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Subject: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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Original Message 1/32 25-Nov-00 @ 12:06 AM - Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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Just read the PC Pro tests on the new Intel Pentium 4 and it makes interesting reading. On their floating point performance test, the most important for Audio performance, the P4 1.5GHz only scored 884MIPS compared to the 1GHz Athlons stunning 1386MIPS! On normal applications there was little difference between the chips and the P4 was quicker for 3D (games) by 20%. These are amazing results given that the P4 was clocked 50% faster than the Athlon. Even more intersting is that you can actually buy a 1.2GHz Athlon now, whereas I doubt you'd get your hands on a P4 until early next year.

Intel will claim the worlds fastest chip, but it's real world performance that matters, not clock speed and for that the Athlon looks the best choice. Maybe software specifically compiled for the P4 will run quicker, but do we really want to have to get new versions of our software every time a new chip is launched? No wonder Intels sales figures are so poor!

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Message 2/32 25-Nov-00 @ 05:57 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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Intel can't continue to drive the market as fast as it is. It's products are starting to suffer, and everybody's working on crazy overpowered machines in the consumer market... I mean, I wouldn't need this 700mhz Athlon to surf the web, I can do that on the P-166 I gave to my mother...

I still develop at work on a Dell P-II 300mhz laptop at work. I have no complaints...

-Craig

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Message 3/32 26-Nov-00 @ 10:48 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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Yeah, check out the testing done at this site.....

www.tomshardware.com

and you'll see very similar results. He even overclocked a P4 to 1.7Ghz and it wasn't faster than a 1.2 Athlon!!

Pretty fucked up really.

Si.

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Message 4/32 27-Nov-00 @ 10:00 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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I worked out from Intels own figures that even if the code was compiled with the P4 optimisation the 1.5GHz P4 would only just beat the 1GHz Athlon by about 10%! which is not noticable to the user.

So you can by an AMD chip that gives higher performance than the latest Intel chip and at far lower cost.

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Message 5/32 28-Nov-00 @ 01:25 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

easyed

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The whole point of the new architecture is that it will allow them to ramp up the clockspeed a lot quicker, so there is no point in buying the first ones on the market. Pentium came out at 100 and went to 200, P2 started at 233 or whatever and went up to 450, P3 launched at 450 and went to a gig (*almost* 1.13Ghz, heheh)so you can expect the P4 to end up doing at least 3-4 Ghz, some ppl are predicting even faster speeds....
Also, have a look at the link above concerning optimisation - an MPEG4 encoder performed over 3 times quicker ofter being optimised for SSE2, although I'm not sure how this would relate to audio apps.
I'm certainly not Intel's biggest fan (AMD have been ahead for a while, and Intel use some pretty dodgy business tactics) but all I'm saying is that the thing has just been released, so it's too early to draw conclusions. There are pros and cons with any design of CPU - the P4 has a wider pipe for instructions or something (I'm not an expert on this shit) which means it can run at a higher clock speed, but instructions have to wait longer to be processed. In the long term, this is going to get A LOT quicker, whereas Athlon will max out at about 1.4 Ghz, so Intel will be ahead for a while until AMD bring out their next completely new design.

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Message 6/32 28-Nov-00 @ 10:02 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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T-Birds are expected at 1.5 Ghz shortly...

Have you ever stopped to wonder why a
400 mhz Pwer PC CPU performas comparably
to an 800 mhz P-III? Or why Sun
workstations still use CPUs under 500 mhz?

There's a lot more to a CPU than clock
speed. IMHO, Intel is trying to
schnooker the home market by simply
driving up the mhz/ghz number quicker
than anyone else. Which, as we all
know, doesn't necessarily equal better
performance - but most home users
probably don't know that! We'll see if
my prediction pans out...

-Craig

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Message 7/32 28-Nov-00 @ 11:21 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jasper

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I'm sold, my next pc is a tbird 800...

roll on the new year!

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Message 8/32 29-Nov-00 @ 04:29 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

volley

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CK, the P4 is an entirely new architecture. Intel is aiming for the future; as someone said, they'll be able to boost clock speeds a lot faster.

Also, the P4 has something called SS2, which essentially is bunch of new instructions permitting parallell execution of floating point instructions. If software manufacturers started using them, the P4 would look a lot better. However, AMD will also support them... =)

My humble advice today is: go for AMD Thunderbird if you want performace today, and go with AMD Duron if you want price/performance. =)

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Message 9/32 29-Nov-00 @ 05:32 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

uncle Remus

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ha.. dell and others are trying to flog off rambus P1.4's even tho rambus & intel have split and rambus is dead... remember the story about the tortoise and the hare tho !!!

