Pentium 987 vs Xeon Gold 5120
Aggregate performance score
Xeon Gold 5120 outperforms Pentium 987 by a whopping 2470% based on our aggregate benchmark results.
Contents
Primary details
Comparing processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and price.
| Place in the ranking | 870 | 3246 |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Cost-effectiveness evaluation | 1.05 | 0.02 |
| Market segment | Server | Laptop |
| Series | Intel Xeon Gold | Intel Pentium |
| Power efficiency | 10.50 | no data |
| Designer | Intel | Intel |
| Manufacturer | no data | Intel |
| Architecture codename | Skylake (server) (2017−2018) | Sandy Bridge (2011−2013) |
| Release date | 11 July 2017 (8 years ago) | 1 February 2013 (12 years ago) |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $1,555 | $134 |
Cost-effectiveness evaluation
Performance per price, higher is better.
Xeon Gold 5120 has 5150% better value for money than Pentium 987.
Performance to price scatter graph
Detailed specifications
Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987 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 | 14 (Tetradeca-Core) | 2 (Dual-core) |
| Threads | 28 | 2 |
| Base clock speed | 2.2 GHz | 1.5 GHz |
| Boost clock speed | 3.2 GHz | 1.5 GHz |
| Bus type | no data | DMI 2.0 |
| Bus rate | no data | 4 × 5 GT/s |
| Multiplier | 22 | 15 |
| L1 cache | 896 KB | 128 KB |
| L2 cache | 14 MB | 512 KB |
| L3 cache | 19.25 MB | 2 MB (shared) |
| Chip lithography | 14 nm | 32 nm |
| Die size | no data | 131 mm2 |
| Maximum core temperature | 81 °C | 100 °C |
| Number of transistors | no data | 504 million |
| 64 bit support | + | + |
| Windows 11 compatibility | + | - |
Compatibility
Information on Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987 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 | 4 (Multiprocessor) | 1 (Uniprocessor) |
| Socket | FCLGA3647 | FCBGA1023 |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 105 Watt | 17 Watt |
Technologies and extensions
Technological solutions and additional instructions supported by Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.
| Instruction set extensions | Intel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX, Intel® AVX2, Intel® AVX-512 | Intel® SSE4.1, Intel® SSE4.2 |
| AES-NI | + | - |
| FMA | - | + |
| AVX | + | - |
| vPro | + | no data |
| Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST) | + | + |
| Speed Shift | + | no data |
| My WiFi | no data | - |
| Turbo Boost Technology | 2.0 | - |
| Hyper-Threading Technology | + | - |
| TSX | + | - |
| Idle States | no data | + |
| Thermal Monitoring | - | + |
| Flex Memory Access | no data | + |
| Demand Based Switching | no data | - |
| Turbo Boost Max 3.0 | - | no data |
| FDI | no data | + |
| Fast Memory Access | no data | + |
Security technologies
Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987 technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.
| TXT | + | - |
| EDB | + | + |
| Anti-Theft | no data | - |
Virtualization technologies
Virtual machine speed-up technologies supported by Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987 are enumerated here.
| VT-d | + | - |
| VT-x | + | - |
| EPT | + | no data |
Memory specs
Types, maximum amount and channel quantity of RAM supported by Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequencies may be supported.
| Supported memory types | DDR4-2400 | DDR3 |
| Maximum memory size | 768 GB | 16.38 GB |
| Max memory channels | 6 | 2 |
| Maximum memory bandwidth | 115.212 GB/s | 21.335 GB/s |
| ECC memory support | + | - |
Graphics specifications
General parameters of integrated GPUs, if any.
| Integrated graphics card | no data | Intel HD Graphics for 2nd Generation Intel Processors |
| Graphics max frequency | no data | 1 GHz |
Graphics interfaces
Available interfaces and connections of Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987 integrated GPUs.
| Number of displays supported | no data | 2 |
| eDP | no data | + |
| DisplayPort | - | + |
| HDMI | - | + |
| SDVO | no data | + |
| CRT | no data | + |
Peripherals
Specifications and connection of peripherals supported by Xeon Gold 5120 and Pentium 987.
| PCIe version | 3.0 | 2.0 |
| PCI Express lanes | 48 | 16 |
Synthetic benchmarks
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.
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. Other than that, Passmark measures multi-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 | 10.28 | 0.40 |
| Recency | 11 July 2017 | 1 February 2013 |
| Physical cores | 14 | 2 |
| Threads | 28 | 2 |
| Chip lithography | 14 nm | 32 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 105 Watt | 17 Watt |
Xeon Gold 5120 has a 2470% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 4 years, 600% more physical cores and 1300% more threads, and a 128.6% more advanced lithography process.
Pentium 987, on the other hand, has 517.6% lower power consumption.
The Intel Xeon Gold 5120 is our recommended choice as it beats the Intel Pentium 987 in performance tests.
Be aware that Xeon Gold 5120 is a server/workstation processor while Pentium 987 is a notebook one.
Other comparisons
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