Conclusion
In fact, we have already made all the most important conclusions about the performance, pricing and power consumption of the contemporary dual-core CPUs in the previous section. I would only like to say once again that Intel really did a great job with these processors on Core microarchitecture. They offer remarkable performance and hence take over the leadership in the high-end processor market.
However, the Conroe launch doesn抰 at all mean that AMD lost this battle. This company managed to rebuild the structure of its offers so that they could fit into the market in these circumstances. Yes, AMD let Intel take the high-end market, however they adjusted the prices on their solutions in such a way that they still remained very attractive mainstream offers. Keeping in mind the upcoming transition of all Athlon 64 X2 processors into the Energy Efficient category and the reduction of their TDP to 65W, AMD solutions may prove up to the mark from the power consumption standpoint. However, this statement needs to be double-checked, which we will do in our upcoming testing.
I have to say that the Pentium D processor family that has lost quite a few of its members will still remain in demand. Despite the high heat dissipation and power consumption of the models in this family, they will still be a good choice for inexpensive systems. So, you shouldn抰 give up on these processors.
In other words, although the launch of Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Extreme is certainly a new stage in the evolution of x86 processors, it is still too early to proclaim Intel抯 complete victory over AMD. Both companies will continue coexisting in the market. Although AMD will have to temporarily give away the high-performance segment and focus mostly on the mainstream and value solutions.
