Intel Xeon 3.6 2MB vs AMD Opteron 252 Database Test

Price comparison & Final Words

In previous articles, we've taken a look at the cost of the processor itself. Since servers aren't just about the processor, we've taken our pricing to an entire platform. We've attempted to spec out Intel and AMD servers from 2 different vendors and have them as close as possible in terms of features. There are obviously a few differences here and there, but as illustrated below, the price difference is negligible between either platform when taking into account the features missing on either platform. Note that we are comparing Dual Intel 3.6 1MB L2 based servers against Dual Opteron 250 servers, since the newer products that we have discussed in this article are not yet in the retail channel.

Final words

We've illustrated how workload has a significant effect on platform decision when it comes to database servers. Obviously, for a small to medium business, where there are multiple different workloads being run on the same server, the decision to go with a platform architecture best suited for Data warehousing alone doesn't make sense. But for larger organizations where multiple database servers are used, each having a specific purpose, the decision to go with one platform or another could have a significant impact on performance. For dual-processor applications, Intel leads the way in everyday small to heavy transactional applications, whereas AMD shines in the analytical side of database applications "Data Warehousing".

These results do raise some questions as to what is going on exactly during each test at an architectural level. Is the processor waiting for data from the L2 cache? Is the processor branch prediction units not suited for this particular workload? Is there a bottleneck with memory latency? We want these questions answered, and are going to investigate ways to provide concrete answers to these tough questions in the future.