Compassion Posted December 24, 1999 Share Posted December 24, 1999 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>And the 500A will require what kind of board (and at what cost?)<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> You will need to buy a new mobo, yes. it runs on the same kind of Socket 370 that all PPGA Celerons run on. Basically any board that'll take the clock adjustment will do fine. I'm using an Abit BE6 mobo that cost me about a hundred bucks (and about $10 for a riser card for the slot1 to PPGA converter). it uses standard 100mhz sdram on a 100mhz bus, so it's not running on a 133... which is not a big deal to me. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>What are the drawbacks vis a vis a PIII or Athlon ?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Drawbacks? Well, if you overclock any chip you void it's waranty... but other than that? Some think that the Celeron's half sized L2 cache is a problem. I disagree and think that the cache is plenty fast enough to feed instructions to the CPU and be able to grab more at the same time. I've not had a problem with it when runing multiple apps. It's my opinion... and take that for what it's worth, that you really wouldn't see much of a decrease in performance becasue of the cache until you started running a fairly busy server. Other drawbacks? I dunno. The FSB might bother some people, but comparisons that I've seen either at Tom's or Anand show that the difference is pretty marginal. For my money, it's not with the upgrade to PC133 ram (unless you are starting from scratch that is). I upgrded from a K6-2 400 and am quite happy. The only real drawback that I can thikn of is weather it'll be available in quantity on schedule. Someone said that Intel was having a yeild problem. That's a good one... Yeilds have never been higher, in fact there have been 2 perfect wafers this year (which doesn't sound like much, but I think that brings the grand total to something like 7 in the history of the company). But the reality is that Intel is flat sold out. The fabs are running full tilt, and are not too far behind, but have not caught up to demand in the last couple months. With a major retooling done this month, and more facilities going to .18 in the coming months (and some new building) they should be selling to demandpromptly, but if your upgrade is goign to me in the next month, you should have no problem finding most parts, but a part that may be brand new (and probably not out yet even) like the 500A, you'll probably have a hard time. Clay- P.S. Please don't tell anyone about my AMD chip... [This message has been edited by Compassion (edited 12-23-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eridani Posted December 24, 1999 Share Posted December 24, 1999 Compassion- Interesting... the grapevine (fine. theregister) has been saying that intel can't get the yields up on the new Coppermines, same cache problem that AMD had with its k6-3's... I've also heard that from a few other sources (most notable cnet news)... Athlon is still a FAR better processor than the PIII (let alone the celeron, but I do have to admit that its a good deal for the price (hey, I'm running a 450 300A at home on one of my computers myself)... no way an 800 mhz celeron will touch a 800-850 Athlon, but pricewise it'll probably be half the price. Thanks for the inside info btw, I'll keep it in mind. -EridanMan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest scurlock Posted December 24, 1999 Share Posted December 24, 1999 I own an AMD K6III 450 mh. You'd probably do just as well or better with an AMD K6II 500. Get with your motherboard manufacturer to see if it will support the faster CPU speeds. Odds are it will. More ram is another option to speed up your machine, but ram is expensive now. You should have at least 128mb ram in your system. I'd recommend a new motherboard thaat supports the AMD Athalon, but I'd wait 'till a motherboard goes into production that supports 4X AGP. I'd also be careful to make sure your current case will adequately cool the new high speed (Athalon/coppermine)processors, whether it be an AMD or Intel machine. I'm not familiar with the configurations of these new computers, not having gotten my hands on one, nor have I been in the market, but my impression is they require cases with an extra cooling fan. Check out www.adamant.com. They have verry reasonable prices, custom configurations, and outstanding service. Just make sure you wait for that 4x agp supportable motherboard before you build an Athalon based system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest John Maragoudakis Posted December 24, 1999 Share Posted December 24, 1999 You are all thinking about speed, price and availability. Important points for sure. Do you want a laptop or a desktop computer? Laptops are fast now. Do you want to be chained at home? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Compassion Posted December 25, 1999 Share Posted December 25, 1999 Eridani: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Interesting... the grapevine (fine. theregister) has been saying that intel can't get the yields up on the new Coppermines, same cache problem that AMD had with its k6-3's...