While the EVEREST CPU tests really only compare the processor performance more than it measures platforms, it still offers a glimpse into what kind of power each platform possesses.

Queen and Photoworxx tests are synthetic benchmarks that operate the function many times and over-exaggerate by several magnitudes what the real-world performance would be like. The Queen benchmark focuses on the branch prediction capabilities and misprediction penalties of the CPU. It does this by finding possible solutions to the classic queen problem on a chessboard. At the same clock speed theoretically the processor with the shorter pipeline and smaller misprediction penalties will attain higher benchmark scores.

As a dual-core CPU in multicore tests, the Phenom-II X2-560BE CPU sits pretty much right where it should, just above the Athlon-II X2-260. It doesn't look like the L3 cache on the Phenom-II X2-560BE does much to increase it's performance. Compared to the two Intel dual-core CPUs, the Phenom-II X2-560BE doesn't really compete in the Queen test. Overclocked to 4.1GHz, the Phenom-II X2-560BE increases its score up to the point where it outperforms the triple core Athlon-II X3-445 and comes closer to the Intel dual-cores, but still falls short.

Like the Queen benchmark, the Photoworxx tests for penalties against pipeline architecture. The synthetic Photoworxx benchmark stresses the integer arithmetic and multiplication execution units of the CPU and also the memory subsystem. Due to the fact that this test performs high memory read/write traffic, it cannot effectively scale in situations where more than two processing threads are used. The EVEREST Photoworxx benchmark performs the following tasks on a very large RGB image:

• Fill
• Flip
• Rotate90R (rotate 90 degrees CW)
• Rotate90L (rotate 90 degrees CCW)
• Random (fill the image with random colored pixels)
• RGB2BW (color to black & white conversion)
• Difference
• Crop

In the Photoworxx test, a somewhat different story emerges. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is much closer to the score of the X3-445 and actually climbs ahead of the Intel Core i5-655K. When overclocked to 4.1GHz, the Phenom-II X2-560BE tops all of the Athlon-II CPUs, hinting that the L3 cache, or maybe just the raw speed at 4.1GHz is responsible for the increased performance.

The Zip Library test measures combined CPU and memory subsystem performance through the public ZLib compression library. ZLib is designed as a free lossless data compression library for use on virtually any computer hardware and operating system. The ZLib data format is itself portable across platforms and has a footprint independent of input data that can be reduced at some cost in compression.

In the ZLib integer test, the Phenom-II X2-560BE again comes out just ahead of the Athlon-II X2-260, the other dual-core AMD in our test bed. Similar to the Queen tests, the Phenom-II X2-560BE is still out performed by the other Athlon-II processors and all of the Intel processor. The Phenom-II X2-560BE manages to just edge ahead of the Core i5-655K when overclocked to 4.1GHz. Overall, for an MSRP of $105, the Phenom-II X2-560BE comes in about where it should with its unlocked multiplier and its L3 cache. It is somewhat disappointing, however, that it can't reach the performance of the $87 Athlon-II X3-445.

The AES integer benchmark measures CPU performance using AES data encryption. It utilizes Vincent Rijmen, Antoon Bosselaers and Paulo Barreto's public domain C code in ECB mode and consumes 48 MB of memory.

While I normally like to put both of the Everest integer performance tests on one graph, the Core i5 processors made that impossible this time. With the new Lynnfield series of processors, Intel made some major changes to the way their CPUs handle AES compression. This new processing is a boon to webmasters everywhere, as well as anyone who deals with compressed files on a regular basis. With that in mind, the two Core i5 processors completely destroy the competition in the AES test. The Phenom-II X2-560BE, while not competing in any way with the Core i5 processor, comes in again right between the Athlon-II X2 and X3 processors.

The floating point tests give us the same story for the Phenom-II X2-560BE CPU. The Athlon-II X2-260 falls just short of the Phenom-II X2-560BE and the Athlon-II X3-445 is just ahead. The Intel Core i5-655K, at nearly double the price of the Phenom-II X2-560BE, outperforms it in every test. The Phenom-II X2-560BE comes closest to the i5-655K in the 64-bit Mandel tests.

