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AMD introduced its AM2 platform just over three weeks ago, and although it did not significantly dent the already great performance of socket 939 processors, there is a definite measurable increase in memory bandwidth with the new chips.

But what are you supposed to do if you have an existing good Socket 939 system with an older Athlon processor?

"Everyone" on the net says that the socket 939 Opterons are great overclockers; as a matter of fact it has been suggested that AMD is keeping availability low and prices high to discourage enthusiasts from buying them and tweaking the heck out of them. Naturally, we wanted to find out if "everyone" was right.

What's the difference between socket 939 Athlon's and Opteron's?

The Opterons always have 1Mb L2 caches, and are subjected to more stringent testing at AMD as they are qualified as server parts. Other than that, they are the same.

We thought it would be interesting to find out how the Opteron 170 stacks up, and how far it can be pushed with just air cooling. Why? Because if even half the legends about the 939 Opterons are true, it may just make an excellent upgrade chip, or the basis for a solid new gaming rig.

How did it do?

Well, you'll have to read this article to find out.

Software used during testing consisted of the following:

• Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2
• NVIDIA ForceWare 84.21 drivers
• CineBench 2003
• LAME MP3 Encoding
• PC Magazine Winstone 2004
• PC Magazine Multimedia Content Creation 2004
• POV-Ray 3.7 beta 13
• RightMark Memory Analyzer
• SiSoft Sandra
• TMPGEnc MPEG2 Encoding
• WinRAR
• Call of Duty
• Comanche 4
• Doom 3
• Far Cry
• Halo
• Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
• Unreal Tournament 2004