AMD Quad FX (Quadfather) - AMD's obscure Dual Socket answer to Core 2 Quad

[@PixelPipes]

Absolutely fascinating (no pun intended) deep dive into a platform I had *zero* knowledge about. All that power and it only manages to be a lowend "quad-core" equivalent. So glad you covered this, and thank you!

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks Nathan :D

[@wilfrido16]

@@FullyBuffered if you change the bios chip to a revision B chip thats floating around on ebay you can run dual quad opterons but you need fully buffered ddr2. It would be interesting seeing what would happen on the games when theres more cores. It would be a relatively easy process and cheap. Getting the board was the hard part.

[@Mirddes]

@@wilfrido16 I would love to see this

[@Mack_Dingo]

Ya heard about it from The WAN show 2023-06-16

[@Mack_Dingo]

How many PCIe lanes did you get back then? did dual socket give you x3 the lanes?

[@F2FTech]

Your quality keeps getting better and better Guido. Awesome job 👏👏

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks Mike!

[@johncate9541]

I remember when this came out, but I've never actually seen one. It was really a DOA product because they couldn't price it competitively. It was really the equivalent of what Intel had done a few years before, when they took a Xeon and rebranded it as a Pentium Extreme Edition to compete with the Athlon 64, and people joked and called it the "Emergency Edition." AMD did it again a few years later when they took a six-core Opteron and sold it as the Phenom II X6 as a competitive response to Sandy Bridge, but that was actually good and I ran one for a long time.

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks for sharing John. I got a good chuckle out of "Emergency Edition" - will remember that.

[@IlGab02]

The Quora guy!

[@Skarfar90]

The Phenom II X6 CPU's were even better than the Bulldozer (faildozer) processors that came out later on. Even the best "8-core" (which was really a hyperthreaded quad-core design) could not even match the i5 2500K, let alone the i7's. I have good memories of the Phenom II being a really good budget option to Intel's offerings at the time

[@wishusknight3009]

@@Skarfar90 They were more than a hyper-threaded CPU. They had multiple integer pipelines that shared a common front end. And although their IPC was pants, in highly threaded workloads it did compete with a 2600K. And as games started to make use of more threads, these CPU's proved to have a decent longevity. That and you could get an 8350 for $110 and overclock the nuts out of it. I know people that ran them for as long or longer than I ran my 2600K. They were far from what they needed to be, but they were not all bad, and some people really stuck with them.

[@TechTechPotato]

Love it. How much did the board+CPUs etc cost you?

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks Ian!

[@HardOCPTV]

Great trip down memory lane! Thanks for taking the time to make this retrospective.

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks!

[@HeyImGaminOverHere]

I had heard of Quadfather but never actually SEEN it ever. Interesting to see how it actually held up. Thanks for the cool showing!

[@Sonyfreak]

Thank you for the interesting video of the Quad FX! I've got myself the spiritual father of this platform. A HP XW 9300 workstation with two Opteron 285. A major difference is, that it uses DDR1, but it has 8 RAM-Slots.

[@wishusknight3009]

I had a similar system but with 275 CPU's on an asus mb. It lasted me a lot of years. Though it took a modified bios to be able to do any overclocking, and what it could do was pretty limited.

[@gingersquatch9844]

I actually have and run this board with the WS/B BIOS and a pair of 2360 SE Opterons while running 32GB of DDR2 ECC ram.

[@philipwalters3565]

Having just recently discovered your videos - I find your presentation excellent - I could listen to you all day long - I love your accent though I can't place it - will definitely be watching more

[@FullyBuffered]

Many thanks for the comment. I am Dutch, although I don't appear to have a standard Dutch accent.

[@N3rdyg33kzor]

Very informative video! I have one of these boards with a pair of FX74's in my collection as well. I remember reading about it back in the day when planning out my then updgrade from Athlon XP build. I of course ended up with a C2Q build, but I always wanted to get my hands on one of these because of how interesting they were (still are). It definitely was a challenge acquiring it. I'm glad it's being covered on youtube.

[@alberthakvoort8473]

Question: how long did you use it? looks like that you could used it for like 6 years.

[@TheUmbrella1976]

Very enjoyable video and neat story! Nice to look back on those days! I remember us having an 2x Athlon MP system on a Tyan board at university. They were actually cheaper than a Pentium with HT. Those must be very rare also these days.

[@mythologicalz]

Awesome retrospective, sad that such a cool platform faded into obscurity

[@Tc4ify]

It was borderline obscure to begin with, proved by only ever getting one single motherboard. While I did hear about it at the time, I never knew a single person that would have it (and that includes a number of high level enthusiasts).

[@0MeALot0]

Before that they had the dual amd opteron socket 940 setups, with also 2 times 2 core cpus. I have a tyan Thunder K8WE S2895 board with 2x opteron 275. First bios is from 2005, ddr1.

