Intel P4 vs AMD

brobear

ive know about HDDVD vs Blue Ray for a while and alot about VHS vs betamax btu this time round hollywood is split down the middle

 

Unless things have changed Blu-Ray is not the consortiums choice and never will be and that hurts Sony a bit. And Blu-Ray is not back compatible which means that people with sizeable DVD collections would have to have an extra machine because they're not going to rebuild or give up their collections. HD-DVD isn't quite as good as Blu-Ray but it's the consortiums choice, it's backed by Microsoft, it stores enough to allow for high quality HD video, and even better is that it is back compatible which means a lot to collectors will make it their first choice.

 

I'll still be watching backups on DVD5 more than likely when they finally decide. I have a DL burner, but I didn't buy into DL when they first brought it out and I'm still not buying those overpriced DL recordable discs. The way things are looking, if DL doesn't come down soon, it may go the way of the Edsel, especially with the new technology coming online in the next year or so. By the time I invest, I think I'll be able to be sure the consortium has it's way or not. Sometimes the industry caves to the wishes of the customers. Case in point is the VHS.

 

I agree, I'll stay mostly with type 5s for now but I've also been buying some dual layer discs for those really large filed long running movies. The price has finally come down to where having a few around has become worth it. At newegg you can get a 10 Pak of Verbatim dual layer for $20.99 or about $2.10 each.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817131163

If you don't mind the Ridata dual layer they're now selling in 25 packs for $29.99 or about a $1.20 each. When the price starts dropping on media it drops fast so I expect them in a year to be around $.50 or less per disc.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817132394

 

Thanks for the info Sophocles. About the time the new toys come along, they finally start getting the prices down on DL media. Looks like they've milked the situation for about all it will bear. I may be able to start using some of the DL in the foreseeable future.

 

Noo, i understand that the xp is old, is it as good as the p4?
cause it is a 32 bit right?
And i am getting my dad's old computer... He is getting a 30.0 duel core from dell.... long story short. i get better computer and i need upgrades to make it nice.. BTW. do you know if you can overclock it?

My dad said maby he can, only if the mobo will let him..

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Triock

 

Factory boards don't usually allow any adjustments. So, you're out of luck unless the system you're getting has a custom board. There are old slow P4s and then there are faster newer ones. Depends on which you're comparing your XP to. There's benchmarks, if they go back far enough, on hardware sites that give decent comparisons of different processors. Basically, a stock 2.0 XP would be comparable to a Pentium running at 2GHz. Until recently the numbers used on AMD processors corresponded to the actual speeds of Intel processors they compared to. It won't be a big time gamer, but you'll have a good usable PC, if all the components are in good shape. Good luck with it.

BTW, most systems are still 32 bit. 64 bit is fairly new. AMD went big time with it first and now Intel is getting in on the show. Very little software has been written for the 64 bit systems to date. It's supposed to be a big thing coming up though.

My next system will be 64 bit, but I'm not running out to get one anytime soon. As I mentioned before, I'm waiting to see what happens this coming year. There's going to be some interesting changes coming along and I want to see how the tech develops. Besides, those new dual cores are still at a premium. As more come on line, the prices will drop to where frugal sorts like myself can buy in.

 

have a A64 3000 venice core yet i cant overclock it more than 2.0ghz. ive been in the adanvances overlcocking menu and set teh mem clock to 200 mhz to prevent overlcoking of my memory and oc just the cpu and anything over 2.0 right after the IDE test and mem test screen(first phase of BIOS) the next screen comes up but instead of the usual readouts i get a blinking underscore.... any suggestions?

the usual temp of my cpu is anywhere from 34 to 45 C depending if load or idle

 

matt5112

Post the memory make and speed and perhaps we can help you pump your speed a bit. And motherboard make and model.

 

motherboard is Giga-byte K8NXP-SLI Ver 1.0 and memory are both samsung running in dual channel runinng at PC3200/ 400mhz. even with the memory clock locked and spread spectrum disabled i cant get higher than 1.98 ghz. would have my PCI-E bus clocked to 110 mhz instead of the default 100mhz contribute to this?

 

matt5112

Lower your hyper transport to 4 instead of 5, unlock your memory and set timings to 3-3-3-8 and then try.

 

soo should i get a better board for it? and would it be worth it?
BTW.. I want to use this as an media computer... you know, get a nice slim case and put a dvd rom and a nice sound card... So it has a 256 mg video card,I know i can get a dvi converter for it.. 1. do you have any suggestions.. and would you go with a small case for looks or a larger one that you can put the full sized pci, and agp cards???

I need dome help on that..

Thanks,
Triock

 

Sophocles

no luck with that the most i can get is stil 220mhz... thanks for trying i am going to reflash my bios to a later version an see if that helps
im running F7 it had F6 on it but im pretty sure theres an F8

Triock

If you are looking for a good home media center case then go to www.thermaltake.com they offer a couple different cases with a load of features.

 

Matt,
The memory speed is how you overclock. If you have good memory it can be OCed past 230 easily but to use non high performance memory you can set the meory clock to 166 or lower to allow higher proc speed.
At 166 then you can bump the FSB to 240 or so and keep the memory in the 200mhz range.
Also the NF4 chipset doesn't like some memory and will overclock poorly untill better memory is purchased.
A trick if you have poorly OCing memory is to set the FSB normal in bios and use Clockgen to increase it from Windows. A 220 max FSB from bios can go 250 from Windows if the Mem clock is set down to 166.

 

64026402

thanks i am considering getting 2-3-2-5 OCZ mem 2x512mb to overclock my cpu to get equivilent to 3500 speeds but im not sure if its worth it because i can get that memory for $200 and a 3500 for $250

 

Hmmm... slow processor and poor memory...
And the 3500 will need better memory to function at it's best as well.

 

well that settles it... because thats whats holding my computer back.

 

Low quality memory will hamper the performance of just about any system. Lower quality memory is usually reserved for the low budget market where peak performance isn't an issue. It shouldn't be a choice at all for a good custom build. Using poor memory is building a bottleneck into a sytem from the start. Don't overlook the chipset in use on your mobo either. Make sure it's capable of what you're wanting to do and not just being capable of accepting the processor you want to plug in. You'll find that especially important in graphics and gaming.

 

Good memory for this board is important. OCZ is known to work well on NF4 boards. The proc will be fine until you get enough for a dual core or maybe a San Diego proc.

 

If you want a fast processor to reach its potential you have to provide for high quality memory. Next to a badly binned processor it's the single greastest cause of overclock failure. As far as overclocking is concerned it's often about give and take. I suggested that you lower your hyper transport speeds to 4X instead of 5X and that sounds like your giving up some front side bus speed, but look at it like this. Your native frontside bus speed is 5 times 200 mhz which gives you a frontside bus speed of 1000 mhz. Now lets look at 4 times 250 mhz which also gives you a frontside bus of 1000 mhz but your CPU speed with a clock multiplier of 9 gives you a processor speed of 2250 mhz. If you want a command rate of 1T then you're probably going to have to lower your frontside bus speed to 4 times 240. Now your processors speed is lowered to 2160 mhz but your memory has gained about 20%.