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well, my info is always from a couple weeks to a few weeks old as I'm in IT, and not at a FAB myself. I do talk to engineers fairly regularly "off the record" and have heard none of what you are reporting, but it could be happeneing. With what's been booked and what's possible in the FABS, not even what likely yeilds are, we're still sold out. The compnay is making the old Digital fab in MA conform to standards to start cranking .18 product a priority next quarter. But you know what? I'm glad that AMD came up with the Athlon and are even getting decent yeilds (from what I understand they have been pleasently suprised by the quality they're getting) in Austin and Dresden should be up soon. It was fun being the only real game in town for a few years, but the Intel way is to fight in the marketplace. We ahd the luxury of laying off for a few years through the mid 90's (well, except for the legal staff ). I think that this is an odd compnay that doesn't get scared, but gets that scary kind of calm focus. I'm starting to see that again, and that bodes well for us the consumers. A focused Intel and a committed AMD means good prices and a faster pace of innovation. Hope no one loses and no one wins in this thing (and of course keeping the balance of power the way it is is also in my interest... or at least my portfolio's ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Captain Foobar Posted December 25, 1999 Share Posted December 25, 1999 Ok, the factors discussed have been price, speed, availability. But what about *reliability*, does anyone have any strong views for or against any brand-name in particular? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionn Posted December 25, 1999 Author Share Posted December 25, 1999 I've heard that some of the Athlon motherboards have some reliability problems running the Athlons. Also I've heard that in some of them the AGP slot is messed up (more proof if needed that I am no tech junkie ) and so the AGP cards don't work. ------------------ ___________ Fionn Kelly Manager of Historical Research, The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eridani Posted December 25, 1999 Share Posted December 25, 1999 Compassion- Amen to that... I have a friends who are very paritisan, AMD or Intel one-sided (I myself in noticably biased as I'm sure is clear)... but Whether you love AMD or hate them, thier viscious competition with Intel has had one clear winner, consumers everwhere. Intel was forced to get on the ball, AMD was forced to create strong products to compete, and both were(are) forced to keep prices low... No matter what team you root for, the winners are clear us. -EridanMan Merry Christmas to all and to all a goodnight, tis time for me to retire (at my brothers right now... the kids are probably going to wake us up in a few hours because "SANTA CAME"... uggh) Christmas was so much more fun on the other end... and remind me never to have kids Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Madmatt Posted December 25, 1999 Share Posted December 25, 1999 The compatability iussue that you mention was between the AGP slot and Nvidea based video cards (TNT,TNT2,GeForce). Nvideas chipsets have very high power requirements and they really push the reuirements of the APG slots. The problem that has occured is that some Athlon motherboard manufacturers skimped out on the AGP specs and cut a few corners. What is happening is that the motherboards are either not producing enough consistant power into the AGP slot or the slot is not properly shielded and is picking up interference off of the other motherboard componets. The result is that you may get no video whatsoever or the system will not be stable. Recent drivers from Nvidea have provided a workaround which basicaly disables the higher AGP x2 and x4 support thereby slowing down the practical speed of the chipset. This problem most manifests itself with Athlon systems running Geforce cards and too a much smaller extent the Ulta Tnt 2 cards. Both AMD and Nvidea are still working on a fix but at this point it will require the OEM motherboard manufacturers to up-spec their boards. There is evidence to say that this already happening but it doesn't do the exisitng Athlon/Geforce owners any good. Now please note that this is not affecting all Athlons and Geforces but it has occured in enough cases to neccesitate action from both Nvidea (releasing somewhat 'downgraded' drivers) and AMD (forcing motherboard manufacturing to abide by specs much closer and reduce overall frequency interfernce) So whats all this mean? Personally I would take a wait and see approach if I was intending on using a Geforce and Athlon combo at present. Check the usenet newsgroups that are dedicated to Athlons and Video cards to guage just how many people are still having problems. If I were to use any other video card (non Nvidea based) then I see no reason (baring personal ones! )to not look into the Athlon as it is a very fine chip with a good performace to cost ratio. Madmatt out ------------------ If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ! combathq.thegamers.net Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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