[@cssorkinman]

Interesting video - I had forgotten about this setup. Good job- thanks for posting :).

[@mattpierce5009]

glad the algorithm brought me here, I had totally forgotten about quad fx. subbed

[@lanceleone2704]

What a beautiful system! Those VRM coolers too... As a cooling system guy, that was a treat to see!

[@edge8941]

What an interesting and pretty unique specimen. I had no previous knowledge of this platform and was pretty riveted by this.

[@AshTechCorner]

Love this platform. Would like to own one one day... hopefully. Are you going to do a follow up video? with maybe some Overclocking or this setup running with some time correct graphics cards in SLI 😎.

[@AG-pm3tc]

I remember drooling over these as a kid. Cool video!

[@FullyBuffered]

Thanks!

[@kevinvanneste2500]

Great video 👍 When I was 18 I saw magazines about it. And now I finally see them in action thanks.

[@scottstamm7022]

I love seeing old tech videos like these!

[@coolmoments2994]

I had one of these, I loved it for its ridiculousness. Plus, it heated my home in the winter in buffalo, NY. I had it setup as an entirely liquid cooled system. It died many years later due to the CPU power connectors turning from blue to black and crumbling from heat cycles.

[@ExV1rUS]

Funny enough I actually still own a Thermaltake Armor Quad FX case, it has 2 CPU trompet holes in the side panel, to extend over the CPU cooler so it would "always" suck in cold air

[@FullyBuffered]

Ha neat, I didn’t know of that case

[@kaushik4472]

Awesome video. Just curious to know where you manage to get these hardwares from..

[@druuudruuu6804]

That Vista support still sends shivers down my spine to this very day.

[@jilianjing7549]

Interesting chips. I have never heard of them. A while ago I had an E5200 and Q6700 on an evga board for overclocking, for fun. With the pentium E5200 i reached 214CB in R15 and 4.5GHz. Really recommend doing some overclocking with old stuff, it can get very interesting. Although this seems so rare it be stupid

[@joshreiman]

Who was knocking at the door at 14:16? Excellent video by the way :)

[@arankthnar]

What an amazing finding! Thanks for sharing!

[@acheleg]

i have a dual core socket 370 mobo for pentium 3 cpus. i had to go through several cpu pair before i found a set, at 866 mhz, which had similar enough power usage & temp properies

[@taufikridwan5229]

Nice hardware collection you have, subbed 👍

[@RETROHardware]

Nice and very rare setup to see running.

[@homelessEh]

still got a dual socket 940 opteron 270 system.... its only a side rig curiosity but some day i pray i will finally have the spare change to order more of the required ddr 1 ecc ram to actually utilize the second 270 and put the unit in 2x 2x mode finally.

[@andrepohlon1283]

Great video👍. I had no idea this platform even existed.

[@turohabaneero]

I've read that having links leading out of KZbin in your description can lower your chances with the algorithm

[@gellande227]

Very interesting video and good presentation. 😎👍 Subscribed.

[@FullyBuffered]

Thank you!

[@aqua-technic]

Very interesting find, great vid, wasn't even aware these existed

[@Mack_Dingo]

ASUS old marketing: Rock Solid - Heart Touching......The Quad-Father

[@randomchannel1712]

Thats why I like your content so damn much. You talk about the hardware I grew up with, the hardware that I've loved for my whole life. My first ever PC was a K10 Phenom 9750 125w model. I've used core 2 duos quads phenoms athlons and everything in between. I've even played with later piledriver chips ocing them to THE MOON AND BACK. I may sound old fashioned but the larger the fet size the more overclockabilty. Currently running my I7-5820k @ 4.3 on stock voltage and getting 1300cb on R15. And this is why I love this era of hardware. And gpus 5950 7950 R9s god damn I'm getting emotional..

[@mylittlepwny3447]

Such a cool board! Ill be keeping a lookout if one ever surfaces on ebay again! I love niche obscure platforms!

[@narutofanz4]

Subscribed and notifications enabled, great content sir

[@Mack_Dingo]

I wish modern MB's still used those bare copper heatsinks, Kinda like the down-draft blower fans too

[@amdintelxsniperx]

i had one of these and i loved it a lot

[@selim63389]

Does any mainboard (cheap enough) only one ram controller? Dont know how to ask but i want to use both cpus easily like in a dell precision 690 where you have 2 4core cpus but windows only detects one 8 core cpu. Sorry for bad english i hope you understand what i mean.

[@spavatch]

With a little bit of fiddling I actually managed to squeeze 671 pts from 1100T in R15 multi thread test compared to 496 shown in the graph. I bet with some of that fiddling this setup would show closer to 400 👍 Oh, and by 'a bit of fiddling' I mean putting the 4x180mm radiator on the outside window sill during winter 😅

[@rodrigofilho1996]

Very awesome video, what about Cinebench R20 results? Can it get to 500 score? Can this system be overclocked and how much would it help...

