What is the best processor?

[Mhtml]

What in your opinion is the best processor? I'm thinking of going with 2 processors.

I want a processor that will go hard and fast and retain value for 2 years at least.

[mouse]

Xeon, Athlon MP or Mac are your only options really, or you can get a 3gig P4 which pretends to be a dual, as do the Xeons too so a dual would actually be a quad :eek:. The Xeon is the best but way more expensive motherboard wise. No comment on the Mac... :D

[Mhtml]

I'm sure I want a 3gig, but who preforms the best out of Athlon and Pentium?

Don't think I'll be able to buy a lot of other components if I go for an xeon though, I'm panning on having a lot of stuff in the box.

Also, a mac is out of the question.. *shudder*

[ionsurge]

Pentiums are what I stick with.

[mouse]

Hard to say how a dual Athlon would fare against a Hyperthreaded Pentium in a SMP capable app. The AMD would probably kick *** but then the Pentium's prowess would be determind by the type of threads it was recieving. I'd say a midrange dual Athlon would be awesome but you'd lose out a bit in non-SMP apps.

Really it depends on the type of stuff you do as to what's best. For most the Pentium would be, others - like me who use alot of SMP programs but only game casually - a dual Athlon might be better.

For a single cpu system I see the 3gig+ P4's as the way forward and a good bridge towards SMP without the expense. You still can't go wrong with either AMD or Intel's fast chips though.

[Mhtml]

Lol, what is SMP? I've no idea. :D
At the moment I only use my computer for basic webdev and graphics, so that includes proggys like studio MX and photoshop, xara x etc.

But that is only because it's all my machine can handle. I plan on throwing really heavy graphic work and lots of gaming at this computer I plan to build.

Graphics cards are next on my list to ask about.. I'm leaning towards GeForce but I don't have the hardware knowlege that Mouse seems to employ. :)

[Mhtml]

Ok, I was just reading about the P4 with HT ... I think I'm going to get that. Just have to make sure that I get all the other requirements to be able to use HT. Not sure at the price yet though.

Like I said before, I don't know much about this stuff. Anything wrong with the processor and HT ? I read a fair bit but since it was on the intel website it may be a bit biast.

[mouse]

Try this: http://anandtech.com/cpu/index.html

[sage45]

Just to add my two cents...

A dual processor system will only utilize both processors efficiently and effectively as long as the OS and the program being accessed allow for multi-threading/multi-processing... Most programs, being 32bit or better, do allow for multi-threading... The problem lies within the programs ability to use multiple processors...

As for HT for P4's, it is available on all P4's... It is just disabled as there are not alot of applications available to take advantage of this... For those who don't actually know, HT (Hyper Threading) allows for the P4 processor to request two threads of information from the os, in essence the processor presents itself to the system as two independent processors... Lab testing showed up to 30% boosts in performance... Personally I think don't think we'll see any vast improvements in performance till at least a 64-bit version of the processor line is introduced...

Also, it should be noted that placing two processors in a system does not mean that you have double the speed (IE - 2 - Pentium 2.4Ghz Processors does not equal 4.8Ghz), what it does translate into is simply this: Load sharing...

Here is the concept: If it takes program X 10 clock cycles to process this information on processor Y, then by adding processor Z we halve the clock cycles, providing that program X will recognize and utilize processors Y and Z. In other words what originally took 10 clock cycles will now take 5 as long as my program will send information to both processors...

-sage-

[oracleguy]

Also, on the subject of dual processors. You can in Windows 2000 server at least, professional may have this to, is you can set either temporarily or permenatly the CPU Affinity for a program.

Which means you can have it either share accross available CPUs or have Windows run it on a specific CPU(s).

So if you use several programs that can't take advantage of multi processors, just set the affinity on them so half is one CPU and half on the other.

[_Spud_]

Personally I would stick with the Athlon XP, they are very well priced, there is a wide range of motherboards for them, and they are just generally better than any of the intel competitors.

