Intel P4 vs AMD

sammorris

It is largely due to the higher clock speed along with Hyper Threading, but both measures are ratios of the other. If one goes up 100 then the other goes down 100 but the general performance remains about the same. in other words a Dhrystone of 10,000 and a floating point of 7000 rusn about the same speed as a Dhrystone of 11,000 and whetstone of 6000. Hyper Threading also works well with Sisoft and it makes some of the scores look good but in real world situations where the CPU is under full load the advantages slip away.

Floating point used to be a measure of how well a CPU functioned in gaming but as everyone knows tha AMD's have the advantage in gaming so where are the differences coming from? In real world use Hyper Threading is always availble do to the demands made by an application which renders different results. There's another specification that is missing here and that is front side bus and memory speed. Here AMD wins hands down.

 

brobear

It's not surprising that the 3.4 Northwood will perform as well as a 3.8 Prescott. The problem with all P4's but even more with the Prescotts is that as one clocks them higher they tend to get hot. The heat is caused by resistance which means that much of the increased voltage and clock speed processor gains are being lost in thermal energy. This was one of the big slams that Intel got when it released its 3.8 570, it had more clock speed but wasn't giving much back in return, especially since the 3.6 Ghz 561 was almost as fast for more than $240 less.

 

Sophocles
Seems everyone agrees Intel's quest for speed was a shot in the foot.

Considering the chipsets in the comparison, the Northwood and the old 875P on the OEM Dell board didn't give too bad a showing. I wonder what that would look like with an Asus board where the memory timing could be set properly?



AS you can see, the timing on this OEM board is pretty bad.

 

Have you checked to see if their is a setting that goes something like this. Memory "by speed." I seem to recall that option was available on the Dells at work. Cas 2 should come up cas2 regardless of the make. Call Dell and ask them why you're getting CAS 3 readings. it should read

2-3-2-6 timings.


Is your PC a tower or small form desktop?

 

It's a tower. I checked the Memory and there's little in there on this board. All I can change is the AGP memory setting. I suspect the memory settings are locked on this one. It's probably reading what it was built for and not what's been installed. I guess I'm lucky I could change the processor.

 

If it's a tower than you might be able use it for a build without having to spring for a case. That could mean that you're only a motherboard away from more options. I stongly recommend this board for it's features and price. I bought a refurbished board and it works great. It came in a box with all the cables and everything.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131492R

http://usa.asus.com/products4.aspx?l1=3&l2=12&l3=31&model=178&modelmenu=1

l8nights has just finished his first build. He went with an Asus P5DL2-VM and a Dual core Intel chip but he didn't say which one.

All this building makes one feel warm and fuzzy all over, I think I'll go window shopping at newegg.LOL

 

That warehouse must be a palace.

 

Brobear, can you click on the SPD tab of CPU-Z and post a picture here of your memory?

 

scubabud

Forget it I was looking at the wrong switch.

 

LOL Not only can I, but I will. It's what I noted in my sig. DELL has just about everything locked down in the BIOS on this system.

 

brobear

The spd switch just identifies how fast your memory is based on what your bios tells it. It's the memory switch that tells you what your actual settings are. If you have CAS2 memory then it should state that. Have you considered the need for a bios update?

 

I'm aware of that. I was wondering why ScubaBud wanted to see it after I'd already posted the Memory screenshot. As I noted, all it added was the info I had posted in my sig. The last time I checked, the BIOS was the latest Dell had on this system. I updated it last year and I've not seen a newer one.

 

I just wanted to make sure that what I felt was correct, my memory that is supposed to be exactly the same, isn't. I have 4 sticks. Here are three screen shots so tell me what you see wrong with this picture:

By the way it is supposed to be 2-3-2-6

 

scubabud

All that the SPD switch does is tell you what your memory is rated for. Your memory is rated for CAS2.5 under normal use with a standard frontside bus 200 mhz which is what your P4 is rated for. You're also running another pair of memory sticks that are rated for 166 Mhz fontside bus at CAS2. You're running two pairs of memory that are mismatched but since your system hasn't crashed or slowed down then and since the 166 Mhz memory is CAS2 it seems to be running Okay at 200 Mhz frontside bus.

 

@Sophocles

Thanks, I understand that, but the problem is that I just found out “two years later” that what should have been EXACTLY the same memory purchased from Newegg.com wasn't. All four sticks are supposed to be 2-3-2-6. Believe me when I say that all packages are exactly the same. The only difference is that memory isn't. When I saw the CPU-Z pic of Brobear is when I decided to do the same for my memory and that’s when I realized why I could never get the timings down to where they should be. Look at the Sandra pic and you can see the different speeds from both channels as well. Cas of 2 will not work but 2.5 will, two sticks are 2.5 and two are 2.0. I also cannot get any better then 2.5-3-3-6, close but no cigar.

I’m sure you’d be pissed as well but like you say, they are still close and work fairly well.

One last thing, all four slots show exactly the same memory, (200) when you select 1-4, just different serial numbers for each.

 

That's because your CAS2 memory is PC 2700 not PC 3200, and it was meant for a 533 mhz Intel frontside bus or a 333 mhz AMD system. It was never meant to run at 200 Mhz natively. If you put it in an intel system by itself you see that it's actually 133.3 Mhz times 4 where as in an AMD Barton core system it would be 166 Mhz times two.

 

Now you lost me... If this is:

Kingston HyperX 512MB (2 x 256MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory - Retail

you are telling me that it is really PC2700?

 

Only the two sticks that are rated at 166 mhz CAS2 the other stick that is rated at 200 mhz CAS2.5 is PC3200. Or at least that's the way your bios reads them.

Intel frontside bus are quad pumped meaning that the real frontside bus of your memory is either 166 Mhz (read 133.3 by intel times 4 is 533 mhz) while your other memory stick that is rated at 2..0 Mz times 4 is 800 mhz frontside bus

 

One other note:

I switched the memory from one set to the other and still CPU-Z reads the same so it is either a reflection of my Asus Board or a glitch in CPU-Z.

 

I have four identical sticks, even the code on each one is exactly the same including 2.6V, etc. The only difference is the serial numbers of each stick when I select 1-4 in CPU-Z. Same heat sink's, same packaging, same everything. And like I just mentioned, I just switched banks and got the same results with CPU-Z showing one bank at 166 and the other at 200. My board has twin banks, one set black, one set blue. P4P800-Deluxe Asus.