PII vs PIII

"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote in message
...

It looks like the machine I have (an HP Kayak XAS, you may have seen me
mention it already) can be upgraded from a PII 400MHz to dual PIII 600MHz.
But the PIII's are substantially more expensive than the PII's, around $70
each compared to $10 each.

I guess I'm not that excited about a 50% increase in clock rate, by
itself. But is there a great advantage just in going from a PII to a PIII
with a comparable clock speed? Would I get substantially more computing
for the money?

No advantage at all with today's software, save your money towards a P4
or Athlon system. One other alternative if you have a lot of sdram memory
already is to go for a 1.4 gig celeron and a motherboard that takes Sdram.
Should be able to put a quality system together for under 150 that way.

Lane

On Fri, 10 Oct 2003 15:22:34 +0000 (UTC), Gregory L. Hansen wrote:

It looks like the machine I have (an HP Kayak XAS, you may have seen me
mention it already) can be upgraded from a PII 400MHz to dual PIII 600MHz.
But the PIII's are substantially more expensive than the PII's, around $70
each compared to $10 each.

I guess I'm not that excited about a 50% increase in clock rate, by
itself. But is there a great advantage just in going from a PII to a PIII
with a comparable clock speed? Would I get substantially more computing
for the money?

The P-III has more multimedia instructions, so it's a win if you're doing
multimedia applications (graphics, movies, etc.).

--
-- Skylar Thompson )
-- http://os2.dhs.org/~skylar/

On Fri, 10 Oct 2003 15:22:34 +0000 (UTC),
(Gregory L. Hansen) wrote:


It looks like the machine I have (an HP Kayak XAS, you may have seen me
mention it already) can be upgraded from a PII 400MHz to dual PIII 600MHz.
But the PIII's are substantially more expensive than the PII's, around $70
each compared to $10 each.

I guess I'm not that excited about a 50% increase in clock rate, by
itself. But is there a great advantage just in going from a PII to a PIII
with a comparable clock speed? Would I get substantially more computing
for the money?

If it will accept a standard motherboard, you'd get better, more cost
effect results upgrading the motherboard, running a single Tualatin,
Athlon, or P4 CPU.


Dave

"Steve Wolfe" wrote in message
...
No advantage at all with today's software, save your money towards a
P4
or Athlon system. One other alternative if you have a lot of sdram
memory
already is to go for a 1.4 gig celeron and a motherboard that takes
Sdram.
Should be able to put a quality system together for under 150 that way.

But once you've used a dual-processer system, it's hard to go back. ; )

nonsense deleted snip

steve


nonsense

So your trying to tell me that dual 600 system is better than a single 1.4
gig system when every benchmark in the world shows a huge gap between the
two. When every game plays twice as fast on the celeron, when photoshop,
excel, word, music software etc perform at least 40 to 60 percent better
maybe even more. Do you have anything at all that would back up what you
just said.

Lane

"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Trevor Hemsley wrote:
On Fri, 10 Oct 2003 17:34:03 UTC in comp.os.linux.hardware,
(Gregory L. Hansen) wrote:

There's a wide range of prices, so I tried to generalize, and I was
looking specifically at PIII 600MHz 512 cache. I was thinking
especially
of a matched pair I saw for something over $100, although they had 256K
cache.

The fact that the top speed for this board is 600MHz leads me to think
that it will only work with the "Katmai" flavour of P-III not with its
successor the "coppermine". The Coppermine was the one where they
halved the amount of L2 cache on the basis that they made it full
speed at the same time. These chips require a lower core voltage than
the Katmai ones and some motherboards don't have voltage regulators
that are capable of supplying the correct one. So, if it says top
speed is 600MHz they probably mean that you're limited to the older,
512KB cache, P-III's.

I didn't realize there was such a difference between a PIII 600MHz 512K
cache and a PIII 600MHz 256K cache. Are all PIIIs with 512K Katmais, and
all PIIIs with 256K coppermines?

Yep. Default core voltage for Katmai is 2.0v and for early coppermine 1.7v.

When I asked about the VRM, I was told the part number 0950-2837 was for
any PII/PIII up to 600MHz, and they specifically said it's not for
"coppermine". I've asked if the machine would support a faster PIII if a
different VRM were installed, but haven't gotten an answer yet, and I'm
beginning to wonder if I will. I think the motherboard has the 440BX
chipset, if that makes a difference, but I know it also matters which
motherboard the chipset is sitting on. And maybe a BIOS upgrade, which HP

may or may not have, and which I've never done.

Some BX boards handle coppermines fine. I have three BXs here running
coppermine CPUs. Some boards require a BIOS upgrade to enable the lower
vcore/different instuction set/microcode, some boards just can't handle
coppermines.

The more I learn about this, the more it all gets complicated by little
bits of information like what you've just said above.

It's all good fun though. I have several clone machines that started life as
PII350s that I got cheaply at auction and now are running various CPUs. The
best of them is a machine I am running as an internet gateway/file server on
our home LAN. It has a coppermine celeron 600 running at 927MHz with just a
slight core voltage increase running in a slightly modified 'slocket' with
standard heatsink. It benchmarks better than a PIII850. A bit af a waste of
a CPU really, the only difference I notice between it and the PII350 it
originally had is SETI work units are done in less than 10 hours now when
they took 18+ hours with the PII. My main machine is an Athlon XP 2200+
(1800MHz) that does work units in 4 hours.

