We measured the overall performance of the CPUs included in this review using SYSmark2004, which is a program that simulates the use of real-world applications. Thus, we consider this the best software to measure, in practical terms, the system performance.

The benchmarks are divided into two groups:

• Internet Content Creation: Simulates the authoring of a website containing text, images, videos and animations. The following programs are used: Adobe After Effects 5.5, Adobe Photoshop 7.01, Adobe Premiere 6.5, Discreet 3ds Max 5.1, Macromedia Dreamweaver MX, Macromedia Flash MX, Microsoft Windows Media Encoder 9, McAfee VirusScan 7.0 and Winzip 8.1.
• Office Productivity: Simulates the use of an office suite, i.e. simulates sending e-mails, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, etc. The following programs are used: Adobe Acrobat 5.05, Microsoft Office XP SP2, Internet Explorer 6.0 SP1, NaturallySpeaking 6, McAfee VirusScan 7.0 and Winzip 8.1.

This software delivers several results, all of them using a specific SYSmark2004 unit. First we have a SYSmark2004 overall score. Then we have a group result for each batch listed above. And for each batch, we have specific results: 3D Creation, 2D Creation and Web Publication for Internet Content Creation and Communication, Document Creation and Data Analysis for Office Productivity.

We were eager to know what performance gain an average user would have by using a dual-core Athlon 64 instead of a single-core one. The results you can see on the chart below.

While the overall SYSmark2004 score for Athlon 64 X2 5000+ (2.6 GHz) using the new socket AM2 was 11.59% greater than the one achieved by Athlon 64 X2 4600+ (2.4 GHz) and 33.33% greater than the one achieved by the single-core Athlon 64 3800+ (2.4 GHz). Athlon 64 FX-60, which runs at the same clock rate but has a greater L2 cache, achieved the same overall score.

Athlon 64 X2 5000+ has also achieved the same performance as Athlon 64 FX-60 on Internet Content Creation batch and Office Productivity batch. For Internet Content Creation Athlon 64 X2 5000+ was 8.95% faster than Athlon 64 X2 4600+ and 53.60% faster than Athlon 64 3800+. And for Office Productivity, the new Athlon 64 X2 5000+ was 15.03% faster than Athlon 64 X2 4600+ and 15.70% faster than Athlon 64 3800+.

Athlon FX-60 was faster than Athlon 64 X2 5000+ on two some segments: document creation (6.37%) and data analysis (3.94%). Athlon 64 X2 5000+ was faster than Athlon 64 FX-60 on communication benchmark (6.34%). On all other segments the two CPUs achieved the same results.