Passmark Performance Test

PassMark Performance Test is a PC hardware benchmark utility that allows a user to quickly assess the performance of their computer and compare it to a number of standard 'baseline' computer systems. The Passmark Performance Test CPU tests all benchmark the mathematical operations, compression, encryption, SSE, and 3DNow! instructions of modern processors.

In our tests there were several areas of concentration for each benchmark, which are combined into one compound score. This score is referred to as the CPU Mark, and is a composite of the following tests: Integer Math, Floating Point Math, Find Prime Numbers, SSE/3DNow!, Compression, Encryption, Image Rotation, and String Sorting. For this review, we've also decided to run the memory benchmark, which results in a composite score based on the following tests: small block allocation, cached read, uncached read, write performance, and large block allocation.

In the CPU test suite for Passmark, the Phenom-II X2-560BE continues its trend of sitting in between the Athlon-II dual and triple-core processors. As I mentioned, Passmark's newest version is tailored towards multi-core processors, so the situation of the Phenom-II X2-560BE isn't too surprising. When overclocked, the Phenom-II X2-560BE surpasses the triple-core Athlon-II X3-445. At both stock and overclocked speeds, the Phenom-II X2-560BE is no match for the much more expensive Intel dual-core processors.

PCMark Vantage Benchmark Tests

PCMark Vantage is an objective hardware performance benchmark tool for PCs running 32- and 64-bit versions of Microsoft Windows Vista or Windows 7. PCMark Vantage is well suited for benchmarking any type of Microsoft Windows Vista/7 PC: from multimedia home entertainment systems and laptops, to dedicated workstations and high-end gaming rigs. Benchmark Reviews has decided to use a few select tests from the suite to demonstrate simulated real-world processor usage in this article. Our tests were conducted on 64-bit Windows 7, with results displayed in the chart below.

TV and Movies Suite

• TV and Movies 1 (CPU=50%, RAM=2%, GPU=45%, SSD=3%)
  • Two simultaneous threads
  • Video transcoding: HD DVD to media server archive
  • Video playback: HD DVD w/ additional lower bitrate HD content from HDD, as downloaded from net
• TV and Movies 2 (CPU=50%, RAM=2%, GPU=45%, SSD=3%)
  • Two simultaneous threads
  • Video transcoding: HD DVD to media server archive
  • Video playback, HD MPEG-2: 19.39 Mbps terrestrial HDTV playback
• TV and Movies 3 (SSD=100%)
  • HDD Media Center
• TV and Movies 4 (CPU=50%, RAM=2%, GPU=45%, SSD=3%)
  • Video transcoding: media server archive to portable device
  • Video playback, HD MPEG-2: 48 Mbps Blu-ray playback

Gaming Suite*

• Gaming 1 (CPU=30%, GPU=70%)
  • GPU game test
• Gaming 2 (SSD=100%)
  • HDD: game HDD
• Gaming 3 (CPU=75%, RAM=5%, SSD=20%)
  • Two simultaneous threads
  • CPU game test
  • Data decompression: level loading
• Gaming 4 (CPU=42%, RAM=1%, GPU=24%, SSD=33%)
  • Three simultaneous threads
  • GPU game test
  • CPU game test
  • HDD: game HDD

Music Suite

• Music 1 (CPU=50%, RAM=3%, GPU=13%, SSD=34%)
  • Three simultaneous threads
  • Web page rendering - w/ music shop content
  • Audio transcoding: WAV -> WMA lossless
  • HDD: Adding music to Windows Media Player
• Music 2 (CPU=100%)
  • Audio transcoding: WAV -> WMA lossless
• Music 3 (CPU=100%)
  • Audio transcoding: MP3 -> WMA
• Music 4 (CPU=50%, SSD=50%)
  • Two simultaneous threads
  • Audio transcoding: WMA -> WMA
  • HDD: Adding music to Windows Media Player

* EDITOR'S NOTE: Hopefully our readers will carefully consider how relative PCMark Vantage is as "real-world" benchmark, since many of the tests rely on unrelated hardware components. For example, per the FutureMark PCMark Vantage White Paper document, Gaming test #2 weighs the storage device for 100% of the test score. In fact, according to PCMark Vantage the video card only impacts 23% of the total gaming score, but the CPU represents 37% of the final score. As our tests in this article (and many others) has already proven, gaming performance has a lot more to do with the GPU than the CPU, and especially more than the hard drive or SSD (which is worth 38% of the final gaming performance score).

