A6-3600 vs Pentium B970
Aggregate performance score
A6-3600 outperforms Pentium B970 by an impressive 59% based on our aggregate benchmark results.
Primary details
Comparing Pentium B970 and A6-3600 processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and price.
| Place in the ranking | 2720 | 2406 |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Market segment | Laptop | Desktop processor |
| Series | Intel Pentium | no data |
| Power efficiency | 1.82 | 1.56 |
| Architecture codename | Sandy Bridge (2011−2013) | Llano (2011−2012) |
| Release date | 16 January 2012 (12 years ago) | 30 June 2011 (13 years ago) |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $125 | no data |
Detailed specifications
Pentium B970 and A6-3600 basic parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters indirectly say of CPU speed, though for more precise assessment you have to consider their test results.
| Physical cores | 2 (Dual-core) | 4 (Quad-Core) |
| Threads | 2 | 4 |
| Base clock speed | 2.3 GHz | 2.1 GHz |
| Boost clock speed | 2.3 GHz | 2.4 GHz |
| Bus type | DMI 2.0 | no data |
| Bus rate | 4 × 5 GT/s | no data |
| Multiplier | 23 | no data |
| L1 cache | 128 KB | 128 KB (per core) |
| L2 cache | 512 KB | 1 MB (per core) |
| L3 cache | 2 MB (shared) | 0 KB |
| Chip lithography | 32 nm | 32 nm |
| Die size | 131 mm2 | 228 mm2 |
| Maximum core temperature | 85 °C | no data |
| Number of transistors | 504 million | 1,178 million |
| 64 bit support | + | + |
| Windows 11 compatibility | - | - |
Compatibility
Information on Pentium B970 and A6-3600 compatibility with other computer components: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.
| Number of CPUs in a configuration | 1 (Uniprocessor) | 1 |
| Socket | FCPGA988 | FM1 |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 35 Watt | 65 Watt |
Technologies and extensions
Technological solutions and additional instructions supported by Pentium B970 and A6-3600. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.
| Instruction set extensions | Intel® SSE4.1, Intel® SSE4.2 | no data |
| FMA | + | - |
| Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST) | + | no data |
| My WiFi | - | no data |
| Turbo Boost Technology | - | no data |
| Hyper-Threading Technology | - | no data |
| Idle States | + | no data |
| Thermal Monitoring | + | - |
| Flex Memory Access | + | no data |
| Demand Based Switching | - | no data |
| FDI | + | no data |
| Fast Memory Access | + | no data |
Security technologies
Pentium B970 and A6-3600 technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.
| TXT | - | no data |
| EDB | + | no data |
| Anti-Theft | - | no data |
Virtualization technologies
Virtual machine speed-up technologies supported by Pentium B970 and A6-3600 are enumerated here.
| AMD-V | - | + |
| VT-d | - | no data |
| VT-x | - | no data |
| EPT | - | no data |
Memory specs
Types, maximum amount and channel quantity of RAM supported by Pentium B970 and A6-3600. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequencies may be supported.
| Supported memory types | DDR3 | DDR3 |
| Maximum memory size | 16 GB | no data |
| Max memory channels | 2 | no data |
| Maximum memory bandwidth | 21.335 GB/s | no data |
Graphics specifications
General parameters of integrated GPUs, if any.
| Integrated graphics card | Intel® HD Graphics for 2nd Generation Intel® Processors | Radeon HD 6530D |
| Graphics max frequency | 1.15 GHz | no data |
Graphics interfaces
Available interfaces and connections of Pentium B970 and A6-3600 integrated GPUs.
| Number of displays supported | 2 | no data |
| eDP | + | no data |
| DisplayPort | + | - |
| HDMI | + | - |
| SDVO | + | no data |
| CRT | + | no data |
Peripherals
Specifications and connection of peripherals supported by Pentium B970 and A6-3600.
| PCIe version | 2.0 | no data |
| PCI Express lanes | 16 | no data |
Synthetic benchmark performance
Various benchmark results of the processors in comparison. Overall score is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.
Combined synthetic benchmark score
This is our combined benchmark performance rating. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.
Passmark
Passmark CPU Mark is a widespread benchmark, consisting of 8 different types of workload, including integer and floating point math, extended instructions, compression, encryption and physics calculation. There is also one separate single-threaded scenario measuring single-core performance.
GeekBench 5 Single-Core
GeekBench 5 Single-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses only a single CPU core.
GeekBench 5 Multi-Core
GeekBench 5 Multi-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses all available CPU cores.
Pros & cons summary
| Performance score | 0.70 | 1.11 |
| Recency | 16 January 2012 | 30 June 2011 |
| Physical cores | 2 | 4 |
| Threads | 2 | 4 |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 35 Watt | 65 Watt |
Pentium B970 has an age advantage of 6 months, and 85.7% lower power consumption.
A6-3600, on the other hand, has a 58.6% higher aggregate performance score, and 100% more physical cores and 100% more threads.
The A6-3600 is our recommended choice as it beats the Pentium B970 in performance tests.
Be aware that Pentium B970 is a notebook processor while A6-3600 is a desktop one.
Should you still have questions on choice between Pentium B970 and A6-3600, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.
Similar processor comparisons
We picked several similar comparisons of processors in the same market segment and performance relatively close to those reviewed on this page.
