The CPU industry has been on quite a ride in the last few months. We saw Atom introduced by Intel mid last year followed by the Core i7 late last year. Even AMD re-branded the Phenom’s as X2, X3 and X4 based on the number of cores and then introduced the Neo last week that’s targeted towards netbook, sorry, low-end notebooks that are ultra-thin and small and consume low power.

Today, AMD is introducing yet another CPU- this time it’s the follow up to their high-end desktop CPU and is being labeled as Phenom II. We received the X4-940 version, which is currently the highest end in the Phenom II range, clocked at 3.0Ghz and featuring four cores. With the Core i7 from Intel already dominating the benchmarks, lets find out if the Phenom II can hold its own or if it’s a bit too little too late from AMD. Lets take a look at the specifications of the two new CPUs that AMD is introducing today.



Before we move on to more details about the CPU, the good thing about the Phenom II is that it’s socket AM2+ compatible so you can pretty much keep all of your system intact and simply replace the older CPU with the newer one, allowing you to upgrade without breaking the bank.



Now AMD will release an AM3 version of the CPU in the next few months that will add DDR3 support to the CPU, but even that socket will be fully backwards compatible and motherboards vendors will have the option of providing DDR2 or DDR3 support on their motherboards. The point that AMD is trying to make here is that your investment is protected and unlike their competitors latest CPU, you don’t have to spend an arm and a leg to upgrade.