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Message 10/32 29-Nov-00 @ 09:33 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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Yes I've read all about this "New Architecture", but it's just an evolution of the PIII architecture with lots of marketing spin. There is no point in boosting clock speeds faster when the architecture is over 33% less efficient running existing applications, its pure marketing nonsense. Just wait for the AMD Sledgehammer...

But the really interesting bit is who actually needs these chips. For most business and home users the current PCs are overpowered. PC sales are right down this year, why, because last year a lot of corporates replaced PCs to ensure Y2K compliance. Intel relies on everyone upgrading every 2-3 years to drive the whole process. The big question is will companies see the need to buy 2GHz chips to run office and E-Mail because if they don't then I think that the days of ever increasing PC performance may be limited by economics. Maybe if speech recognition takes off they will, but we'll have to see...

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Message 11/32 29-Nov-00 @ 10:13 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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That's exactly my point... Intel is
driving the chip market faster than the
market has a need for new hardware.

$$$ killed Rambus... It's too expensive
for the performance benefit.

And as far as Intel constantly expanding
the instruction sets... Umm, little
lesson in processor architecture:

CISC - Complex Instruction Set Computer.
Processors like Intel's are CISC
processors. There are lots of
instructions. This results in an
inefficient and complicated CPU core.

RISC - Reduced Instruction Set Computer.
These CPUs are designed with very few
instructions, but the CPU core is much
more highly optimized to execute those
few instructions very quickly.
Pipelining implementations are usually
better, and they usually outperform CISC
CPUs of equivalent clock speed. Sun's
SPARC, SGI's MIPS, and Apple/IBM's Power
PC/G3/G4 CPUs are RISC. See the pattern?

Generally, at least when I took
architecture in college, RISC designs
were considered to be far superior to
CISC designs in terms of simpler design,
better performance, easier
manufacturing, etc... It always puzzled
me that Intel kept adding new
instructions to their CPU since the
prevailing thought in the industry is to
go the opposite way. In fact, I can't
think of a single CPU in use today in
computing that isn't a RISC-type device
unless it's intended to be "Intel
Compatible"

-Craig

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Message 12/32 30-Nov-00 @ 04:48 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Volley..

I wouldnt count on the Duron there..its equivelnt would be a Celeron...I tried using a Celeron in a music pc type o' enviroment, and it sank fast. The damn thing cant even handle running winamp and an internet service at the same time. I think Intel may have marketed the Celeron towards Grandmothers sending email. Or maybe it was "Internet PCs" they were goin for..Ive found that running a DAW like i am, including 4-5 VSTi's at once, AT LEAST needs a pIII or K7..that is, if you dont want stuttering audio or crashing systems..oh yeah! my T-bird system gets here either tomorrow or Friday..I'll bet some of ya want to know how it fares for the use of Cubase or any other Softsynth related stuff...

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Message 13/32 30-Nov-00 @ 04:59 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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it's got VERY small cache the duron.

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Message 14/32 30-Nov-00 @ 05:03 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Syn

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read tomshardware.com or arstechnica.com for the lowdown on the duron, it simply spanks a celeron

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Message 15/32 30-Nov-00 @ 10:49 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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Your lesson in processor architecture is too simplistic. The cores of the Pentium Pro, Pentium II, III and 4 and the AMD K6 and Athlon are all RISC. To maintain compatability with the x86 instruction set they employ a decoder which translates x86 instructions into micro-ops and feeds them into the pipelines.

The next generation of Intel chips (Itanium) and the AMD Sledgehammer will work differently again. It is true though that the x86 compatability does limit the performance, but not that much. The clever bit is the speculative execution where the chip takes a guess at what operation will be needed and does it before it's required, all very clever stuff.

I don't think the Duron is a good buy for audio given the very low prices of Athlons. I would suspect that the Athlon's floating point performance, which determines how many plugins you can run is a lot better than the Duron's.

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Message 16/32 30-Nov-00 @ 11:26 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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actually Pentiums are not so much more expensive

p3 600 �114

p3 800 �153

athalon 800 �128

25 quid ??.... and ONLY intel chips can run in dual or more processor mode currently with win2k which when sorted out IS the way to go without doubt - now, if you can run up to 8 processors & 4gb ram.. why bother to upgrade?.. just buy more chips & ram and get more cheap p3 800's (they will be cheap next year and the next after that etc..

so mebbe it's time to 'get off' the upgrade processor/board etc cycle and start to look at adding MORE processing power as we need it to a fixed reliable system ??