The PCMark Vantage test results seem to favor slightly the Intel processors over the AMD processors, but after a quick price comparison, we can see why. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is scheduled to be released at an MSRP of $105, about $94 less than the i5-655K. Both the i5-680 and the i7-920 cost near $300, considerably more than the Phenom-II X2-560BE. In the TV and Movies tests, the Phenom-II X2-560BE comes in just above the Athlon-II X2-260 and below either of the Intel dual-cores. When overclocked, the Phenom-II X2-560BE comes within a few hundred points of the Intel Core i5-655K and nearly reaches the Athlon-II X3-445 triple-core processor as well.

The Gaming test suite is scaled a little differently where the Phenom-II X2-560BE is concerned. The Phenom-II X2-560BE actually beats the Athlon-II X3-445 in this section and comes closer to the i5-655K than before. When overclocked, the Phenom-II X2-560BE comes out ahead of the Athlon-II X4-640 and almost reacheds the X4-645. It would appear that the L3 cache on the Phenom-II X2-560BE must have something to do with the increased performance in the gaming suite, as all other computer components are identical between it and the other AMD processors.

The Music suite as well gives an advantage to the Phenom-II X2-560BE over the triple-core Athlon-II X3-445. While it still lags slightly behind, the Intel dual-cores, it appears that the L3 cache of the Phenom-II X2-560BE may once again be the culprit behind its better success in the music tests. When overclocked, the Phenom-II X2-560BE gets even better marks and once again outperforms a stock Athlon-II X4-640.

SiSoftware Sandra

SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. It should provide most of the information (including undocumented) you need to know about your hardware, software and other devices whether hardware or software.

It works along the lines of other Windows utilities, however it tries to go beyond them and show you more of what's really going on. Giving the user the ability to draw comparisons at both a high and low-level. You can get information about the CPU, chipset, video adapter, ports, printers, sound card, memory, network, Windows internals, AGP, PCI, PCI-X, PCIe (PCI Express), database, USB, USB2, 1394/Firewire, etc.

The SANDRA DhryStone and Whetstone tests are CPU tests that run completely within the CPU + cache memory itself. These tests are perfect for seeing general efficiency per processing core. Dhrystone is basically a suite of arithmetic and string manipulating programs and is an older CPU tests. Even so, it remains a simple and accurate way to show RAW CPU processing performance. The whetstone benchmark primarily measures floating-point arithmetic performance.

Once again, the Sandra test suite shows us the same trend that we have been noticing all along. The Phenom-II X2-560BE falls right between the dual and triple-core Athlon-II processors and the L3 cache doesn't seem to provide much of a difference. The Intel dual-core processors easily outperform the Phenom-II X2-560BE and are more closely paired to the Athlon-II quad-core processors. Again, this can be expected from a test suite that focuses on multi-core processing. Even older multi-core tests such as the Dhrystone tests show the preference for multiple cores over core speed. In fact, when overclocked to 4.1GHz, the Phenom-II X2-560BE loses ground for some reason on the Dhrystone tests.

The Whetstone tests are almost exactly like the Dhrystone tests in that the Phenom-II X2-560BE surpasses the Athlon-II dual-core, but not the triple-core or the Intel dual-core processors. The only real difference is that there is an increase in performance for the Phenom-II X2-560BE when it is overclocked.

Cinebench R11.5 Benchmarks

Maxon Cinebench is a real-world test suite that assesses the computer's performance capabilities. Cinebench is based on Maxon's award-winning animation software, Cinema 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation. Maxon software has been used in blockbuster movies such as Spider-Man, Star Wars, The Chronicles of Narnia and many more. Cinebench Release 11.5 includes the ability to more accurately test the industry's latest hardware, including systems with up to 64 processor threads and the testing environment better reflects the expectations of today's production demands. A more streamlined interface makes testing systems and reading results incredibly straightforward.