The the XP cpu’s are built on the .013 micron technology, so you will get a cpu that will run quite cool as well as fast

If you teamed that up with a nForce2 mobo you will have a cracking system

[mouse]

Originally posted by _Spud_
Personally I would stick with the Athlon XP, they are very well priced, there is a wide range of motherboards for them, and they are just generally better than any of the intel competitors.

The the XP cpu’s are built on the .013 micron technology, so you will get a cpu that will run quite cool as well as fast

If you teamed that up with a nForce2 mobo you will have a cracking system Athlon XP processors are:
a) not faster than Intel's P4's, check the benchmarks;
b) they do not have rock solid chipsets as provided by intel;
c) they do not allow any type of memory to be used, Intel allow sdram, ddr, 16-bit RDRAM, 32-bit RDRAM, dual channel DDR motherboards are now available too.
d) They don't run cooler, every P4 from 2.2GHz up and many from 1.6-2.0 are 0.13micron and have 512kb cache. My 0.13micron 1.8a chip is about a year old now.
e) AMD don't use hyperthreading technology which has now been proven to work quite well after a fair bit of doubt. Software taking advantage of this will be more prevailent as well as the benefit there already is in smp apps.
f) AMD's don't overclock as readily.

AMD make good processors, their top chip - if you can find one after AMD's series of paper releases - will compete with a top P4, but to say they're better than Intel's is just plain wrong. As value for money goes AMD may be better for some people. If I was buying a system now I'd go for a dual Athlon but only becasue it'd suit my work better than one 3gig P4 at similar money.

[Mhtml]

I think I'm going for a p4, I'll probably have to save a bit longer because I want 3.06ghz.

So far the cheapest I've found was $1340.99au. For non Australian people this is about £482.513 and $778.222us.

At least I think that was the price, can anyone find it cheaper?

[_Spud_]

QUOTE]Originally posted by mouse
Athlon XP processors are:
a) not faster than Intel's P4's, check the benchmarks;
b) they do not have rock solid chipsets as provided by intel;
c) they do not allow any type of memory to be used, Intel allow sdram, ddr, 16-bit RDRAM, 32-bit RDRAM, dual channel DDR motherboards are now available too.
d) They don't run cooler, every P4 from 2.2GHz up and many from 1.6-2.0 are 0.13micron and have 512kb cache. My 0.13micron 1.8a chip is about a year old now.
e) AMD don't use hyperthreading technology which has now been proven to work quite well after a fair bit of doubt. Software taking advantage of this will be more prevailent as well as the benefit there already is in smp apps.
f) AMD's don't overclock as readily.

AMD make good processors, their top chip - if you can find one after AMD's series of paper releases - will compete with a top P4, but to say they're better than Intel's is just plain wrong. As value for money goes AMD may be better for some people. If I was buying a system now I'd go for a dual Athlon but only becasue it'd suit my work better than one 3gig P4 at similar money. [/QUOTE]

a)Yes they are, in a direct comparison amd based chips are much faster per mhz
b)Yes they do, all VIA based chipsets are rock solid, so are the nforce base chipsets
c)And again yes they do, admittedly amd’s don’t work with RDRAM, but that is rubbish anyway.. they will work with most types of memory.
d)I did not say they run cooler, I said as they are built on 0.13 micron technology they run cooler than they used to.. not in comparison with Intel
e)bah, hyperthreading is crap, if you can activate it and make it work correctly then yes it will have a slight performance increase over the amd chips
f)LOL they don’t oc, you are joking right.. amd’s are the easiest chip to oc

[Flyte]

mouse: get your facts right before you post about such matters.
The only reason P4's benchmark higher is because they overclock higher. An Athlon XP at the same MHz as a P4 absolutely knocks t he socks off it. P4 may have HyperThreading technology, but that is only supported on the latest chips, and not supported by much software. The Athlon XP however has Quantispeed which isn't software reliant and is on *ALL* XP chips.
They may not have rock solid chipsets by intel.. but they have rock solid chipsets from *lots* of different manufacturers.
The choice of ram is irrelevant because DDR can match RDRAM at top spec.
AMD's don't overclock so readily granted, but when you do overclock them, they run a lot faster. My 1600+ for example has a stock speed of 1400MHz which I overclock to 1800MHz with an increase of ~3'C boosts my 3D Mark scores greatly. Just a 400MHz increase will give a 600MHz boost, because 1800MHz is a 2200+ speed.

