After running enough test runs on the 8150, at 3.6ghz the IPC penalties are quite severe, compared to 4ghz where in take Cinebench it jumps over a full point above a i5 and just behind a i7, considering the intended highest end Zambezi's were intended to be 2 billion transistors deep running at 4ghz up to 4.5ghz on boost and with far reaching overclocking potential, I will do the nvidia thing and call Zambezi a Half Bulldozer, which when you look at how badly skimped down the specs where due to GF not perfecting the 32nm process it is very much a plan B.
So if we take a FX 8150 at 4ghz and it gives in between i5 and i7 results, it is not half as bad as made out to be, and very far from what it was intended to be. Vs its direct replacement the Thubans.
1] IMC sub 10s in MaxXMem admittedly with only 4GB of DDR3 1333 (waiting to recieve AMD branded modules to test soon and this was all I had on me) that itself is very impressive considering a 4ghz 1100T does like 22s.
2] IPC, considering that a higher clock speed would have mitigated the loss of IPC, compare 3.6 to 4ghz is over a point in Cinebench and 200marks more in 3DM11, I will honestly say nothing was gained or lost, the 1100T still remains a fantastic processor in light of all this, running my 1100T vs my 8150 it seems to be the same thing on aggregate.
3] Power control and efficiency. A thuban needs 1.4+ v to hold stable at 4Ghz, 1.280v to hold stable at stock. The FX is far better on voltage stability, While it loses control at high overclocks the FX is still day to day the more efficient chip in that regard. FX running 4.4ghz at 1.315v stable, 4ghz 1100T 1.425v.
Fast forward to PD, achieved clock speed intended, Resonant clock mesh as intended, Bolt on instruction sets, improvements to front end and memory controller notably fixes to latency which should help micro stutters, but still well down on transistor counts.
Overall Zambezi is not as bad as made out, but not as good as intended...but most definitely far from 20/30/50% numbers I have heard.
I have only encountered stuttering at extremely high graphic settings with the fastest GPU's on the market, and multi GPU's as well, starts to get noticable at GTX670/HD7950 level.