[@MasterDrood]

This was pretty amazing, never heard of this platform. Thank you

[@patg108]

Shame this didn't support the OG Phenoms also found on AM2, could of had 8 cores. at a time when people had 1 to 2 or 4 at most. Is there a dual socket Am2 board that does support Dual OG Phenoms with 4 cores each?

[@ThaexakaMavro]

yup remember the days i had the 3000+ the 3700+ and the opteron dc165 overclocking monster

[@chrissraceporting7055]

I'd love to have a play with this setup.

[@downundergarage6968]

Whete did you find that board? Amazing

[@qtontech902]

Can you share the video referenced used as history of amd64 in 2006

[@kippie80]

That was a lot of fans and cooling fins.

[@vukos]

Thanks for this fascinating look into a unique and rare platform

[@Krisztian5HUN]

The quadfather and megatasking 😆 PR people from the 90s?

[@homelessEh]

..i never knew about fasten8.. that idea makes me sad they never seen it through..

[@SullySadface]

Boy howdy I didn't expect to see a 1090T in that lineup.

[@ProcessedDigitally]

thanks for the history lesson!

[@general_error]

Very good. Have this platform too with pair of Opteron 2220 fsb-overclocked. Installed Vista for more period-correct experience)

[@crypto602]

old but gold

[@lactobacillusprime]

Going back to this video, the sockets look like socket AM5+ :)

[@mattelder1971]

Watching this video 4 years later, looked on eBay for one of these motherboards. Holy shit! Only one available that I see and they want over $1800 for it.

[@Trick-Framed]

Subbed. Good Content.

[@SyphistPrime]

I never heard of this. Makes sense why it failed though. Thanks for sharing this bit of history.

[@DuneRunnerEnterprises]

IMHO - the name is a kinda like a "following the trend". Because,there was QuadGt by Abit,as well.

[@dexsters5643]

P.s, How much that good condition board costed like i got a rampage 2 extreme for a 100 euro i bet the skulltrail and quadfather both alone costed 500+$

[@jorgefuentes7022]

This is Incredible. I tough the FX CPUs were released since 2011 upto 2016 on the Bulldozer Architecture and it's later revisions Pilledriver and Vishera for Socket AM3+ and 760G, 970, 990X, 990FX Chipsets. This probe AMD worked in the FX concept before the K11 core.

[@charlesturner897]

These weren't "FX" CPUs, they were athlon CPUs, think of it as pentium 4 extreme edition compaired to an i9 extreme edition, they both have "extreme edition" on the end but are in no way related.

[@electronicsworkshawp]

You are awesome, dude.

[@FullyBuffered]

Thank you!

[@willpitts9957]

Throw a RTX card into it to really see it shine. Also try 4Gb sticks of Ddr2, those weren’t around when the board was made. But usually on most amd setups 4Gb Ddr2 sticks work

[@amdintelxsniperx]

i had two fx 74s and had them oced to 3.4 pretty damned good for the time LOL and itw as so fun

[@FullyBuffered]

That's awesome, thanks for sharing!

[@Mini-z1994]

Ah this platform, think der8auer showed this a few months back. Certainly needs some better cpu coolers, a pair of 120mm tower coolers on a bench setup would keep it somewhat cooler. Got a core 2 quad q6600 not being used atm for my testrig in case i decide to go back too that. Currently that testrig is running a core 2 duo e8400 @ 4 ghz, bit stability issues with dual channel ram configuration but it is quick for a dualcore at that speed for sure, specially with most of the things i benchmark favoring faster dualcore stuff anyway. 3dmark 2k1, 2003,2005,2006, aquamark, quake 1 timedemo, quake 2 timedemo, & a few games like f.e.a.r that has built in benchmarks or benchmark tools available. 3dmark vantage uses quad core i think though i do have that installed there too test some heavier loads besides metro 2033.

[@MRHOTCAKE]

When I want to get one of this kind of hardware and realize how expensive/difficult to find are, I remember even a low end hardware can be better than this, but still is amazing and I want it to put it to game or work

[@dexsters5643]

You should do a part 2 with max upgrades with max ram because ive heared AMD can handle 4gb ddr2 stick rather then intel core 2 and maybe with better cooling some overclocking?

[@macncheese3169]

I have that +3800 chip still runnin like a king

[@MatthewSuffidy]

Setting voltage is unfortunately pretty important especially if it was too high in the first place. Pretty bad mistake. I just got a ryzen 5900x.

