AMD Phenom II X4 940 - first AMD Phenom 45nm CPU, Deneb Core

The last three years were kind of tough for AMD. Ever since acquiring ATI the company struggled in each and every of its major business segments. Intel Core 2 ruled over the hearths and minds of increasing mass of users (and especially the ones with more specific needs like gamers, overclockers and enthusiasts) and NVIDIA G80 had no competition in the video card segment, being the only DirectX 10 core for whole 6 after its release. Intel released their first quad-core processor in the middle of 2006та, the first AMD Phenom showed up almost a year later, incapable to put to shame the old Intel core. But the summer of 2008 was the time of intriguing twist in the video card market - the new AMD HD4800 series gaming cards did what the company and its fans needed badly. Now, 6 months after the release of the HD4800 and 2 months after the Intel Core i7 release, we witness the latest attempt of AMD on reclaiming the hearts of the gamers with the Dragon platform. Ladies and Gentleman - please welcome the first 45nm quad-core AMD processor with Deneb core, as the representative of the Phenom II family.

Bearing in mind that rumours about AMD Phenom II were running around the Internet even before the release of Intel's Core i7, many looked forward to the new AMD processor as the core of a new Intel platform alternative. Now focusing specifically on Deneb, few things must be noted. First of all, Phenom II is a family name for processors with improved architecture and capabilities, compared to the older Phenom X4. The new processors are manufactured by the 45nm process and the first of them - Deneb (that is again, at the focus of our attention) is a quad-core processor for the AM2+ socket, with a price of the top model (Phenom II X4 940) lower (for the time being) than the one of the most basic Core i7 processor. AMD Phenom II X4 Deneb for AM2+ runs swell on almost all older motherboards with that socket, while AMD accent on 790FX/GX, which is found in plentiful supply on various motherboards possessing quite ample abilities at very reasonable prices. The core is combined with two DDR2 memory controllers, very similar to the Phenom X4, unlike the Core i7, that comes with 3 channel DDR3 controller. And that at time when a Core i7 motherboards cost approximately 4-5 times more than equivalent 790FX/GX motherboard (clearly visible when comparing top model X58 chipset board against top model 790FX of the same brand). And all this topped with AMD's very interesting Overdrive tool - one allowing total control over the processor overclock with easy to use graphical interface is by all means undeniably clear statement form AMD - they are here and they seek revenge at Intel. And I believe we all agree that when "revenge" translates to us like "gaming platform with plenty of abilities and very affordable too" we're cool with it.