First Look: Intel's Atom CPU : Introduction

05:10 - Tuesday 27 May 2008 by Pierre Dandumont
Source: Tom's Hardware – Keywords: intel, atom, cpu

Table of content:
1 – Introduction
  1. 1 – Introduction
  2. 2 – Performance

Introduction

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We had a short time to test a mini-ITX Gigabyte GA-GC230D motherboard equipped with a 1.60 GHz Intel N230 Atom CPU. The motherboard is HyperThreading compatible and includes 945G/ICH7 support. The large heat sink, which is covered by a fan, cools only the processor chip. The processor’s FSB speed is 533 MHz; it has 512 KB of Level 2 cache and is HyperThreading compatible.

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Talkback
JDocs 28/05/2008 08:08
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JDocs
Well that was kinda expected. We were told the Atom would perform around about the same as a 900mhz Pentium 3.
Nick_C 29/05/2008 12:49
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Nick_C
What happened to the power savings comparison?
gow87 29/05/2008 08:27
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gow87
what a pointless waste of time?

Surely this chip is designed to compete with low power chips... so why not compare it to low power chips? maybe the VIA competition? actually show people power draw etc...

I also find it amusing that the northbridge on the board seemed to need more cooling than the processor? which would suggest it gives out more heat... in which case maybe a better replacement should be available>?
Shengster 02/06/2008 02:27
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Shengster
I concur with gow87. What is the point of having a review on the Intel Atom if you don't compare it with low-powered CPUs? The Intel Atom was designed for UMPCs, Netbooks, and Ultraportables. Where's the emphasis on power consumption? Comparing it to an "underclocked" dual-core CPU isn't even a very good comparison.

What we should be getting is real-life application performance, and practical applications of the Atom's capabilities.

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