[@homelessEh]

i gotta laugh my buddy just upgraded to a ryzen 1700X ..but the only heat sink he has is literally one of these ancient heatsinks THANK GOD amd Standardized the cpu mounting bracket all the way through am2 am3 and am4 11:15

[@homelessEh]

soo its a good cooler fine enough to run a ryzen 1700x nominally

[@homelessEh]

..it also had a phenom 2 965 the 3.4ghz unit soo its seen some heat in its years.

[@drumsmoker731]

What a gem you've found yourself there. That rarity will surely hold up well in value. Maybe for your retirement 😜

[@FullyBuffered]

Ha who knows ;)

[@shabbirhussain659]

Call ❤

[@Skarfar90]

It's fun looking back at how things were in the past where Intel and AMD traded blows for being the top manufacturer. From the early days of AMD making licenced Intel processors, to making their own architectures. Athlon vs. Pentium, and the rise of multi-core CPU's. Then the long stretch of time where AMD was so beaten to the ground (by the far superior Intel Core line) that they bet the company on the success of Zen, which was a huge turning point. And from there, Intel was the one lagging behind. Today it seems like they are more evenly matched, both in terms of gaming and productivity. And with the upcoming Zen 4 and Raptor Lake parts, it looks to be an interesting autumn

[@Abhishek-C92]

90 nm yup still good with my intel pentium gold which is 22nm

[@bgtubber]

Fascinating piece of tech history. BTW, I might be wrong, but didn't Intel start throwing around the "Megatasking" buzzword lately?

[@brrebrresen1367]

remember when this came out and a there was a lot of talk about "quad" core gaming, and that AMD was late to the game. thing though was that AMD already had a "Quad-core" system before the socket 1207 with SLI support and all that, but it was even less marketed by AMD for enthusiasts or gamers. and this was the old socket 940 with the dual Opteron 260 and up. motherboard manufacturers on the other hand made some clearly enthusiast/gamer focused boards like the Asus K8N-DL, MSI K8N Master2 based on the nForce chipset that made for some very unconventional gaming rigs that made a lot of people turn their heads if you had your side-panel off back then (2005? windowed cases? what's that?) bought the "bit" more expensive Tyan K8WE, a pair of Opteron 275's, 8sticks of Corsairs XMS 512MB CL2 Reg ECC and a pair of Geforce 7800GTX-512 early 2006 ready for the large LANparty "The Gathering" 2006. only downside, the socket 940 Opteron's while having some lower power variants had even less power management making for some absurd idle consumption.

[@H3LLMAU5]

Came in looking for this thanks to Linus talking about it at the WAN SHOW

[@BillBrasky-p8p]

I implore you to get off the Linus plantation. How can you continue to watch Imbecile Linus when you know that actually good channels exist?

[@OciosoAleatorio]

Sensacional, saudações do brasil.

[@homelessEh]

256 points on cb15 phenom 2 1045t gets 480 ish..

[@HandFromCoffin]

Hmm.. those SATA connectors! This is back when I still found computer hardware really interesting.. It just feels like it's not as fun any more.

[@skaltura]

at the time, that would've been total bad ass setup :)

[@prezeskodaty4637]

athlon x2 3200, athlon x2 3400 are more stable versions than the next newer versions due to changes in the processor core

[@tunkunrunk]

I only new about AMD Athlon MP dual socket , but never about quad FX

[@samuelaubrey2612]

I remember my core 2 quad 6600 well

[@ChrisBro095]

Imagine the spaceheating potential

[@mrwang420]

I swear fan stickers make the fans wear out faster. I take them off. And I got some pretty old fans.

[@SpikeTheBear]

Damn cool platform despite its flaws

[@trinhson1368]

why are the sockets absolutely the same look as am5?

[@FullyBuffered]

While they look similar (as they both are LGA), they certainly aren't the same.

[@trinhson1368]

@@FullyBuffered yeah like wayyy less pins, or else there would be ppl trying to put zen 4 cpus in these boards as the newer ones are hella expensive ;-;.

[@BoBaH_BoBaHoB]

At first I thought about four FX-8350.

[@hardrivethrutown]

I'd love to mess around with this sort of hardware, I really like these strange motherboards

[@CuttingEdgeRetro]

What could have been if IPC was a little stronger. If this was successful we could have ended up with a 2x 6c 1090t style platform by 2010. Shame.

[@FullyBuffered]

There was so much potential here for sure..

[@gingersquatch9844]

I have one running dual 2360 Opterons

[@facebag666]

YOOO i have one of theese too!

[@prezeskodaty4637]

threadripper 1950x processor, two geforce gtx titan x maxwell 2.0 gm200 sli graphics cards, ddr4 ram memory 128 gigabytes this is a computer supported by manufacturers until 2040

[@n0rie9a]

LMAO just about to say " skulltrail flashbacks anyone?"

[@Barsilono]

Хорошее видео про интересную "железку".

[@DuneRunnerEnterprises]

Interesting !!!