Must Read: Samsung Galaxy S4 review

Topic: Processors

AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

Summary: Just how fast can overclockers with a supply of liquid helium push AMD's FX 'Bulldozer' CPU? To record-breaking levels, that's what!

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes

By for Hardware 2.0 |

Take some overclockers, lots of liquid helium, and a prototype AMD FX 'Bulldozer' CPU and what do you have? A Guiness World Record breaker, that's what!

Overclockers Brian Mchlachlan and Sami Maekinen took the AMD FX silicon to a whopping 8.429 GHz, beating the current record of 8.308 GHz.

Check this out!

Very cool!

Topic: Processors

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily email newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

Talkback

30 comments
Log in or register to join the discussion

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    they have a record for highest frequency? Doesn't sound like it would be hard to break. I could design a totally horrible chip that could be stable at 10GHz but run about as fast as a 386.... would I get a world record because of the frequency, or is there some other factor involved?
    doh123
    Reply Vote

    • Your design would not be an AMD FX would it?

      @doh123
      People
      Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @doh123

      Then get to work.
      bobiroc
      Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @doh123 <br><br>Well making a CPU is very complex. Though you are right about clock speed not being the only thing in dertermining CPU performance. <br><br>AMD was the one that proved it when Pentium 4s were running at 3.2Ghz but a 2.2ghz Athlon 64 could beat it. <br><br>The Over Clockers would tel you "The 8 Ghz FX is much faster than the stock speed." They will rejoice at their Rigs hardware stats and Benchmark scores just as feverishly as a Fantasy Footbal nut whith their football stats. <br><br>but it really makes no impact for anything else. Even the current CPUs are powerfull enough to encode HD video in real time. No matter how fast a CPU is, it still needs a descrete GPU for gaming. <br><br>in the end the OC people will eventualy buy the next best thing, which kind of makes over clocking pointless.
      Bakabaka
      Reply Vote

      • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

        @Bakabaka

        I could be wrong here but I thought both AMD and Intel were hitting a GHz to Performance Ratio Wall that is only slowly increasing. Meaning they can ramp up the clock frequency but would have to cut back the calculations per clock kind of like what Intel did with the pentium 4 which is how they were able to achieve such high GHz frequencies back then. They were basically less efficient chips.

        So if he was to make a 10GHz chip it could easily be outperformed by another processor running at only 3Ghz. In order to overclock it you need extreme cooling because of the limitations of the silicon.
        bobiroc
        Reply Vote

    • @doh123 .. don't talk about it wise@ss

      .. do it. Until you do and can prove it, you're pretty much like the vapor that was expelled when the helium hit the coolant chamber during the demo' ... all hot air.
      thx-1138_
      Reply Vote

  • Liquid Helium cooling?

    Whatever next? Seeing as we've already left all sense of practical reality behind, should we also test how fast this chip runs on the surface of the dark side of the Moon?
    Zogg
    Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @Zogg
      You see the video of boiling oil and frying food with some mobo? I kinda thought the aquarium was cool as well but practicality was out the window.
      partman1969@...
      Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @Zogg Did you ever see those races of the NHRA where special cars (aka "dragsters") wth 9000HP are riding faster than what you can think. Well, let me tell you they aren't allowed or practical to go on a trip on a sunny Sunday afternoon.
      Do you see any similarity here?
      nanomartin
      Reply Vote

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    Will an 8.629GHz Bulldozer outperform a 5Ghz Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge?
    regsrini
    Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @regsrini That is the question.
      j-mccurdy@...
      Reply Vote

    • It's likely this is just the beginning

      @regsrini .. the 5GHz Sandy Bridge could likely surpass under the same test conditions.

      This demo was so cool (..pun intended)
      thx-1138_
      Reply Vote

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    What is that in bogomips?
    kenift
    Reply Vote

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    I suppose that's OK if everything is on-chip/in-cache, but how many wait cycles does it waste when it needs to go off chip for memory?
    dabbsil
    Reply Vote

    • Bozo ..

      @dabbsil .. it's a raw MHz record attempt - nothing more or less. The idea is to simply get a successful read and system operability while attempting to achieve the highest clock reading.

      .. wakey, wakey .. and pay attention next time.
      thx-1138_
      Reply Vote

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    Congrats to AMD. I had a NexGen mobo/cpu back... a while.
    AMD bought NexGen (they had an awesome Linux processor - RISC/CISC? - forgot now) so I've been following and using their CPU's and video cards since.
    I think however, that I will refrain from trying the same test on my system. ;-)
    MTsyko
    Reply Vote

  • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

    Nice to have a fast processor, but until they finally get a truly stable operating system, speed is nothing if your forever blue screening.
    Fred.Mills
    Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @Fred.Mills

      I haven't seen a bluescreen since i adopted Win7.

      Which was as soon as it was available.
      fairportfan
      Reply Vote

      • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

        @fairportfan
        I had an Asus board give me raid 0 issues (BSOD) on my first attempt, but patiently waiting for Firmware update paid off. Windows 7 has been flawless since.
        partman1969@...
        Reply Vote

    • RE: AMD's FX CPU hits record-breaking speeds

      @Fred.Mills

      Hate to break it to you Fred, but it's 2011.

      If your OS is "forever blue screening", you've either got serious hardware issues, or you need to upgrade from Windows 98.
      WozNotWoz
      Reply Vote
CNET Join | Log In | Privacy | Cookies Close