There is not one side to this argument, so I'd just like to get the facts straight.

[Mhtml]

Hmm... Good information on both sides now. I'll really have to think about this decision but maybe I will let price play a larger role in this if AMD works out cheaper..

Thanks for the second side on this guys, that is if you are correct which I see no reason to doubt.

[_Spud_]

Mhtml, I would now take all this info we have given you and weigh up the best solution for you, do you want to go the Intel route, or the AMD route.

Don’t just look at the prices of the chip, look at the prices of the motherboards, cases mem and the heatsink etc

[Mhtml]

That'd be cool. :D
I think I'd go with intel..

[mouse]

Work per cycle is only relevant if you're comparing like for like clock speeds, Intel's top chip is 3GHz and the benchmarks (http://anandtech.com/cpu/index.html/) say it beats the top AMD chip without any overclocking, the AMd doesn't lose out completely but overall the P4 wins. Check out the Futuremark, 3Dmark2001 scores, Intel pretty well dominate when overclocking is introduced too. Nobody buying a new P4 will be getting one at anything near an AMD clock speed unless it's second hand and maybe destined for high fsb overclocking such as the 1.6a's that were reaching 3.2GHz on their standard heatsinks last year. Nobody cares if they're chip is working really hard at a low frequency, they care about the time taken to complete a task and on current form that's the P4.

DDR can't beat - or come close - to either PC800 or PC1066 RDRAM on bandwidth. DDR will edge PC800 on latency. Bandwidth therough the cpu is becoming more important hence next year's 800MHz core chips from both Intel and AMD.

AMD is an option, not one I dismiss readily either. The NForce boards are quality imo, nVidia has almost saved AMD who've suffered from Via's reputation for years.

I feel Intel are on top now, they could release their 3.2-3.4 chips and leave AMD in deep trouble (AMD are in massive debt) but I feel they don't do it because a) AMD are good competition and Intel can't be a monopoly; and b) AMD are bringing some new technology to the fore in the next few years which Intel will happily take advantage of.

[sage45]

Originally posted by Flyte
P4 may have HyperThreading technology, but that is only supported on the latest chips, and not supported by much software. The Athlon XP however has Quantispeed which isn't software reliant and is on *ALL* XP chips.

To correct this, HT is available on *ALL* P4 chips... not just the latest...

"Hyper-Threading was officially announced at the Intel Developer Forum last fall and it was demonstrated running on a Xeon processor performing a Maya rendering task. In that test the single Xeon with Hyper-Threading enabled was 30% faster than a regular Xeon CPU. The performance benefits were definitely impressive and even more exciting was the unspoken fact that Hyper-Threading is actually present on all Pentium 4 and Xeon cores; it is simply disabled."

Also it should be noted that HT is not software driven... It is as I said, the software (OS, Applications) need to be able to take advantage of it, but it is not driven by the software nor does it need a software interface... The chip actually presents itself to the system as two independent processors...

"Hyper-Threading is the marketing name applied to a technology that has been around outside of the x86 realm for a little while now - Simultaneous Multi-Threading (SMT). The idea behind SMT is simple; the single physical CPU appears to the OS as two logical processors but the OS does not see any difference between one SMT CPU and two regular CPUs. In both cases the OS dispatches two threads to the "two" CPUs and the hardware takes it from there."

"In a Hyper-Threading enabled CPU, each logical processor has its own set of registers (including a separate PC) but in order to minimize the complexity of the technology, Intel's Hyper-Threading does not attempt to simultaneously fetch/decode instructions corresponding to two threads. Instead, the CPU will alternate the fetch/decode stages between the two logical CPUs and only attempt to execute operations from two threads simultaneously thus addressing the problem of poor execution unit utilization."

Now this being said, I have been a long time AMD fan and fanatic... So I am not presenting a biased opinion, I am stating facts...