As I said, it's all good fun.
--
~misfit~


---
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On Fri, 10 Oct 2003 18:31:51 UTC in comp.os.linux.hardware,
(Gregory L. Hansen) wrote:

Are all PIIIs with 512K Katmais, and
all PIIIs with 256K coppermines?

I think all P-II and P-III processors prior to coppermine had 512KB,
half speed cache.

beginning to wonder if I will. I think the motherboard has the 440BX
chipset, if that makes a difference

One of the better Intel chipsets.

--
Trevor Hemsley, Brighton, UK.

In article ,
Lane Lewis wrote:

"Steve Wolfe" wrote in message
...
No advantage at all with today's software, save your money towards a
P4
or Athlon system. One other alternative if you have a lot of sdram
memory
already is to go for a 1.4 gig celeron and a motherboard that takes
Sdram.
Should be able to put a quality system together for under 150 that way.

But once you've used a dual-processer system, it's hard to go back. ; )

nonsense deleted snip

steve


nonsense

So your trying to tell me that dual 600 system is better than a single 1.4
gig system when every benchmark in the world shows a huge gap between the
two. When every game plays twice as fast on the celeron, when photoshop,
excel, word, music software etc perform at least 40 to 60 percent better
maybe even more. Do you have anything at all that would back up what you
just said.

You must have missed the part where he said he wasn't going to play 3D
games with it.

I understand what he's saying about it. Try doing something in NT while
another program is loading, for instance. The mouse pointer jumps around,
things get choppy. A dual processor machine might not be faster, but you
don't get that sort of business because there's a second processor to
handle the GUI while the other handles interrupts. And I actually
wouldn't be surprised if the dual 600MHz *is* faster than the single 1.4
GHz if your benchmark involves doing more than one thing at a time.

--
"Is that plutonium on your gums?"
"Shut up and kiss me!"
-- Marge and Homer Simpson

"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Lane Lewis wrote:

"Steve Wolfe" wrote in message
...
No advantage at all with today's software, save your money
towards a
P4
or Athlon system. One other alternative if you have a lot of sdram
memory
already is to go for a 1.4 gig celeron and a motherboard that takes
Sdram.
Should be able to put a quality system together for under 150 that
way.

But once you've used a dual-processer system, it's hard to go back.
; )

nonsense deleted snip

steve


nonsense

So your trying to tell me that dual 600 system is better than a single
1.4
gig system when every benchmark in the world shows a huge gap between the
two. When every game plays twice as fast on the celeron, when photoshop,
excel, word, music software etc perform at least 40 to 60 percent better
maybe even more. Do you have anything at all that would back up what you
just said.

You must have missed the part where he said he wasn't going to play 3D
games with it.

I understand what he's saying about it. Try doing something in NT while
another program is loading, for instance. The mouse pointer jumps around,
things get choppy. A dual processor machine might not be faster, but you
don't get that sort of business because there's a second processor to
handle the GUI while the other handles interrupts. And I actually
wouldn't be surprised if the dual 600MHz *is* faster than the single 1.4
GHz if your benchmark involves doing more than one thing at a time.


And more nonsense
Again do you have anything that shows that they are even remotely close
in benchmarks even while multitasking. Dual machines make good servers and
ok single app workstations but they are terrible desktop machines. The vast
majority of software is designed for single processors and are virtually
worthless on a dual machine and it's getting worse every day as software
developers code for the P4 single CPU. To sit there and wait for a program
that can't take advantage of the extra CPU doesn't make any sense with
today's prices. One thing that should be mentioned is the overhead that a
dual system has compared to single CPU which practically negates any
advantage.

Lane

So your trying to tell me that dual 600 system is better than a single 1.4
gig system when every benchmark in the world shows a huge gap between
the
two.

You're missing the point. I'm not talking about benchmarks. I'm talking
about usability.

Have YOU used a dual-CPU desktop? I didn't think so. Now go back home
and play with your toys.

steve

And more nonsense
Again do you have anything that shows that they are even remotely
close
in benchmarks even while multitasking. Dual machines make good servers
and
ok single app workstations but they are terrible desktop machines.

Please, tell me how many dual CPU systems you use as desktops. I've got
quite a few here. I'll bet you're talking out of your butt.

The vast
majority of software is designed for single processors and are virtually
worthless on a dual machine and it's getting worse every day as software
developers code for the P4 single CPU.

Hahahahahaha! You don't have a clue how many things are actually vying
for CPU time, do you? And you don't have a clue about interrupts, do you?

To sit there and wait for a program
that can't take advantage of the extra CPU doesn't make any sense with
today's prices.

You're telling me that when you run X, and you have the X server trying
to get CPU time, your app trying to get CPU time, your kernel using CPU
time for disk I/O, your kernel using CPU time for network I/O, and quite a
few others, that one CPU is going to get left idle? Like I said, you've
never used a dual-CPU desktop, have you? Go home and play with your toys.

steve