Many AMD fans are waiting with baited breath for the upcoming release of the new FX Bulldozer processors. While we patiently wait for the new range to hit the market, AMD are teasing everyone by breaking a new record, entering the Guinness Book Of Records for the ‘Highest Frequency of a Computer Processor'.

The upcoming 8 core AMD FX processor looks set to be an overclocking champion. Chris Cloran, corporate vice president and general manager for the Client Group at AMD said “The record-breaking processor speed that resides in the AMD FX CPU clearly demonstrates performance gains for the new AMD Bulldozer multi-core architecture, which will provide x86 computing power for this CPU and future AMD Accelerated Processing Units.”

The new FX processors are due to launch in Q4, later this year and the record speed was clocked at 8.429ghz, besting the previous record of 8,308ghz. This record was achieved in Austin, Texas on August 31st by ‘Team AMD FX', a core group of skilled overclockers who were working alongside AMD staff members.

The overclocking event was approved and verified by Guinness World Records adjudicator Freddie Hoff who said “We applaud AMD for their entry into Guinness World Records for achieving the Highest Frequency of a Computer Processor. We congratulate everyone involved in this record-breaking achievement.”

The return to the ‘FX' brand name for AMD is a big deal, especially for fans of the company who fondly remember the previous series of processors, which were class leading at the time.

The upcoming range of FX processors will be completely unlocked, targeting the demanding enthusiast user who will never be happy with reference speeds or stock voltages. AMD will be supplying Vision Engine software to fine tune the system performance, although we would expect the hard core audience will be overclocking directly via the bios.

While the end user will certainly not be running their Bulldozer processors at over 8ghz on Liquid Nitrogen, the performance indicators would highlight that we can expect good overclocking performance, even on high end air coolers such as the Noctua NH D14. We look forward to getting our hands on the upcoming technology and seeing how far we can push it!

How was this overclocking record achieved? Simon Solotko – a Senior Manager at AMD said:

“About a month before, we invited the insightful and relentless overclocker Brian Mchlachlan for initial testing, to validate the AMD FX CPU’s overclocking potential and respond to a combination of extreme cold and high voltage overclocking. To our satisfaction AMD FX processors passed the first tests, overclocking with liquid nitrogen at temperatures below -180 degrees centigrade.

We could find no cold bug, the bane of overclockers, which often stops modern processors from functioning in extremely cold conditions. The question, which we have answered once before, was whether the AMD FX processor would continue to scale, to achieve higher frequencies, if we dropped the temperate further below this unbelievably cold threshold. Would the extreme cold of the liquid helium, a substance only a few degrees higher than absolute zero, break this processor, or by improving conductivity and decreasing temperatures, allow it to run even faster?

In the week prior to the event we sent a number of processors to Brian and to Sami Makinen, the renowned AMD overclocker in Finland, to identify the candidates for a potential world record run. After a few days of testing, eight processors were found to be able to hit over 8GHz in their expert hands.

We ran through three staged systems in a demonstration for the press. On the third run, everything went perfectly, and a world record fell.

Welcome back, AMD FX. And thank you to the team. Sami Makinen, Brian Mchlachlan, Pete Hardman, Aaron Schradin, and myself, Simon Solotko – AMD FX processor overclockers.

Of course, records are made to be broken and we look forward to seeing the community push the AMD FX CPU even further. We think we are just scratching the overclocking surface”

CPU validation of this record achievement is available here.

Kitguru says: Is this fast enough for you?

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