Read more about it here:

http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1576&p=1

-sage-

[Mhtml]

lol, I have never learnt so much about processors in the one spot. This thread should surely be archived?

Hmm, I am thinking I will get a p4 2.6ghz processor.

said To correct this, HT is available on *ALL* P4 chips... not just the latest...

The chip info says that to but the intel website says this..

Hyper-Threading Technology requires a computer system with an Intel® Pentium® 4 processor at 3.06 GHz or higher, a chipset and BIOS that utilize this technology, and an operating system that includes optimizations for this technology. Performance will vary depending on the specific hardware and software you use. See http://www.intel.com/info/hyperthreading/ for information.

Now I am confused, if the chip says that it is hyper-threading capable why does intel say otherwise, I mean they made the chip.

[Mhtml]

http://www.intel.com/products/desktop/processors/pentium4/index.htm

That's the page I got that exerpt from. So will a p4 2.66ghz processor be able to utilize hyper-threading ? Should I contact the intel support and ask?

[sage45]

Originally posted by sage45
unspoken fact that Hyper-Threading is actually present on all Pentium 4 and Xeon cores; it is simply disabled."

Unspoken is the keyword here... It is disabled... Intel should be able to provide a utility to enable it...

-sage-

[Mhtml]

Oh ok, I missed that part :) Thanks sage45. :D

[deskoh91]

Intel Pentium 4 3.06GHz w/ HT (Hyper-threading). It is COOL! I am curently using it and it is VERY stable and fast. But you need WinXP Pro to use HT, although XP Home supports it too but it works like ****.

Xeon? Not bad but can cost you a bomb. prepare more than S$6000 for a little above average Xeon, compared to $3000 something for P4 3.06. But Xeons generally are more powerful and stable.

Macintosh does not even come into my mind. It is lousy performance compared to P4s and Xeons.

[deskoh91]

sorry! That censored thing I wondered how it poped up. All I typed is Xeon!

[mouse]

Originally posted by deskoh91
sorry! That censored thing I wondered how it poped up. All I typed is Xeon! You're what? Australian? just guessing from the $3000.

Xeon's are just P4's with mambo cache, although they've had hyperthreading for a while. The expensive thing is the motherboards really which cost more than the cpu's themselves.

My new 2.4A P4 is running at 43oC under heavy, constant load, I'm somewhat impressed :D

[deskoh91]

Sorry! I have to admit that my information on CPUs is bad. This is because my friend told me about that. I personally did not do any research and so I blindly followed it. Sorry about that!

[Mhtml]

$3000? Geez, lol. $2000au is a whole system. :D

[deskoh91]

nah... I am in Singapore. US$1 is actually S$2.10

[mouse]

Might be able to track down some ES chips (also known as "Intel Confidential") in Singapore, some of these have unlocked multipliers like in the old days so you can switch either FSB or multiplier for the optimum overclock.

[Thejavaman1]

Originally posted by mouse
Might be able to track down some ES chips (also known as "Intel Confidential") in Singapore, some of these have unlocked multipliers like in the old days so you can switch either FSB or multiplier for the optimum overclock.

Also if you look around on some of the for sale forums at [H] and the other major sites you may be able to find an ES chip, they are not that cheap though...

[oracleguy]

Supposdly Intel is supposed to release HT enabled CPUS from the 2.4 range up to 3 in the first half of this year.

I just built for my dad a Pentium 4 2.4Ghz with 1GB of PC1066 RIMM on a ASUS P4T533-C mobo and it is very fast. And with a 80Gig western digital with 8meg cache, windows xp pro boots practically instantly.

I used to be a big supporter of AMD but their lack of progress has sorta turned me off to them. I mean yeah internally they may work better but their clock speed is just so low. And I hate the PR codes they use. I remember when they used to do that back in the Pentium 1 days with their K5's and they stopped cuz people hated it.

