SiSoft Sandra 2009 - Processor	Source: Sandra

Sandra is designed to test the theoretical power of a complete system and individual components. The numbers taken though are again, purely theoretical and may not represent real world performance. Higher results are best.

SiSoft Sandra 2009 v15.72 - Processor Processor Arithmetic Dhrystone ALU: (GIPS) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 68.25 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 24.86 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 23.56 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 43.7 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 28.64 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 28.7 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 21.26 Processor Arithmetic Whetstone iSSE3: (Gflops) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 60.22 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 23.41 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 22.17 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 42.17 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 27.64 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 27.9 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 20.47 Processor Multi-Media Int x8 iSSE3: (Mpixels/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 119.35 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 57.08 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 54.17 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 125.63 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 81.85 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 81.92 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 59.87 Processor Multi-Media Float x4 iSSE2: (Mpixels/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 95.4 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 32.83 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 31.22 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 55 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 36.04 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 36.08 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 26.67 Processor Multi-Media Float x2 iSSE2: (Mpixels/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 49.63 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 16.63 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 15.76 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 29.99 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 19.68 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 19.68 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 14.54

At its stock clockspeeds, the Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition just can't keep up with the Core 2 Duo processors, coming in last in every SiSoft Sandra test except for the SSE3 integer benchmark.

SiSoft Sandra 2009 - Memory	Source: Sandra

Sandra is designed to test the theoretical power of a complete system and individual components. The numbers taken though are again, purely theoretical and may not represent real world performance. Higher bandwidth and lower latencies are best.

SiSoft Sandra 2009 v15.72 - Memory Multicore Efficiency Bandwidth: (GB/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 30.51 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 9.57 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 9.11 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 4.75 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 3.67 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 3.72 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 3.86 Multicore Efficiency Latency: (ns) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 17 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 42 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 44 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 89 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 83 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 80 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 103 Memory Bandwidth Int iSSE2: (GB/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 18.86 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 6.77 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 7.26 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 12.18 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 11.38 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 11.45 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 10.3 Memory Bandwidth Float iSSE2: (GB/s) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 18.86 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 6.65 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 7.27 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 12.17 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 11.41 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 11.42 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 10.26 Memory Latency (Random): (ns) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 81 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 86 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 77 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 83 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 82 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 84 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 87 Memory Latency (Linear): (ns) Points Ranking Intel Core i7 920 9 Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 12 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 11 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition 15 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR2) 14 AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (DDR3) 15 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 16

The Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition's overly-large L3 cache really puts the hurt on it in this test. Memory bandwidth is low, memory latency is slow. While the iSSE2 tests are a win for the Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition, these fringe cases won't mean much for overall system performance. Keep in mind though, these results are still pretty good given the price of this processor.