The Cinebench R11.5 test scenario uses all of a system's processing power to render a photorealistic 3D scene, "No Keyframes" the viral animation by AixSponza. This scene makes use of various algorithms to stress all available processor cores. The OpenGL graphics card testing procedure uses a complex 3D scene depicting a car chase with which the performance of your graphics card in OpenGL mode is measured. During the benchmark tests the graphics card is evaluated by way of displaying an intricate scene that includes complex geometry, high-resolution textures, and a variety of effects to evaluate the performance across a variety of real-world scenarios.

In the CPU Single Core tests, Cinebench focuses on a single thread of processing, so all of the AMD CPU scores are based nearly completely on their clock speeds. You can see this clearly from the results if you exclude the Core i5 processors. The Phenom-II X2-560BE at 3.3GHz sits just above all of the AMD CPUs and even above the Intel Core i7. The Athlon-II X2-260 at 3.2GHz is the closest comparable AMD CPU. When overclocked, the single-core tests show the Phenom-II X2-560BE at 4.1GHz topping the charts completely and even outperforming the more expensive Intel dual-core CPUsyou're your primary computing needs involve singl-core processing, the $105 Phenom-II X2-560BE could be the choice for you, as it provides a lot of clock speed for not a lot of money.

In the Multi-Core Cinebench test the Intel CPUs can take advantage of multi-threading so the Core i7's four cores turn into eight threads, giving it a much higher score than anything else in this test best. The Multi-Core test also shows the Phenom-II X2-560BE right where it should be, between the dual and triple-core AMD processors. The Core i5 dual-cores, with four threads each, easily outperform both the stock and overclocked Phenom-II X2-560BE.

Video Game Benchmarks

PC-based video games can depend heavily on the CPU if the attached GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) is less powerful, or the graphics settings are configured so low that they create no strain on the video card and rely purely system processing speed; a phenomenon known as CPU-dependence. The opposite is true when the video game has a powerful video card installed, and can handle all graphical demands without receiving assistance from the CPU. It may seem unlikely that someone spending enough money to buy a top-of-the-line graphics card would settle for the Athlon-II X4-645 as their gaming processor because of its lack of L3 cache and its entry level price. However, I recently put together a system with my brother, an avid PC gamer who opted to save money on the CPU and go for a higher end video card simply because of the vast amounts of proof that the CPU adds little to a game. Also, with the recent release of Intel's GTX460 and GTS450, high quality gaming graphics are beginning to be available to casual gamers and users. Since the GTX460 competes directly with the GTX285 used in our test bed and at a cost of $50 to $80 less expensive, it is appropriate that we test our games here with that caliber of GPU even while are CPU test bed is relatively low-priced.

For the Gaming Benchmarks we have limited our test bench to just the AMD CPUs to show the limited scaling in performance. A PC video game can be considered playable with frame rates of about 30 frames per second (FPS). Once a game reaches above 60 FPS, especially when played on a monitor with a refresh rate of 60Hz, a player can rarely see a difference with increased frame rates. Since no DX11 video card was used in our test benches for the Athlon-II X4-645 processor and due to the fact that we know the GPU pulls most of the weight in a game, we have limited our video game testing to just three benchmarks. The games are very graphics intense, and are used in this CPU benchmark to show specifically that the CPU is relatively immaterial when it comes to playing games. All three of the games were tested at a resolution of 1920x1080 and with the highest settings possible, including 8xAA and 16xAF.

Devil May Cry 4 was released for the PC platform in early 2007 as the fourth installment to the Devil May Cry video game series. DMC4 is a direct port from the PC platform to console versions, which operate at the native 720P game resolution with no other platform restrictions. Devil May Cry 4 uses the refined MT Framework game engine, which has been used for many popular Capcom game titles over the past several years.

MT Framework is an exclusive seventh generation game engine built to be used with games developed for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and PC ports. MT stands for "Multi-Thread", "Meta Tools" and "Multi-Target". Originally meant to be an outside engine, but none matched their specific requirements in performance and flexibility. Games using the MT Framework are originally developed on the PC and then ported to the other two console platforms. On the PC version a special bonus called Turbo Mode is featured, giving the game a slightly faster speed, and a new difficulty called Legendary Dark Knight Mode is implemented. The PC version also has both DirectX 9 and DirectX 10 mode for Windows XP, Vista, and Widows 7 operating systems.