Like for example, I bulit my computer in Dec '01. It's a AXP 1600+ with 512MB of PC2100 DDR. I have really good mobo in it. And I was planning on updgrading the processor, double the ram, and add an additional 100gigs of space in it this June. (Because it isn't in my budget to completely replace the thing until Aug. of '04) Anyways, my point is that if I go buy a new CPU for it, I can get a 2400+ that really only runs at 2.06GHz (isn't that correct? it is so hard keeping the dumb PR codes straight) That can gain me an amazing 600MHz and what if I want an AXP that has a supposdly better internal architecture than a P4 at maybe 2.8Gigs? I can't because AMD just doesn't have their CPUs fast enough.

With Intel releasing the Titan P4 soon with a 667Mhz FSB, AMD really needs to get their act together. What's the Athlon 64 coming out with, FSB wise? It should be at least 533, if AMD was smart.

Excuse the ranting; I'd recommend going the Intel route. It just seems to have more scalibity in the long term than AMD. I mean it's good AMD is around because without some compition Intel could charge whatever they want for their CPUs because they'd be the only thing in town.

[Mhtml]

Yup, I've decided on exactly that. I've read so much on the web and in magazines to help me come to that decision.

Originally posted by oracleguy:
I mean it's good AMD is around because without some compition Intel could charge whatever they want for their CPUs because they'd be the only thing in town.


Hmm, but with AMD lagging they can charge whatever they want. I mean the 3.06Ghz is a rip-off , you get it is priced significantly higher than the 3.0Ghz ..

I plan on getting a 2.66Ghz .. Still not sure on my motherboard yet.

[oracleguy]

Originally posted by Mhtml

Hmm, but with AMD lagging they can charge whatever they want. I mean the 3.06Ghz is a rip-off , you get it is priced significantly higher than the 3.0Ghz ..

I plan on getting a 2.66Ghz .. Still not sure on my motherboard yet.

Good point, I hadn't thought of that. :)

Mobo wise...
The ASUS P4T533 is a good one. It has 2 rimm slots and onboard RAID.
http://usa.asus.com/mb/socket478/p4t533/overview.htm

The ASUS P4T533-C is a variant of the above one. The plus is that it has 4 rimm slots but the downside is that there is no onboard IDE RAID.
http://usa.asus.com/mb/socket478/p4t533-c/overview.htm

I've used both mobos with 2.4gig P4s. And whats cool is that they have a socket for a standard power connector so you don't need a P4 power supply. ASUS calls it EZ Plug.

Just make sure if you are going the RIMM route, and you should if you can afford it, that the mobo has the Intel 850E chipset.

[mouse]

The granite bay dual DDR stuff looks good too. Probably better buy for the future too 'd suggest as the DDR could pass over into another DDR system where RDRAM seems to have an uncertain future.

AMD are hardly lagging, not really, I personally think Intel's new technology is a better bet than AMD for the future; with more HT and SSE optimised software you're only going to get more speed for your 3GHz. With an XP2700 you'll not get this but you'll still have a very fast chip.

I'm using an Abit TH7-II (don't buy one :D) which only supports a 23 multiplier with my 24x100 chip :o seems to mean no overclocking for me until I can get a newer - preferably cracked - bios. My mission at the moment is silencing everything so I can leave my machine on overnight, much harder than overclocking believe me...

I maybe wrong but I understood Intel to have dropped 667MHz bus' in favour of the full 800MHz rising to 1.2GHz for the Tejas core. This along with huge cache. AMD will be 800MHz too and clock will increase a fair bit too, the problem is that Clawhammer is already being talked of in some places as a Duron-esque chip with Intel's Prescott core competing with the Sledgehammer.

Current mobos won't support these chips anyway, they'll probably run dual DDR ram so future technology won't be relevant to your hardware choice.

[Thejavaman1]

Originally posted by mouse

I'm using an Abit TH7-II (don't buy one :D) which only supports a 23 multiplier with my 24x100 chip :o seems to mean no overclocking for me until I can get a newer - preferably cracked - bios. My mission at the moment is silencing everything so I can leave my machine on overnight, much harder than overclocking believe me...


Is is bad when my Vantec Tornado seems quiet? :D


Mobo wise, I would get one of the Abit IT-7 or IT7IIv2 mobo's. I have the IT7 and have been very happy with it...