64-bit Toys for Athlon-64?

gbulmash asks: "I'm looking to see just how much performance I can squeeze out of a new Athlon-64 system. This isn't for benchmarking, but more like you got a new car and you're looking for a long, straight road where you can push the needles into the red before letting off the gas (and then maybe a twisty mountain road to test cornering). Can the all-knowing Slashdot readers recommend some AMD-64 enabled/optimized distros and packages that will let us new proud papas of AMD-64 systems fully open up the throttle on these bad girls and see what they're made of?"

What tools can be used to bech Linux period?

[schotty]

Other than compiling an app and timing the time spent, what are good tools in general that can be used?

You should already have something to test it with.

[jkc120]

Ok, so maybe this is a bit troll-ish, but if you've spent the money to buy one of these things, wouldn't you have a target _application_ to run on said platform?

I mean, the only thing you've proven is you can purchase something hot off the assembly line so that it can sit there and do 0 work for you. Don't you have an application or server or _something_ that you intend to use this machine for?

If not, I hope you have some kind of justification for this box for your management in their budget ;)