On the PC version of Resident Evil 5, both DirectX 9 and DirectX 10 modes are available for Microsoft Windows XP and Vista Operating Systems. Microsoft Windows 7 will play Resident Evil with backwards compatible Direct3D APIs. Resident Evil 5 is branded with the NVIDIA The Way It's Meant to be Played (TWIMTBP) logo, and receives NVIDIA GeForce 3D Vision functionality enhancements. NVIDIA and Capcom offer the Resident Evil 5 benchmark demo for free download from their website, and Benchmark Reviews encourages visitors to compare their own results to ours.

Capcom's Street Fighter IV is part of the now-famous Street Fighter series that began in 1987. The 2D Street Fighter II was one of the most popular fighting games of the 1990s, and now gets a 3D face-lift to become Street Fighter 4. The Street Fighter 4 benchmark utility was released as a novel way to test your system's ability to run the game. It uses a few dressed-up fight scenes where combatants fight against each other using various martial arts disciplines. Feet, fists and magic fill the screen with a flurry of activity. Due to the rapid pace, varied lighting and the use of music this is one of the more enjoyable benchmarks.

I'm not going to go into too much detail here explaining the very clear results of the video gaming tests. All of the processors in our test bed, including even the lowest-end Athlon-II X2-260, are capable of playing each of these video games without any problem at all. The lowest scores of all come in the Resident Evil 5 benchmark and are all around 60 FPS. As I mentioned above, with the common monitor refresh rate of 60Hz, it would be nearly impossible for anyone to notice a difference between 60 FPS and 90 FPS. Paired with a good GPU any of these processors, and certainly the Athlon-II X4-645, is capable of being a gaming processor. With new video cards being released all the time at more-affordable-than-ever prices, users should not feel like they have to get a super expensive processor in order to realize the full potential of most games. This may definitely change soon and games such as Mafia II with APEX PhysX and 3D will likely require not only a high-end GPU, but CPU to match. But focused on the vast majority of users who are not even compatible with DX11 hardware as of yet, these games and demands are still in the future. For now, nearly any CPU will do.

AMD Phenom-II X2 Final Thoughts

With the Phenom-II and Athlon-II series of processors, AMD has clamped down on the entry-level CPU market with an iron grip. The Phenom-II dual-core processors come at an entry-level price and bring an L3 cache along to play. The Phenom-II X2-560BE and its predecessors bring and unlocked multiplier and an L3 cache to an affordable price-point. This allows a lot of would-be enthusiasts a chance to experiment with overclocking without spending too much money. The distinct possibility of unlockable cores also brings a fun aspect to the mix, although I must caveat that with some wise words I read on the subject. If you want a quad-core, buy a quad-core, don't expect to be able to unlock a Phenom-II X2-560BE just because it's a possibility.

In our testing, the Phenom-II X2-560BE came close on occasion to the Intel Core i5-655K, but lagged behind most of the time. In reality, the Phenom-II X2-560BE and its L3 cache really came in just above the Athlon-II X2-260. While this seems like the place where it probably should be, the disappointment is that the more expensive Phenom-II X2-560BE doesn't outperform the Athlon-II X3-445. The places that it most shows its possibility to overcome the Athlon-II X3-445 is in gaming benchmarks (though not necessarily actual gaming frame rate tests).

Our gaming tests, as well as the rest of our benchmarks, show conclusively that the Phenom-II X2-560BE is a processor that has game. It certainly isn't the best CPU available in any single event, but it will do any of the jobs we tested it for and excelled at its price-point in gaming. It appears that the best use for the Phenom-II X2-560BE would be games or programs that don't depend too highly on multi-core processing. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is definitely great at single core processing, with its high stock clock speed and even better overclocked speeds.

I would be more than content to suggest to our readers that if they are looking for a less expensive way to become an enthusiast, they should consider the Phenom-II X2-560BE. The unlocked multiplier and possibility for two extra cores will give you plenty to play around with, and the Phenom-II X2-560BE will let you play games and do just about anything else you need to do for a price that won't break the bank. If you are an avid gamer that is looking forward to playing the most intensive multi-threaded games or you frequently use programs that need multi-core processors to work effectively, you might want to look for something other than the Phenom-II X2-560BE to meet your needs.