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Message 17/32 30-Nov-00 @ 11:45 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Syn, maybe the Duron does spank it, but then again, doesnt AMD jus spank Intel? ; )

anywho, The Duron is SUPPOSED to market against the Celeron..it cant help if its 100x better.

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Message 18/32 01-Dec-00 @ 06:58 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Syn

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lol @jimmy
I agree!
lol @ ck *joking :-)*
the durons fpu is exactly the same as the athlons only the on die cache is smaller and runs at chip speed like the celerons, man when i get some money i am going to build a new computer (out of a duron) and make all your intel boxes bend over and take it up the *ss! (with my 256 megs of ram it will hurt plenty good) hahahahhah i am crazy today

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Message 19/32 01-Dec-00 @ 03:07 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jasper

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Jimmy, which celeron would that be exactly? I have no problems like you mentioned with mine. (500mhz).

I aint disagreeing with your point, but considering k tests audio apps with a 200mhx pro.. you seriously think a celeron is worse?

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Message 20/32 01-Dec-00 @ 06:07 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

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hehe - exactly... but whilst the durons are cheap, i STILL think you consider a p3 tho, they are 500 quid now for a basic 800 machine and at least you have the option to go multi-cpu in future with another p3 & a board change.

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Message 21/32 01-Dec-00 @ 07:00 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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True, my lesson is simplistic... It's
also not really my area of expertise,
but the additional decoding logic and
the fact that single instructions must
be broken down and pipelined make things
more complex and thus slower.

Anyway, I just wanted to make the point
that adding new instructions to a CPU
does not really equal better performance.

-Craig

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Message 22/32 02-Dec-00 @ 12:14 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Yo Jasper...I was havin problems with a 566 mhz Celeron..as a matter of fact, im on it now. It wasnt that it couldnt handle cubase, it was that it kept on dropping and stuttering audio, or softsynth play..but then again, if yours works, then keep on doin it..dont fix it if it aint broke..and K..while the p3's may be cheap, the k7's are cheaper ; )

On a side note, i jus got and assembled my amd T-bird 700 mhz box today. Boy oh boy, it kicks the crap outta my old k6/2 500 mhz system. I truly think that I can make music without swearing or beating the PC anymore. Also, i was running the standalone version of Pro-52, and i ran the latency down to 10ms..without ASIO drivers..jus the regular ol onboard audio...how is this possible? someone tell me please...

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Message 23/32 02-Dec-00 @ 01:22 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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Which motherboard did you use for that box?

-Craig

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Message 24/32 02-Dec-00 @ 08:23 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Believe it or not, this is an ECS mobo..

Ive heard that ECS isnt the most reliabe of mobo's, but this one seems to accept anything ive put in there. its a K7ASA if you're curious bout the model number..I plan to go with with one of them Asus Slot A boards soon, as ive heard good things bout them. anyone know of any sound cards that i should avoid with my t-bird/athlon? im tring to look for the best, cheapest solution ; )

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Message 25/32 03-Dec-00 @ 01:05 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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Event and Lexicon say their cards definately won't work.

-Craig

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Message 26/32 03-Dec-00 @ 06:18 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Thanks for the heads up craig..think ill scratch those from the list..Event is the same is echo isnt it?

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Message 27/32 04-Dec-00 @ 05:23 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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Yup. Can't keep track of it all these
days y'dig?

-Craig

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Message 28/32 04-Dec-00 @ 09:27 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Word...that leaves me with what cards? I ultimately wanted to get an Event..or a Core 2..any suggestions?

Jimmy

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Message 29/32 04-Dec-00 @ 10:13 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

99devils

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Try Midiman/M-Audio, or Frontier if
you're looking for digital I/O

-Craig

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Message 30/32 06-Dec-00 @ 10:02 PM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Blunted

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wow, funny how you people just love AMD! Pretty cool, considering I work for them n all......I guess I better get back to work on sledghammer!!

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Message 31/32 07-Dec-00 @ 04:30 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Jimmy

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Yeah, i heard that sledgehammer is gonna do some serious whuppin..

K8?

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Message 32/32 07-Dec-00 @ 08:19 AM - RE: Pentium 4 1.5GHz slower than an Athlon 1GHz!

Blunted

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