The problem with half those benchmarks is half of those games no one really cares about ;D xD

they are also some of the most multi thread freindly, but if you want popular games

aint that a pretty picture?

Told you. It is worse.

I think AMD have just given up on having close to the same single-thread performance as Intel. If it will take 5 years to redo the architecture again, there is no point.

I have to give credit where it's due and, as you said, AMD has failed (by a mile) to deliver a high-end CPU worth buying.

Although (and that's not an excuse) some reviews state that Bulldozer was designed first to be a server-workloads CPU that was moved to be a desktop one, and that in those scenarios it might be good (something that must of us don't care).

Well, maybe next time...

The good thing for consumers is that SB is far better than what anyone needs for the forseeable future.

I will be watching the Trinity launch in Q1, because that has the Bulldozer replacement "Piledriver". If there was some kind of crippling bug or clockspeed limitation, one would hope it could be fixed in that.

Yes, they did delay BD so it launches only 3-4 months before its successor.

I'm quoting myself (something stupid, I know) to say that I confused Bulldozer with the previous CPUs or APUs of AMD.

Bulldozer doesn't have an integrated graphics part.  

But if their roadmap is credible, piledriver will only be an increase of 10-15 %. Enough to put it above the Phenom II x6 but still behind Intel parts.

I'm more interested in the problems Global Foundries has with the 32nm fab process. If that's the reason AMD hasn't been able to launch these chips at their goal speed and they can fix it, we may see Piledriver parts hitting th 4GHz as their stock speed and that may close the gap even further.

I have to say that I am thoroughly disappointed by them benchmark scores :'(

As expected, Sandy Bridge conquers.
25/600k it is. Or its Ivy Bridge Successor, depending on when I get it. The general advantage in encoding is too small to compensate for the lack of gaming potency.

Oh well, guess I'll be going Core i5 2500K afterall. Worth pointing out that AMD have said Win7 doesn't recognise the new architecture so some performace gains will likely occur with Win8 towards the end of the year, although not enough to beat Sandy Bridge by the look of things. Maybe when more software utilise all the cores available and AMD merge their new architecture with the Fusion concept, we might get some better chips.