HDZ560WFGMBOX Conclusion

The Phenom-II X2-560BE performed very well against the lower end Athlon-II X2 processor that we tested it against. It came in just under the Athlon-II X3-445 processor. When overclocked to 4.1GHz it even got close and overcame to the performance of the X3-445, mostly in single threaded applications. It also came close to the Intel dual-core i5 processors tested when overclocked. While we can't fault the Phenom-II X2-560BE for coming in behind processors that cost two and three times the amount, I had expected a better performance compared to the Athlon-II X3-445. The performance of the Phenom-II X2-560BE is great for its price compared to many Intel offerings, but compared to other AMD offerings, it falls a little short.

The Phenom-II X2-560BE withstood rigorous testing like a champ. I pushed the processor past the limits multiple times while trying to discover the best overclocking scenario in two different motherboards with two different chipsets. After literally days of stress testing to ensure stability, the processor still ran strong overclocked to 4.1GHz and even ran strong at 3.9GHz without any extra voltage. Anyone who has ever desired to experiment with overclocking now has an entire line of very inexpensive processors to try out without spending a lot of money. All this stability is a testament to the high quality and increasingly high yield of Phenom-II processors.

The Phenom-II X2-560BE is a very well-rounded processor. It functions in both AM3 and AM2+ motherboards, making it easy to find something in any price range that is compatible. One of the things that AMD has been good at it is keeping compatibility between its updates in processors and chipsets. Rather than introducing a new socket for each new series of processors, the AM2+ and AM3 sockets cater to nearly all of the AMD processors now available. This means that users can upgrade slowly, one or two pieces at a time, rather than replacing the entire system at once. The Phenom-II also functions in a huge variety of situations. It can be a gaming CPU, a work CPU, a student or family computer CPU, just about anything

The Phenom-II X2-560BE, with its 45nm process and somewhat low TDP of 80W, is an excellent overclocker. This is common amongst Athlon-II and Phenom-II processors alike, especially the higher yield ones that being released now at faster clock speeds and with newer revisions of silicon being used by AMD. The Phenom-II X2-560BE is a black edition processor, so we were working with an unlocked multiplier . We could lower the multiplier through the BIOS or increase it, as well as increasing the bus speed and voltage. Even so, just using the multiplier and voltage, we were able to get the Phenom-II X2-560BE to 4.1GHz cooled only with air using the Scythe Mugen II CPU cooler. (For more information on this cooler, check out Benchmark Review's 1st Quarter 2010 CPU Cooler Performance Review.) This represents about a 20% increase in the clock speed of the Phenom-II X2-560BE. We were able to reach a stable 3.9GHz as well without raising the voltage at all.

AMD's HDZ560WFGMBOX retail kit is being sold at NewEgg for $105.99, which means the Phenom-II X2-560BE is priced at the low end of the processor segment. Still, it is slightly higher than previous releases of Phenom-II X2 processors. Enthusiasts will enjoy the Phenom-II X2-560BE for its unlocked multiplier, L3 cache and two disabled cores. At the same time, the Phenom-II X2-560BE struggled to keep up with the Athlonm-II X3-445 which comes in at only $87. The trade-off comes in what you are planning to do with the processor. If you want to experiment with overclocking or unlocking, or if you need it for single-core applications, the Phenom-II X2-560BE is great. Otherwise, you might want to consider an Athlon-II X3 or X4, which provides better performance for a similar price.

Pros:

Cons:

Ratings:

• Performance: 8.50
• Construction: 9.50
• Functionality: 9.50
• Overclock: 9.35
• Value: 8.50

Final Score: 9.07 out of 10.

Questions? Comments? Benchmark Reviews really wants your feedback. We invite you to leave your remarks in our Discussion Forum.

Related Articles:

• Logitech MX-620 Cordless Laser Mouse
• Ineo Alienvibes W401 Speaker System
• Benchmark Reviews Has Moved To WordPress CMS!
• In Win BUC Computer Case
• Cooler Master HAF-X Case RC-942-KKN1
• Logitech G930 Wireless Gaming Headset
• Apevia X-Jupiter Jr G Mid Tower ATX Case
• ASUS Rampage IV Formula X79 Motherboard
• ProlimaTech MK-13 Heat-Pipe VGA Cooler
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 Video Card Tests